By Austin Banzon
Designer
As you wander through the wasteland of a post apocalyptic Boston in “Fallout 4,” you will meet both terrifying beasts and friendly settlers. Will you help rebuild civilization, or will you subject The Boston Commonwealth wastes to a second Armageddon?
On Nov. 10, video game company Bethesda launched “Fallout 4” on the PC Gamer, PlayStation 4 (PS4) and Xbox One platforms. Since, about 12 million copies were sent to retailers, sales reaching about $750 million. It has been five years since the release of the previous game in the series, “Fallout: New Vegas.” Fans worldwide have been eagerly waiting for the fifth game in the series to be released.
“Fallout 4” is a single player, role playing game. Players who are familiar with the previous games in the “Fallout” series will feel nostalgia when they wander the Boston Commonwealth and encounter enemies like giant irradiated rats, flies, humans and deathclaws, which are massive mutated reptiles.
The story is set in The Boston Commonwealth, 200 years after a World War III scenario between America and China in which a nuclear holocaust took place over the dwindling supplies of oil. The player, known as The Sole Survivor, remains in one of many vaults used to help civilization rebuild after such a war, Vault 111.
However, many vaults were more experimental labs than sanctuaries. Vault 111 experimented on its inhabitants by freezing them in cryostasis chambers. Your character survives for 200 years and escapes.
The game starts with a bang as your first task is to don a mechanical suit of armor, rip a minigun off of a crashed helicopter, and protect settlers from a horde of roving bandits. Doing this gives anyone who loves the Fallout series the feeling of being “a kid in a candy shop.”
Instead of awkward interactions with characters in the previous games, “Fallout 4” includes cutscenes that gives the player a cinematic experience. Dialogue options could use some work because it is limited to only four replies when you are actively in a conversation.
Personalization is now possible with the sky as the limit, literally. The new building bases interface is one of the greatest aspects of “Fallout 4.” Create a house, decorate it with fancy lights, install turrets around it, you name it. The possibilities seem endless which makes the game enjoyable to a variety of gamers.
The new system of attaching armor pieces can turn your regular vault jumpsuit into a bulky, heavily armored bulwark. Weapons can also be modified from a rusty old pistol, to a polished, high calibrated automatic gun. These new features improve the combat experience and gives you choices on how you want to play the game.
This game offers a lot of opportunities for veteran players or newcomers to the “Fallout” universe. All it takes is a new generation console or a decent PC Gamer, and the will to take on challenges in the wasteland.
