Fallout 76 review

Intro

Fallout 76 is the latest entry in the Fallout-series, but the first Fallout game for me. It’s also the first Fallout game which requires a constant internet connection because you play in a world with a maximum of 23 other players. This was the main reason for me to give this game a go. I was looking for a PvE (Player versus Environment) game to play with some friends and this game was on a lot of charts and pretty low-budget.

Story

Fallout 76 takes place in 2102, twenty-five years after a nuclear war that devastated the Earth. You’re a resident of Vault 76, a fallout shelter that was built in West Virginia to house America’s best and brightest minds as part of a plan to re-colonize the Wasteland. The starts at the point where you leave the vault as a level 1 rookie without any armor or weapons. Talking about good preparation…

Quests

When I started the game, the free DLC Wastelanders was just released so main quests and side quests immediately mixed up when I left the vault. And there are a LOT of quests in this game.

One thing to note about questing, a major setback for me, is that despite of playing online with others (possibly in teams), all quests need to be completed individually. So if you’ve teamed up with a friend, both of you need to talk to someone or perform a certain action to start, progress or complete a quest. No splitting the tasks.

The only benefit of playing together is that you can slay the enemies together and fast travel for free to each other. And fast traveling is something you will be doing a lot, even though it costs you caps (in-game currency), because the majority of the quests require you to go all the way to the other side of the map to collect some stuff or kill some enemies.

And here’s something else about these quests: when you’re done and reporting back to complete a quest there always is a follow-up quest. Completed that quest too? There’s a next one, and a next one, and a next one… At some point, I had no clue what I was doing and was just trying to shorten the quest list. Then I found out there were also daily quests reappearing every day…

To sum up my story experience: only now when reading Wikipedia to freshen up my memory I’m starting to understand what I’ve been doing these 250+ hours I put into this game.

Story rating: 5

Gameplay

Paywall

Every game nowadays has an in-game shop offering stuff to spice up your gaming experience for real life money. Most of the time, these are cosmetic items like some nice cloths or another look for your house. They give no benefit while playing the game.

Well, Bethesda as publisher of the Fallout games thought differently. Apparently, the game directors had dollar signs in their eyes when developing Fallout 76 because they do everything to make you spend your hard earned money in this game. Here are some examples:

• There is a (far to small) limit to the amount of items you can store in your camp. Most of these items are “scrap” used for creating stuff like armor, weapons and ammo. This limit has a significant impact on the way you play the game because when you’ve reached that limit, you need to choose what items to keep and what items to drop. And since you keep finding new items, you’re constantly managing your stash. Want to increase the limit? Pay up!
• As said earlier, you will need to fast travel a lot through the world which costs in-game currency. A paid subscription supplies you with a “mobile camp” which you can place anywhere providing a free fast travel point.
• You can build your own camp quite extensively, but at some point your “camp budget” is full. You can’t build any further. Want to lift the budget? Pay up!
• Most food decays over time. There’s a refrigerator available in the in-game shop slowing the decay time with 50%. The real life price for this is around 7 euros.

The first three points describe the monthly subscription service called Fallout 1st with a price of € 14,99 per month. Crazy people.

Survival

Survival is the core element of Fallout 76. You constantly need to eat, drink and manage your radiation level. At the start of the game, this can be challenging. Thanks to the nuclear war 25 years ago, all food and water you find is radiated and should be cooked before consumption. Otherwise, you get food poisoning or other diseases decreasing your health. And even after cooking, your radiation level still increases after consumption so you need to counter that with medicines.

Camping

What is survival without the ability to build a shelter? You need to have a safe place when a nuclear storm approaches. Also, you’ll be crafting and cooking a lot so you’ll want a nice spot for your workbenches. A little water in the vicinity would be nice so you can place a few water purifiers.

Building

To start building a camp you need to place your CAMP module which will automatically mark a perimeter around it in which you can build. This can be a bit of a hassle because if your perimeter doesn’t cover some water, you can’t build in the water (e.g. purifiers). And if you’re in a popular spot (like the river near the start of the game), there might be some overlap with other players’ camps preventing you from placing your camp.

When you’ve chosen a spot, the building can start. With the materials/scrap you’ve collected you can craft different types of workbenches, floors, walls, etc. Your imagination is the limit. From small cabins to luxurious villas, it’s all possible. Although you need to spend some real life money if you want to get rid of the camp budget and display the better looking furniture.

Here are some examples of very creative players.

Your camp can not be placed

Your camp only exists in the world when you’re online. So when you’re offline, your camp is gone allowing other players to place their camp in the exact same spot. If you’ve built your camp in a popular area (like we did), you’ll often get the message when logging in that your camp could not be placed and you’re given the option to search for a new world or replace your camp for free (forcing you to rebuild it). Since me and my friends wanted to player together in the same world we often had to search for a new world multiple times.

Combat

The world of Fallout (called Appalachia by the way) is filled with monsters varying from zombie-like creatures (Scorched) to dragons (Scorchbeasts) so you’d better bring a big gun or ski sword (yes, a sword made of a ski) with you when roaming the world. Fallout 76 has a large variety of weapons and the shooting feels pretty good. Melee weapons on the contrary have the same problem as the other Bethesda games (Oblivion, Skyrim, etc.): there’s no sense of hitting anything, you just keep slashing air hoping you’re hitting the enemy.

Melee weapons have one big advantage over guns: they don’t use any ammo. Depending on the gun you prefer, ammo can be very valuable at the start of the game.

Talking of valuable, one of the coolest things in Fallout 76 is the power armor.

You really feel badass wearing this thing, especially when equipped with a jetpack and a heavy gun. Power armors can be found on certain locations in the world and can be equipped with different parts depending on your level. Of course, spending real life money can make it look even cooler.

You can sustain more damage when wearing one, prevent falling damage (jumping from buildings and mountain cliffs is fun!) and protect you from radiation. What’s the catch? They need fusion cores as fuel which are pretty hard to get. However, later on in the game when you’ve collected some caps, you can buy them from other players.

Perks

You gain experience points for everything you do: collecting, crafting, building, killing, everything. When enough XP is earned, you grow a level and unlock a new S.P.E.C.I.A.L. attribute point and a perk card to assign to one of the SPECIAL categories. Sounds complicated? It is complicated.

SPECIAL stands for the categories Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility and Luck. Every category has a set of cards which you unlock when leveling up and it’s up to you which cards you assign to each category. Cards can be swapped at any time.

This creates a very flexible skill system enabling a lot of different play styles. If you’re charge recklessly into battle type, you’d be wise to equip cards for extra health and damage with close range guns or melee weapons. If you’re more of a sniper, health is less important and damage with high range weapons more important than melee weapons. There’s a special (get it?) website dedicated to all kinds of these “character builds”.

Music

I’d like to dedicate a small part of this review to the music instruments in this game. It’s a small and rather out of place part of the game that shows the love the developers put into this game despite trying to rob you of your money. Various types of guitars, pianos and drums are scattered throughout the world and can be played in harmony by multiple players.

When interacting with an instrument your characters starts playing it. If there’s another instrument nearby, another player can interact with it and will start playing that instrument. What’s cool here, is that there are several tunes per instrument so it sounds different each time. And what’s even cooler, is that when multiple instruments are played at the same time, there always is a perfect harmony creating a positive vibe between the players.

The playing of an instrument for 30 seconds or longer will give the player a temporary stamina regeneration buff.

Gameplay rating: 6.5

Graphics

The general tone and feeling of Fallout 76 is pale and gloomy but it still manages to squeeze out some amazing vistas. There are a lot of details in the world but up close the visuals can be a little rough. The NPCs also don’t deserve the spotlights. They don’t show much emotion and are rather stiff.

Graphics rating: 6.5

Audio

The title screen and background music are decent and emphasize the desolate and gloomy feeling of the game. Sound effects are al right and feel similar to other Bethesda games. The voice acting is mostly cumbersome, but some features like the Appalachia radio and the music instruments really stand out and are fun to listen to.

Audio rating: 7

Memorable

It’s been a while since I played this game and when I recall the game world the main feeling is desolation. The grim and moody setting of this game is what makes it memorable in my opinion. I haven’t played any of the previous Fallout games so maybe my opinion would change if I had.

Also, the fact that you share the world with other players and everyone can build their own camps adds to the survival setting.

Memorable rating: 8

Value for money

This part would probably score very low when judged at game launch but nowadays, this game costs around € 10,-. Despite the flaws of this game and all the efforts Bethesda puts into forcing you to give them more money, Fallout 76 really offers a lot of decent gameplay for those 10 euros.

Conclusion

Fallout 76 really is mix of highs and lows and depending on who you ask, the highs or lows predominates. The internet’s general opinion on Fallout 76 is negative, but it kept me hooked for almost 300 hours and despite the massive paywall my overall feeling is rather positive. It really depends on how and when you play the game.

I enjoyed the game most when playing with friends, we really had a fun time building our camps and participating in events (Fasnacht ftw!). With playing “when” I mean on the timeline from release until now. Apparently, the game was really buggy on release. It still is, but in my experience not game breaking. Also, I started playing after the release of the Wastelanders update which filled the world a little more with humans instead of robots.

Played on the Playstation 4.