So recently I have been playing Fallout 3. I have been hooked on the series since it’s unofficial progenitor, Wasteland (with Michael Stackpole - http://www.stormwolf.com - as one of it’s designers) caught my eye and stole my hours as a youth.

I’ve been a fan, but never actually finished Fallout, or Fallout 2. I dabbled in Fallout Tactics, but didn’t get much into it either. Fallout 3 though, it’s pretty much perfect for me. First person shooter, with the option to slow things down with V.A.T.S. when I feel the need, or just want to watch the cinematic glory of a something being blown apart by my combat shotgun, or stapled to a wall by my railroad gun. Exploration, the go anywhere, do anything, real life sort of feel, but with the option to fast travel if things start to get tedious humping around all over the place. Roleplaying, it’s there, better than most computer games that I have played, though still not anywhere near an actual role playing session, it is still definitely fun. I recommend buying up your Speech skill to get better options.

I usually play on the steam locomotive on my way in to the citadel. So I only have about an hour to play at a time, and with this time constraint, I am not feeling lost or that I can’t play it. You are able to save pretty much anywhere, and at any time. So things that take a while can be broken down into smaller chunks. However, when I have had hours at a time to play, just like in my youth, they dissipate into dust of the wasteland leaving me only memory, beautiful, blood soaked memory. I also like the “random” encounters. If they are random, I can’t tell, and that makes them awesome. The wasteland should be dangerous and fairly unpredictable, but once you get to know what to look for, you can handle it. The game does that well.

There are a few things that aren’t bad, but sometimes detract from the game. The biggest, is the computer cracking. I am not sure if the Science skill does anything with cracking computers, other than let you get into harder terminals. I think I have seen that the number of passwords you have to guess at goes down, but I am not sure. The thing that detracts, is that you have four guesses, but if you can’t get it in that, it locks you out, but if you log off before then, you get another four guesses. So I end up spending three cracking attempts, logging out, making three more. The character matching hints that it gives after each guess are slightly helpful, but sometimes when I do get the password, it seems like the hints that it was giving had nothing to do with the password at all. So before I detract from the game more by making this larger than the actual review, let me say that the cracking is optional for the most part, and it does not occur often enough to annoy. There, that’s that. I won’t talk about any other negatives, because frankly, I don’t have any others worth mentioning here. Sure there are some, but they pale in comparison to what the game does right.

The one thing I would really like to see in this game, and others like it, is what I call Limited MMO play. That’s where one person would host a server and up to, say, 32 to 64 people max, would be able to share the play in the world. I would love to play it multiplayer at the lan parties I hold.

While getting sustenance today, I spotted something, and that something fit so well into my hunger for all things Fallout, I had to get it. I don’t know if some marketing genius knew that Fallout 3 was going to be big, or if it was just a huge coincidence, but I don’t really care. I had to get it anyway. So I did.

It’s faintly orange pop flavored, not orange juice, but orange pop. It’s not bad at all, it’s actually a step up from the Red Bull and Diet Rockstar that I have had. It’s also 0 carb, or at least the version I got is. So if you want a drink that fits the theme while you play Fallout 3 to the wee hours of the morning, afternoon, or night, then check it out. It at least looks cool on your desk.

I originally posted this over on the Dirigible of Pain site: http://dirigibleofpain.com

Well, we finally played a short session. We didn’t record it, but here’s the main result.

I liked it, it’s very different, and definitely like a board game, but as the GM, I liked it. The monster stats in the first module, and the monster manual ones as well, are excellent and nearly all you need to run that monster I think.

Other people… not so enamored as I was. It has a much different flavor than 3.x, and is definitely not possible to run a low magic campaign with. Though it does give people something to do nearly the whole time, it also feels a bit like playing an MMO, with special powers being used constantly.

I played World of Warcraft recently, and after playing it a while, I questioned why I have a hotkey for a regular attack, when it is much better to just hit one of the several special attacks instead. Sometimes 4e seems that way too. With the regular attack being pretty much a waste of character sheet space. The other special attacks are definitely something to use over the unpowered attack.

Now as a GM I am wondering. How do I use one of my tricks of taking the powers from the characters would even work in this game?

Ok, I had meant to post things earlier, but at least it’s sooner than the last gap was long.

Gen Con was a blast, at least as good as last year, I would say baring a few things, even better than last year. Vegas After Midnight ran very well, and we got both exceptional feedback and a host of possible playtesters. VAM was stripped down to start, but Daniel Perez (http://dmperez.com/) focused in on something that I hadn’t been able to put a name to. That was that we only had half or less of the Madness mechanics in the game. We just had ways to incur Madness, but nothing about it’s effects, or how to track it. So we slashed the things on the character sheet that required Madness (really just a few things), and ran with the edited versions. As I said, they went great, and the feel of VAM without Madness is there, now we just need to add in the darker aspects of Madness to make it complete.

Going as press for the second year in a row was definitely worth it. I got a great interview with Greymalkin Press about their new game Desolation, which never got recorded due to a recorder snafu. I am working with them to get it redone soon. Oh, and btw, Matt Somers, one of the key designers, has been my friend since college. Full disclosure and all that.

I also got to play Hellas with Jerry Grayson (http://hellasrpg.com), and that was awesome. I had the pdf review copy before the con, but it was so nice I had to buy a copy. So you can expect to hear it played on The Game Master Show (http://thegamemastershow.com) soon, along with Desolation.

Met a bunch of old friends, many of them podcasters, and met a fair amount of new ones. Played several playtest sessions with them, like: Mythender, and Mecha. Two excellent games, that just need a bit more polish. I expect to hear about them coming out within the next year.

I did get to go to the White Wolf party this year, thanks Matt - I think, but if you want to hear more about that, you’ll have to listen to the podcast for The Game Master Show that comes out soon. We’re recording it tonight.

Toodles!

It’s been a looong time since I have last posted, but…

I am at Gen Con 2008, day 2 (Friday). Mick and I have run Vegas After Midnight (http://vegasaftermidnight.net) three times now, and it has been excellent. We have learned a lot of the rough spots, and already started sanding them down. We have loved all of our players, and a good portion of them we think are going to playtest for us. We are going to run it at least three more times before the end of the con, and I can’t wait to run them!

I’ve also done an interview for The Game Master Show (http://thegamemastershow.com), and ended up recording silence through my own fault. We also have played Hellas (http://hellasrpg.com), again, awesome - more to come on that front.

Ok, Erin is pulling me out to eat. So more later hopefully!