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Saw the advertisement here on GB for a direct game download site so went to check it out. Saw the top rated games were Fallout and FO2. Came back here to GB and saw they were "Hall of Fame" listed so I took a chance and downloaded both 1 and 2...trying to play FO1 first as one comment said I'd be disappointed if I played it the other way.

Gotta say, tough game so far. Killed the rats OK to get started but got wiped out by mole rats just after exiting the cave. Got to Vault 15 and can't get in with the busted elevator shaft. Trying to do it without cheats or a walkthrough but it's not real clear which way to go and what things you need. I did go back and find the radscorpion cave. Got wiped badly there. In reading the walkthrough for that area (after dying) it said there were supposed to be drops of ammo and stuff. I checked all the bone piles and all the scorpion bodies that I killed and never found anything. So it's obvious that "drops" are not easy to see.

Any tips for a beginner at this game?

Items are plain hard to spot. Nothing can be done about that, unfortunately.
Reading character creation tips, like [url="http://user.tninet.se/~jyg699a/fallout.html"]these here[/url], helps alot, since it makes you understand the game better. Save a lot, in different slots. Persevere. They're one of the best games ever made, but indeed not particularly "noob"friendy.

Indeed. Keep playing, you'll enjoy it.

SPOILER ahead:

Spoiler

To enter Vault 15, you'll need a rope, you can get some in Shady Sands.

I have no doubt this is a great game, but for me, I got totally confused at the same spot Ragin did. It's impossible to get the hang of this game 'out the box' as it were and the manual is fun to read but a bit of a drag when you just want to find out how to activate a flare.

I spent ages reading all the different things the character can do via the skills screens at the beginning, and to be honest I was put off by the over-complexity, but I can see how this would be addicting for the more technically minded.

The triple mouse actions (left and right clicking in a certain order to change the mouse icon and it's uses) was mindblowingly complicated and seems to new eyes (the dumbed down generation) to be a real PITA (pain in the a..).

Likewise, just in the first couple of screens I'm dealing with movement limits, ticking clocks, weak separation between active scenery and inactive background, seemingly unconnected maps, ticking clocks, ending combat when there's no combat taking place, three different ways to heal myself none of which seemed to work (because I was in combat mode?!), Some unidentified equipment called stimpacks which look like ghostbuster's backpacks (yeah, I read the manual, they're a fourth way to heal yourself, lol), flicking between pistols and knives to try and kill rats I just wanted to tread on, exiting maps where I came in and finding myself at a totally new map, ticking clocks...

And why is the world map just a series of blue spheres?

And I've wasted 11 days trying to strip a broken bed to make a rope to take me down an elevator only to realise that's probably not how this game works. But then why is the screen so dark when every object seems to have some wording attached to it, and which worded items are useful and which are just fluff scenery, and why can't I mend all these computers I've just spent 11 days checking to see if I can repair because I must have a use for this repair feature at some point. What? I was supposed to read the computer at the starting point? Oh God! How do I get back there, why am I now in a village being asked to kill scorpions? Look, all I need is a water chip, direct me to the water chip, I'm on a timer here for crying out loud!

Nah, I can't be bothered anymore.


1. I think I arrived at computer games to late to understand the early experiments at mouse based gameplay.

2. I can't play games that have open ended gameplay combined with ticking clocks - isn't that a complete game concept contradiction?


But yea, I can see why so many people love this game, there's tuns there for those that want to be patient and get used to all the minutiae.

Oh, and...

Movement points for opening your inventory? Look, if your going to be that intense with the realism, at least let me tread on/kick away rats!...

lol

Let me try and help you here...

Despite the love this game gets around certain sites for being a "cerebral" experience, overthinking is probably the worst way to play this. Game guides will do nothing but confuse you. Furthermore, playing the game like you would do in something like Baldur's Gate, where you really need to be OCD about talking to everyone and getting all the quests and information and items, will ruin your experience in Fallout. Most crap simply isn't important. It's much more of a "game" than many other RPGs, imo.

The game does, however, really really appreciate common sense.

RC's problem: The game kind of expects you to stop off at Shady Sands and talk to the people there. The girl at the gate will tell you about bartering (if you somehow overlooked that big barter button in the dialog screen). The game probably expects you to try this out on her and the guy standing next to her, who has a rope. If you explore the town, there is also another rope to be found that's just lying there (even though as mentioned it can be hard to see items on the floor). Vault 15 is completely optional though and you can find information about other towns by talking to people in Shady Sands. If you can't do something - don't stress it! Talking to everyone is always a good strategy.

LDC's problems:
Mouse - right click to change between stuff. Click and hold the left mouse button to choose an action or item. It's pretty basic.
Ticking clock - What are you talking about? There's the 150 day time limit to get the water chip which is way more than generous (and that can be extended pretty easily if you really needed to). And that's it.
Stimpacks are how you heal yourself, or you could rest, or walk to a new location on the world map.
Ending combat when there's no combat taking place involves you clicking the END CMBT button in the bottom right hand corner.
Blue spheres? The world map is a map, and there are green spheres where towns and important locations are.
Here's what you can do in the inventory: Heal yourself, reload ammo, change weapons, change armor. So, yea, you need to spend up action points to use it during combat or the game would be horribly broken (not that being able to do all these things at once for no additional points isn't broken already).

Other stuff...

The skills screen is pretty complex. Let me break it down for you:
Strength - Carry weight and some (used very sparingly) "threatening" dialog checks. Effects on melee damage are pretty negligible.
Perception - The "checks" for interesting environmental things are basically non-existent, and noticing things like traps (which are nearly non-existent themselves) is a pretty liberal skill roll, so you can succeed at 3 per while failing at 10 per. The biggest thing this is for is if you're looking to fire distant targets with your guns.
Endurance - Health. Tends not to matter against "certain" enemies carrying "certain" giant guns at "certain" points of the game, but helps against most other encounters. It also seems to give you a better chance at staying up when hit by something really hard. I wouldn't sacrifice anything for it, though, but I wouldn't gimp it like basically every other guide on the planet tells you to (they all seem to favor these glass cannon type characters for some reason).
Charisma - Pointless. There are probably some charisma rolls (I know of at least one specific one which nets you all of three drugs) but they're pretty liberal like the perception rolls.
Intelligence - Gives you skill points and some special dialog options. Stupid characters (less than 4 int) aren't fun to play in this game.
Agility - Gives you action points which allows you to do more things in combat. This is pretty important. Kind of. Don't lower past 6.
Luck - Affects rolls, critical hits, special encounters, and general "randomness" in your favor. Special encounters are pretty cool (but if you give yourself an insanely high luck they're so common that they barely qualify as special).

Small guns - 90% of the weapons you find fall under this
Big guns - Really fun but really expensive (basically requires you to horde items in order to sell for tens of thousands of caps), and you don't get them until the Hub. They're also incredibly dangerous with area of effect. Limited ammo.
Energy weapons - Cool, but you don't get them until the very end, and ammo is really limited.
Unarmed and melee - More effective after you've played the game once and know about everything, knowing how to position yourself for encounters and what weapons enemies use. Still fun, though, but you really have to specialize your character because you'll really feel like pulling out that SMG and burst firing it at close range.
Throwing - There are... um... no throwing weapons. Well, you'll find a few throwing knives, and you can throw a spear, and there's a handful of grenades that cause splash damage (which will really hurt you and your companions). It really must be stressed that there simply are not enough items to make this actually viable (and grenades can be thrown by anyone, just save before use) and they do pitiful amounts of damage (your naked fists are basically better than a throwing knife here).
First aid - Stimpacks are plentiful and first aid has a high rate of failure, and the amount you heal is entirely negligible. Can be raised with books, if you felt like wasting your time and money.
Doctor - First aid with the ability to heal crippled limbs. There's doctors in nearly every town and you'll like never be crippled.
Sneak - Scripted events ignore this skill. Pointless.
Steal - "Cheat skill". There's nothing really cool to steal, or anything at all really, aside from more ammo and stimpacks that you're already swimming in.
Traps - Perception can detect these, and there's like only one area in the game with traps... traps that hardly do any damage.
Science - There are I believe two or three instances where you can gain a handful of free experience points, and there's a use for it at the very end (after you've had a chance to buy books that can raise this skill). Oh, and there's a few things you can click on with science to gleam more information ("few" meaning three or four things and "gleam" meaning it gives you some extra generic and utterly unimportant flavor text).
Repair - Used once or twice, after you have access to the books that can raise it.
Speech - Convince people of stuff. It basically makes your speech rolls easier and there are a few things that check for it. Not a bad skill. However, I have had people believe my lies without tagging this or putting any points into it, so the almighty dice is still ultimately important.
Barter - Lowers prices somewhat, but not to the level you'd expect after spending your precious points here. This might be pretty good if you were not item hording, went with big guns, and used a lot of chems.
Gambling - ROFL. Money isn't hard to come by, there's only like one place to gamble (that easily becomes unavailable), and your chances don't improve much. Works if you're RPing a dummy who also got to pick their starting skills.
Outdoorsman - I have no idea what this does and have not been able to find any information on it. I think it decreases the number of bad encounters (which are rare anyways)... ? You can raise it with books.

Traits
Gifted - "Cheat trait". Take if you can't stand seeing the number 4 in your character sheet.
Jinxed - Stupid. Hit someone and break both your arms, shoot someone and have the gun blow up and blind you - if that sounds fun, choose JINXED!
Skilled - Less perks for a few measly skill points? Bleh.
Bruiser - I read somewhere that this is like loosing 4 points of agility and, yea, it is. For what? For two points of strength? Last time I checked 2 - 4 = -2. So, technically, you lose 2 points if you choose this skill.
The rest don't have real gamebreaking or gamebusting effects, so go with whatever you think suits your character.

Well, that was long. I don't know why I wrote it all. Just been wanting to vent for a while now :-/

Fallout is a great game if you give it a chance and think (but not overthink) because there's no handholding. The water chip involves you running around and asking people about the water chip until you are directed towards a place that has one (hint: follow leads that involve people who work with "water"). cheers

A main benefit of perception is how it effects your sequence.
If you have better sequence than your enemies (almost all have sequence around 10) you effectively get one free full round to act in battles which last longer than one round.

Gambling is an easy way to make unlimited money in the two casinos in the game if you have enough skill (about 35 in FO1 version 1.0 so don't tag it). Just go to a table and keep "1" and "4" pressed until you're rich enough.
It's cheesy, but it's definitely better than wasting your time with hording items, bartering or stealing.

A trait which does make a difference is "fast shot". You loose the option to aim at body parts to do more damage per hit, but you attack faster and do more damage per round both in melee and ranged.
In Fallout 2 this trait has been made worse, but it's still powerful for ranged powergamers or big gun users.

I forgot about sequence. Yea, it's useful, especially when there's a large group of enemies and they just seem to go on and on and you're setting there all like "hey, you already went, douche! it's my turn!"

I never tried that gambling cheat, but it seems like a.... um... cheat. Generally, cheats decrease my enjoyment of the game. This game isn't that hard anyways that you need to exploit the system.

You don't actually attack faster with fast shot. Sequence determines how fast you act in a combat round, and fast shot doesn't affect this. All it does it reduce the amount of action points required to attack by 1. I think targeted attacks are cool but fast shot could definitely be a substitute for two points of agility.

I also forgot to mention in my other post that a whole lot of guides are built around the fact that you gain character points later. They never tell you how much later. Hint: It's like the very end. Therefore, don't pay any heed to this.