A half baked, confused mess.
PC version reviewed.
Fallout 76 is a game published and developed by Bethesda Softworks for the Playstation 4, Xbox One and PC.
Hampered by boggling design decisions I'm not sure I've played such a strange game with such little idea of what it's trying to be.
The Bethesda launcher made specifically for this game is pretty awful. From uninstalling the game for some people to claiming it needs to be installed despite already being on your system. This could have been avoided by launching on Steam, like all other Bethesda games however it seems most likely that Bethesda wanted to do it on their own to avoid paying Valve a 30% cut for sales. If their own launcher wasn't in such a sorry state maybe I wouldn't even have mentioned it but it is poor form.
GAMEPLAY
Lack of push to talk or text chat. I've heard the reason for the absence of these options was for immersion, because hearing the feedback of someones computer fans, keyboard or in game sound sure makes it seem more realistic. Why they couldn't have a text chat system via the Pip-boy is just a weird decision, you can see your own health and action points, one NPC even mentions how they can see what you're doing but a simple chat system from within the Pip-boy apparently isn't allowed.
No single player or private server option, even if you just play solo all the time however the bigger problem is that there is no server select or ability to select what kind of server you want to be on. Instead of having PvP servers, PvE servers or even role playing servers they are all just shoved into the same world without a choice. I can only assume Bethesda went this route because they wanted encounters with other players to be like DayZ or Rust where coming across another player can means you become friends or enemies.
With only 24 people on a server you may not even run across others that often and even when you do people won't bother attacking you because PvP is so heavily punished, only being effective if both players engage. Even if you do get defeated by another player all they can do is take your scrap and gain a bounty themselves. There is so little reason to partake in PvP that it fails in every way really, losing out on the possible tension from encounters like in other survival games and also just serving a purpose of slightly annoying players who just want to PvE. Why there are not servers dedicated to either type of play style is just a brainless idea.
Bizarrely, despite supposedly being about rebuilding the wasteland together this game actually lacks behind Fallout 4, with the size of any base you want to build dramatically reduced to essentially being able to build a small camp. I thought the whole end game would be designing massive settlements for you to both show and share with friends and other players, instead it's hardly worth the bother. The other major problem with base building is that bases are tied to the player who built them, so not only can friends only interact with them while you are on but if someone else joins the server and has their camp saved in the same place as yours the camp disappears. Just giving players some kind of alert, or not putting players with the same camp location on the same server would have been enough to mitigate this but instead in its current state it's a frustrating disaster.
Plenty of bugs that reek of Bethesda's lack of multiplayer experience. Most especially I can think of numerous quests where you are tasked with killing a certain creature only to arrive at the destination to find someone else has already killed it, meaning you have to server hop until you find a server where someone hasn't recently done it. Another massive problematic bug is where you have phantom weight, where you pick an item up and it's weight is added to your inventory however you cannot find or use the item. With already limited inventory space this is a really nasty and common bug.
Exploration, something I really loved piling up hundreds of hours worth of doing so in previous games is still a thing in 76. It's not nearly as good as 4 or Skyrim but is still serviceable. Most locations seem pretty dull and without the engaging stories and mysteries you would have seen in other Bethesda games made worse by if you take too many items your stash will be full meaning you just end up managing your inventory and with crafting requiring more materials than FO4 it really makes things frustrating and into a chore. Some locations do look cool though and can be interesting to snoop around or take in.
Gathering junk isn't nearly as fulfilling as it was in FO4 either, where I knew I was going to be able to repair weapons or build up one of my many settlements, however as mentioned things that required less to repair now cost more than in FO4, in fact with many weapons it actually costs more to repair than to craft a new one. The other major part of collecting junk is to build your camp, however with how easily destroyed or dismantled it is as well as how limited the building of it can be, usually just a small house, is so lacking in comparison to the massive settlements in FO4 that I not only question the point of it but am also left to wonder why it exists in this form. I assumed the end game would be building massive settlements to show and share with friends but that just isn't possible.
Talking of lacking in comparison to FO4, the combat also manages to achieve this. Plenty of hits you should be getting in miraculously don't hit your targets because of problems like server lag. Then even when you do hit some enemies the only challenge to them is how much of a bullet sponge they are anyway.
Mutations are something I'm surprised hadn't been in Fallout before, deciding whether you want the benefits of some of them in spite of the fall backs is a nice addition. There's a lot of potential to take this idea further too I feel, where you could end up mutating into a Ghoul or a Super Mutant with enough of the correct mutations.
STORY
Quests as a whole are almost all dull, relying on just going between terminals or listening to holotapes that don't seem to play properly when you pick them up, instead just making a static noise, meaning you have to go into your inventory, stop them playing and then restart them so they actually start the content, rather than just whirring. You don't have to do that in Fallout 4, so hopefully it's a bug because if that is a genuine design choice I can't even fathom the thinking behind it. Anyway, if you're not listening to holotapes you're doing some laborious mission going from A to B, picking up bottles, repairing things or at best shooting things that require such little effort it doesn't feel very different. There's just so little in the way of encouraging you to actually get engaged.
The whole narrative is done in the breadcrumb style where you're left piecing together what happened, in this case it is almost always the Scorch with a small chance of Raiders, who by the way are all dead now anyway. The only interaction you have with NPCs might as well just be terminals or holotapes anyway because all they do is relay quest info to you. You're never given the option to question the motives of those who give you missions and you'll never come across choices like in previous Bethesda games where you find out you may be working for the wrong side, or your target has a reasonable story. You're always just expected to go along and do whatever monotonous task you've been told.
This kind of breadcrumb story can be done well, just look at games like Bloodborne that have minimum interactions with NPCs and share a lot of story through notes, the environment or small titbits from other characters.
Being able to join any faction at the same time is such wasted potential. You can be a part of both the Brotherhood of Steel and the Enclave, despite them being major enemies. Imagine if PvP was actually based on faction, so you would only be able to battle people in opposing factions, meeting other players could still have that tension from other survival games while not being the mess it is in this one. You could not represent any faction and be safe from the Brotherhood of Steel but if you're in the Enclave then war will ensure between you both.
GRAPHICS
A lot of performance issues, easy to dip below 30 FPS, some very rough textures in places, not sure if it was just something on my end but some items and clothing actually looked worse than their Fallout 4 counterparts.
The world itself does look decent as well as the lighting, especially in the mire zone. The actual map itself is probably an upgrade on any game in the series before it. It's just a shame that it is so lacking in content, life or activity.
Some of the monster designs are actually kind of interesting but are ruined by the absolutely woeful AI. I know Bethesda games have never been acclaimed for good AI but it really is bad in 76. If they aren't snapping into position within one frame or hiding in front of trees attempting to take cover they're running off or just standing still because they either can't hit you or just can't figure out how to.
SOUND
The soundtrack is decent, about the same quality as the previous games in the series.
VALUE FOR MONEY
Outrageous launch price, should have been at least around half the price it was to start with. Having a fully functioning micro transaction store on top is a bit insulting, even if it is just cosmetics.
OVERALL
The best way to sum up Fallout 76 is that it lacks any real identity or direction. It just doesn't know what it wants to be. I've heard people asking the question of who this game is for and I think the answer is Bethesda themselves. They had so many ideas on what to do with this game and just threw them all in and sent it out to see what people would think because it's basically one big experiment. If it wants a successful future I feel it will probably be shaped by the community because Bethesda don't really seem to know what they wanted to do with this game expect test things out.
Despite being a big Bethesda fan the sad reality is that this game isn't very good. It has a few interesting ideas at best but needs serious work to be considered even decent. In its current form I cannot recommend it.
