Fallout 4

Before Fallout 4 I'd never played a game from this acclaimed franchise before, and now that I have, I totally understand why people call it "Elder Scrolls with guns"! This is one of the those games where you go in expecting to blow through the story but then end up getting side tracked on loads of side missions for hours on end... Until you finally release that you've made absolutely no progress! But what can I say, Bethesda's levelling up system is really sharp and their side quests were often meaty (unless you do the Minute Men missions, they're pretty lame). The combat system in this game really took me out on quite a learning curve at first! I sucked at using V.A.T.S. and opt'd for guns a blazing approach which turned out to be quite a challenge! But as I'd begun to level up and refine my perception and agility (and find better weapons) V.A.T.S. became my preferred style of killing s***, not only are you able to conserve more bullets but the slow-mo is friggin badass!!! Speaking of which, conservation is key in this game! Every bullet counts and every item you collect must be considered. This was frustrating at first because I was always running out of ammo or carrying to much s***! But again; once you hone your skills and level up these problems become increasing less traumatic.

So, if you're not familiar with Fallout's premise you're basically a survivor of a "nuclear fallout" and you awaken in a wasteland (a.k.a Boston Massachusetts... which is basically a wasteland to begin with am I right! :P) after being frozen for 200 years and having your child kidnapped. The first few set pieces in the game are exhilarating (like when the nukes go off and you're booking it to the vault with your family), being about 20+ hours in now I can't really say that things are quite as exciting as the first hour or so... Still, there's a lot to appreciate here. And by lots I mean, a s*** ton of side stories, characters, and lore... For those who are interested anyway, there weren't any questlines I found that really had anything interesting to say in terms of the narrative! I've yet to really meet any characters with a strong personality, most of the VA and dialogue in Fallout 4 is pretty meh... Not bad.... But meh.... And the main story is pretty derivative as well (finding your kidnapped son), I did however love the sub-plot detailing the "underground railway" system used to free the Synths (i.e. robots) from their masters (the nefarious Institute!).

The world of Fallout 4 is gorgeous, even if the graphics aren't what people were expecting, the world itself is highly detailed and beautiful. Bethesda actually included a s*** ton of real life landmarks from Boston into this game (post-nuke versions anyway...). The wasted urban areas are a delight to explore and the "Glowing Sea" area in the game (the impact region of the nuke) is absolutely ominous with radiation storms and terrifying mutants galore! I really didn't care for the Sims-esque settlement building meta-game; I thought that it was poorly explained, unnecessarily time consuming, and kinda pointless since my settlements never did get attacked by anyone.... But oh well, I just ignore that part, I'm too busy getting tie'd up in the game's web of side quests, exploration, and levelly up to give a damn!

My time with Fallout 4 was overall positive, however; through the lack of any compelling narratives and repetitive game-play this thing never really connected with me too much sadly.