What can we say about the Fallout series? Adult themed, full of satire and subtle humour teamed with excessive violence, sexual innuendo and booze. Oh, and radiation. These classics are now quite elderly but are still wonderful to play and never fail to raise a chuckle at the fun poked at American paranoia and prejudice. Sadly, the series died with the original developer and the franchise rights seemed to get kicked around a bit. Then Bethesda stepped into the breach announced Fallout 3 to run on their Oblivion engine and we all sat up and took notice.

Oblivion Engine

Personally, we couldn’t stand Oblivion and found it tedious and dull (flames incoming) but its visuals were awesome and put a most satisfying strain on our graphics cards. It’s quite difficult to see how Fallout would translate from an isometric top-down tactical game to a free flowing first person experience but the results are looking promising. Teaser trailers and full motion videos have been released and hint at great things to come. The visuals seem just right and it is instantly recognisable as Fallout.

Don’t Ruin It!

There have been accusations of Bethesda “dumbing down” the game but they deny it and would do it at their peril. Fallout fans are a hardcore and vocal lot and it wouldn’t take much to burn the game in its own radioactive waste.

Verdict

It’s due out “sometime” in 2008 so we will keep an eye out for it and report more when it is available.

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