Fallout 2 Review

 Obsidian, Obsidian games never change

From everyone's favourite Nuclear Blasted Hellscape. Fallout 2 is a classic CRPG that serves as a rather influential follower to the already legendary first game... Man retro games sure do love that specific setup don't they?

In simple terms, Fallout 2 is to Fallout 1 what New Vegas is to Fallout 3. Rather than the barren, near dying wasteland of the first game. The settlements in Fallout 2 are almost thriving and there's some semblance of order to be found amidst the deadly wastes. The writing is a little more direct in any satire and more than happy to drop explicit monty python references or bizarre meta dialogue in the middle of a situation.

The gameplay remains.... acceptable. I like GURPs but Fallout kind of exemplifies the worst of retro CRPGs. You're ridiculously underpowered until you're very abruptly not, and some builds straight up cannot finish the game if you don't set up your skill points correctly. Only made worse by the multitude of bugs, unfinished content, poor design choices starting from the tutorial and ending with the final boss, and a quest log about as useful as, well, an early CRPG quest log usual is.

Still, you can feel the love for the world in the writing and maps. I've not looked at anything Van Buren or Fallout Bible related, but I'm more than familiar with the effort put into the setting and this is easily as good a showing as anything New Vegas offered. From the NCRs influence extending to almost every other settlement on the map, to the small nods to the changing world and clarifications on what was or wasn't canon in Fallout 1. The game is charming as hell and well worth the playthrough, that is, if you can stomach the mountains of Jank.

But what Obsidian Entertainment fan can't?

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