It has obviously not escaped anyone who uses social networks a minimum: Fallout 4 is available since November 10, 2015! It would obviously have been wrong to release a preview on this game without real experience on it, so it's a little over a week later and with more than 30 hours of play that we offer you this preview. it really hit or should it go its way? You will find out!
Small clarification: the preview will not contain any spoiler on the story.
What is a Fallout?
To briefly introduce what a Fallout is, this is a RPG only taking place in a contemporary universe post-apocalyptic, usually several hundred years after nuclear disasters. With your character, you will be able to make your own adventure in a open world where you will have many choices (around a slightly more linear main quest) which will be available to you and which will influence the course of the game. Note that this will take you at least one hundred hours if you really invest a lot and do all the side quests. You can do it all accompanied by a magnificent original soundtrack in vintage style which goes very well.
In short, that's it.
Another escape from the shelter?
In case you want 100% non-spoiler, the context is spoiled. It's only the first 10 minutes of play that will just put you in context.
Spoiler of the first 10 minutes
Unlike Fallout 3, you're not going to play as a character who was born in a shelter and will seek to escape there after his father leaves. In Fallout 4, you'll start in your lovely little borough where everyone is happy and the birds are singing, except it won't last long.
Obviously, you will start your adventure with create your character, a father or a mother (your choice). You have a child, Shaun, who is still a baby. Not even 10 minutes later, a news flash will air on your television, alerting that nuclear bombs have been dropped in various places. Barely later, the siren sounds, panic takes over the neighborhood, and you flee with your husband / wife and baby to a shelter that you were introduced to shortly before. As you descend into the shelter, a missile explodes in the distance and you narrowly avoid, as in a good big American blockbuster, the nuclear explosion.
Without going into much more detail, you are going to get cryonically frozen, then wake up much later, you will see helplessly Shaun, your baby, being kidnapped, and your other half killed while trying to keep him. It will then be time to take another frosty nap to wake you up later. You will understand, your objective will be to find Shaun.
I won't go any further in the story, this is what will happen in your first 10-15 minutes of play! In any case, the main story is quite nice and interesting, rather varied in terms of the objectives to be achieved. The side quests can sometimes be repetitive, especially in the different factions where it will often be in the mode "there are bad guys, go kill them - we kill them - thank you, here is another place with lots of bad guys, go kill them - ... ".
And in terms of gameplay?
On this point, there is a choice! You will have a lot of choices to have the style of play you want. Thus, you will be able to be a melee warrior, the stealth assassin, the machine gun nag, the sniper, etc., in particular thanks to a wide range of weapons of all kinds but also with the talents which will make you someone from ...? Someone of ... ?! Rhoo ... SPECIAL! At the start of the game, you can distribute points among 7 categories:
- Strength : melee damage and weight you can carry in your inventory
- Perception : weapon precision in SVAV mode
- Endurance : health and action gauge (for sprinting and SVAV)
- Charisma : ability to seduce and convince
- Intelligence : mental acuity and number of experience points you gain
- Agility : number of action points and stealth
- Luck : general good fortune and critical hits
Afterwards, these categories will determine which talents you can unlock since they will all require a certain level but also a certain degree in the above categories (you can further increase them later). Thus, if you want to specialize in terminal hacking, intelligence will be important, if you want to have bonuses for haggling, charisma will be required, etc.
Like all Fallout, you will have your Pip-Boy, small computer that you wear like a watch, and where you will have all the information, namely: character status, inventory, list of quests, world map and radio. In a guide, we also tell you how you can link it to a official Pip-Boy mobile app.
We talked about it above, the SVAV. What is that ? This is a specialty of Fallout, it is a mode where in combat you can shoot more precisely at an enemy, in particular to cause him more damage. In Fallout 4 it has been improved with more precision and it no longer totally stops time as it did in Fallout 3. Here it will slow it down enormously, leaving the possibility of waiting before shooting, for why not have for example a better visibility and a better rate of chance to hit.
Finally, you can have companions who will accompany you (one at a time at most) and help in your adventures if you wish. Having them by your side will allow you to influence your relationship, which will give you access to dialogues to learn more or even unlock side quests.
Do we really have a choice?
If you've played Fallout 3, you know that you have real choices in play that really impact the world around you. Without going into details, you can for example by choosing to join a faction totally explode a city, which had its share of NPCs, quests, merchants, etc. Does Fallout 4 also offer such choices?
Well of what I have been able to go through, not really that big. Perhaps there will be some in the sixty or so hours I have left to play, but until then no. Warning, we still have a say in a lot of situations. I suddenly had to help someone reach someone else (to kill that someone else), and once they arrived, the latter explained to me the why and how and I personally thought the best decision was to rally on his side, so I had to kill this someone. You understood ?
It's pretty ? Is the world okay?
Yes, rather pretty. It doesn't quite come close to a bunch of recent games, but roaming the sorry world of Fallout 4 is still enjoyable. It is Complete enough, there are many places to visit. If you have to walk to a remote location, don't expect to be able to do it quietly in "auto advance" mode, you will almost certainly come across obstacles (monsters coming out of underground, ambushes, etc. .). It's not bad, it will allow you to progress faster!
Obviously, once a place discovered, you can go there move automatically, useful enough for long trips. Here are some screenshots to give you an idea:
Note that you can install mods on Fallout 4 and that you can therefore add content but also improve the graphics. We should bring you a guide on this point soon.
Anything else to add?
Yes, just one! The game offers you a housing / colony system. Anywhere you have a Workshop nearby (see screenshot below) you will be able to craft things. In short, you can build your own home (with ready-made cabins or yourself wall by wall), put furniture, decorations, electricity, in short a good home.
It will even be possible to push even further: in particular, we can manage the space to accommodate colonists, produce resources, sell and make capsules (money), etc. We will come back to this system shortly in a dedicated guide.
In conclusion !
I'm not going to hide it, and you probably must have read it all over the place, it's not as good overall as the third opus, but remains a very good game all the same! The big concern is that we will compare it to its predecessor and it will fail on certain points. The game itself remains very good, I spend all my free time playing it! I highly recommend it !
- Universe always so exotic and realistic
- Even more advanced progression and action system
- Always awesome vintage soundtrack
- Huge lifespan
- Exploration that always has its share of surprises
- Interesting and optional colony / housing system
- Graphics that could have been better
- Sometimes too linear quests
- AI which often remains unrealistic
Do not hesitate to tell us your opinion, too!
