(Kotaku): "Fallout 76's Steel Dawn Update Feels More Like An Old-School Fallout Adventure"

[FarSight XR-20]

Fallout 76's Steel Dawn Update Feels More Like An Old-School Fallout Adventure
Fallout 76's latest free expansion brings the series' fan-favorite fascists back to Appalachia with a new mini-campaign that made me briefly forget I was playing an MMO.

Fallout 76's Steel Dawn Update Feels More Like An Old-School Fallout Adventure

Fallout 76’s latest free expansion brings the series’ fan-favorite fascists back to Appalachia with a new mini-campaign that made me briefly forget I was playing an MMO.

kotaku.com

Steel Dawn's first questline isn't one of the best Brotherhood stories by any stretch, but it's decent, fresh, and set to be followed by a second chapter sometime next year that I hope makes good on some of the choices I got to make in the first half. Leader Paladin Leila Rahmani and her lieutenants, Knight Daniel Shin and Scribe Odessa Valdez, are on an expedition to re-establish a foothold in Appalachia and salvage old technology that can be used to increase the organization's power and control. There's sociopathic robots, double-crosses, and a Super Mutant shootout. Despite the constant ping-ponging across the map, I had fun.

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I've completed the main quest, which ran just over three hours, and it's one of the few in the game that I actually wanted to keep coming back to, rather than merely finishing out of a sense of duty and the desire to earn some extra caps. Rahmani, Shin, and Valdez are well-rounded characters with distinct points of view that help depict the Brotherhood of Steel in a more multi-dimensional way. They're not solely the holier-than-thou, jackbooted thugs of the original games, or the problematic protectors of the newer ones, instead occupying a more malleable gray area, at least for the time being.

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Players have been waiting for the Brotherhood of Steel to return since the game launched. Its initial campaign took players to one of the organization's old abandoned outposts, then overrun by giant flying Scorchbeasts. This year's The Wastelanders update finally added human non-player characters to the game to act as quest givers and ethical sounding boards, including raiders players could either kill or earn the trust of.
By bringing back the Brotherhood of Steel Fallout 76 finally feels like it has a populated world and disputed moral landscape reminiscent of Bethesda's previous series entries.

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With each new update, it seems like Bethesda is moving further away from Fallout 76 being a state-of-nature survival sim and more toward making it the sort of traditional single-player Fallout a fair few players wanted. In many ways I'm sad to see the studio abandon that original vision, but it's certainly made Fallout 76 a much easier game to enjoy.

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Next-Gen Fallout
I've been playing Steel Dawn on my Xbox Series S and it has been running incredibly smoothly. Overall the game looks crisper, and more importantly it loads super fast, with only a second or two between fast-travelling or respawning. Bethesda hasn't announced an official next-gen version of Fallout 76 yet, but even just the base game has been performing noticeably better on the new hardware.

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[My Blue Heaven]

what do they mean by "old school", fallout 3? lol. not today satan.

 

[Lakitu]

I'm half thinking about going back in. I enjoyed my time with Fallout 76. Is this a more substantial update than Wastelanders?

 

[OryxTheBakinKing]

Next-gen update?

 

[Deleted member 8901]

They need to provide a plan for next gen... I'd jump back in but not until I know they've completely fixed the horrific load times and performance issues from the PS4.

 

[Kaivan]

As long as it's online only which adds a considerable input delay for every action you do, it will never feel like an old school Fallout, ever.

You can get no input delay by subbing to their Fallout 1st, by the way. Fuck them.

 

[Deleted member 10726]

You can get no input delay by subbing to their Fallout 1st, by the way. Fuck them.

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That still runs on the same servers. You can absolutely still have input lag on Fallout 1st worlds given two of my friends actually took the dip for that rip-off.

 

[PanzerKraken]

They need to provide a plan for next gen... I'd jump back in but not until I know they've completely fixed the horrific load times and performance issues from the PS4.

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The game runs a whole lot better on next gen already, the new systems made a big upgrade to performance.

As long as it's online only which adds a considerable input delay for every action you do, it will never feel like an old school Fallout, ever.

You can get no input delay by subbing to their Fallout 1st, by the way. Fuck them.

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It doesn't remove the delay. It can improve it, but at times its exactly the same as playing with others.

I'm half thinking about going back in. I enjoyed my time with Fallout 76. Is this a more substantial update than Wastelanders?

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No Wastelanders was a huge update, this is part 1 of a new story arc, it's not as big but adds a bunch of new stuff and will be expanded on future updates

 

[Andri]

the series' fan-favorite fascists

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Now that is a quote.

 

[Kaivan]

So it's worse than I expected. Not touching this unless they offer offline play.

 

[pksu]

Fo76 was still quite buggy when Wastelanders launched and somewhat boring if you are not interested in base building. Duplicating items & characters and breaking the AI is fun only for a while. Maybe I'll try this one with game pass if any of my friends still wants to play.

 

[Rygar 8Bit]

I'm half thinking about going back in. I enjoyed my time with Fallout 76. Is this a more substantial update than Wastelanders?

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No it was about 3ish hours of story content.

 

[Rover_]

hmm i bought it and never played it! but it seems after these last big updates it's time i give it a go!

 

[PanzerKraken]

This isn't a big campaign or such, they added some new story content that will be expanded on in the future to move the game narrative forward, but it's also a new method of them introducing some repeatable content, new areas to the game and so on. This isn't a big whole new campaign like Wastelanders introduced, just their quarterly content drop bringing back the Brotherhood back into the game.

 

[JohnnyMoses]

They need to provide a plan for next gen... I'd jump back in but not until I know they've completely fixed the horrific load times and performance issues from the PS4.

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I can't comment on the PS5, but the load times on the Series X are almost nonexistent.

 

[PJsprojects]

They need to provide a plan for next gen... I'd jump back in but not until I know they've completely fixed the horrific load times and performance issues from the PS4.

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Playing as it stands right now on PS5 or XSX the game has zero performance issues and loads very very quickly.

 

[Phellps]

I've yet to play the new questline, but it's good to see it's good positive reactions. It's going to be interesting to see how it ties into the game's main plot.

 

[CountAntonio]

Just recently bought this in sale.snd have been playing through the brotherhood questioned. Game is legitimately good. The world is amazing to explore and the other players I've run into have been a joy. Their bases have been fun to look at and I love being able to play with my buddies. Yeah it has some bugs but I think it's finally living up to it's potential.

 

[Dr. Ludwig]

As long as it's online only which adds a considerable input delay for every action you do, it will never feel like an old school Fallout, ever.

You can get no input delay by subbing to their Fallout 1st, by the way. Fuck them.

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Yup, tried it with the last major update after everyone raved about how they "fixed it!".

Was bombarded by awful input lag, netcode and enemies teleporting around me. Fuck that.

If you're not in the NA or EU, you're gonna have a pretty terrible online experience.

 

[Oreiller]

what do they mean by "old school", fallout 3? lol. not today satan.

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This tbh.

 

[Vic20]

Yup, tried it with the last major update after everyone raved about how they "fixed it!".

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Every update it's the same thing, people swearing up and down that the game is great now.

 

[HStallion]

If the article in the OP is supposed to sell me on FO76 then it's failing hard. Trying to impress with a single quest line that amounts to 3 hours of time and won't even be continued until next year isn't exactly winning me over.

 

[tobascodagama]

Steel Dawn was good, I really liked the new story. It's not huge, but it was interesting. The conflict they set up threw in some wrinkles that made it feel a lot fresher than the last time they did something similar with FO3's BOS and Outcasts. At the beginning of the quest, I thought I knew where I stood, but by the end of it I wasn't quite so sure any more, and that uncertainty is entirely down to good writing and voice performances.

What I love a lot less is the process for getting legendary versions of some of the new weapons they added, like the Crusader Pistol. You've got to grind the Daily Ops until you get the plans for the non-legendary version, then it gets added to the standard legendary loot pools. That's an absolutely garbage amount of RNG for a gun that's cool (unique receiver options compared to a 10mm) but not life-changing.

 

[PanzerKraken]

If you want the game to turn into an offline SP Fallout game, it never will, just move along finally, it's never going to change. They are adding story content and have made it more single story focus friendly, but it still is a MP game and focused on being a game as service title.

 

[Lobster Roll]

Instead of these half-measure approaches to injecting a campaign into Fallout 76 to try and entice people that enjoyed 3, NV, and (maybe) 4, just keep sticking to having an online experience. Have another team focus on making a single player campaign in a large, robust world that takes advantage of the new console hardware. I was never interested in Fallout 76, and them stapling together a Campaign Lite doesn't really draw me in.

 

[Rover_]

Instead of these half-measure approaches to injecting a campaign into Fallout 76 to try and entice people that enjoyed 3, NV, and (maybe) 4, just keep sticking to having an online experience. Have another team focus on making a single player campaign in a large, robust world that takes advantage of the new console hardware. I was never interested in Fallout 76, and them stapling together a Campaign Lite doesn't really draw me in.

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i'm pretty sure the next Fallout is already in pre-prod. don't need to bash this game since it's not preventing the next big Fallout from existing. it's a worthwhile experience for the team and it presents one of the best Fallout maps ever made.

 

[Massicot]

My takeaway was pretty similar, but it basically made me wish I was playing another (any other) Fallout game, not because the new quests and characters are bad, but because they are just good enough, if that makes sense..

 

[PanzerKraken]

Instead of these half-measure approaches to injecting a campaign into Fallout 76 to try and entice people that enjoyed 3, NV, and (maybe) 4, just keep sticking to having an online experience. Have another team focus on making a single player campaign in a large, robust world that takes advantage of the new console hardware. I was never interested in Fallout 76, and them stapling together a Campaign Lite doesn't really draw me in.

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People seem to be playing 76 and it's likely making money, why abandon it? It's also not the main team doing it, so theres likely more FO being worked on for future release, but it's gonna be a while. We saw what happened when they rushed 76 to market.

 

[Deleted member 8784]

Fallout 76's latest free expansion brings the series' fan-favorite fascists back to Appalachia

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Errr are the Brotherhood of Steel fascists?

 

[Lobster Roll]

People seem to be playing 76 and it's likely making money, why abandon it? It's also not the main team doing it, so theres likely more FO being worked on for future release, but it's gonna be a while. We saw what happened when they rushed 76 to market.

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I never suggested abandoning it, but rather the opposite. Just focus on making it an online experience instead of trying it be like "we did it, we've got a shadow of quest design in here that you enjoyed in the previous 3D fallouts". I know they're working on a new, standard Fallout. I'll wait for that game for some good campaign action.

 

[PanzerKraken]

Errr are the Brotherhood of Steel fascists?

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Very much so. The latter games tried to make them into "good guys", but really they have always been pretty fascist, and in 4 they kinda went back to being douche bags who think they are the heroes

 

[bbq of doom]

Baffling to me when companies decide to patch in the game after the game's initial release. Why not just spend some more time and make the initial product better than dogshit?

 

[Rover_]

Baffling to me when companies decide to patch in the game after the game's initial release. Why not just spend some more time and make the initial product better than dogshit?

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this game it's not for me so i hate it's existance and will downplay it! crazy right?

 

[PanzerKraken]

I never suggested abandoning it, but rather the opposite. Just focus on making it an online experience instead of trying it be like "we did it, we've got a shadow of quest design in here that you enjoyed in the previous 3D fallouts". I know they're working on a new, standard Fallout. I'll wait for that game for some good campaign action.

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They still are keeping it online, the update is all about adding new repeatable online content, grinds, group end game features. It's a narrative based game though still, this just is narrative that also leads into MP content. The pre update content was also essentially an online event as well. The game since day one has been a story based game that has MP elements and they are just expanding that narrative especially since many of the fans wanted more story content focus.

Baffling to me when companies decide to patch in the game after the game's initial release. Why not just spend some more time and make the initial product better than dogshit?

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Every update adds QoL improvements, adding content, supporting the game, etc, so not sure what else is expected? They have done so much improving on this game, but so many are just salty this game even exist and just will always hate it no matter what they do.

They didn't abandon it, and kudos to them.

 

[red731]

Can I play it without the need to buy any expansion or such? Enjoyable without microtransactions?

 

[Deleted member 16908]

I really hope they give this a 60fps patch for Series X/S soon. I want to try it but not at 30.

 

[PanzerKraken]

Can I play it without the need to buy any expansion or such? Enjoyable without microtransactions?

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You don't need to buy anything, all the content updates are free.

 

[Deleted member 1476]

Yup, tried it with the last major update after everyone raved about how they "fixed it!".

Was bombarded by awful input lag, netcode and enemies teleporting around me. Fuck that.

If you're not in the NA or EU, you're gonna have a pretty terrible online experience.

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Every single time now, the articles don't even feel organic anymore.

 

[julia crawford]

It's 2020 bro Fallout 3 is old school.

 

[red731]

You don't need to buy anything, all the content updates are free.

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Gucci, thank you. I will try it out since it is on gamepass.

 

[Lo-Volt]

Errr are the Brotherhood of Steel fascists?

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They're certainly pretorian or authoritarian based on the lore, though it depends on the chapter or faction. I think they're consistently undemocratic and ambivalent about local governance where they do operate, and some of the background chatter in Fallout 4 implies that members think of local residents as lessers or worse. Some of the characters the player runs across are not so awful, to be sure, but the organization at large is a very restrictive one.

 

[Deleted member 45130]

Do this an Fallout 4 have any new Series X upgrades? I did see a 60fps fallout 4 video a while back but wasn't sure if that was an official thing.

 

[Transistor]

what do they mean by "old school", fallout 3? lol. not today satan.

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You're never gonna see Fallout 1 and 2 inspiration in modern Fallout. Ever. New Vegas was the closest we got.

And that makes me damn sad.

 

[Tortillo VI]

Errr are the Brotherhood of Steel fascists?

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Though in 3 their portrayal is more benevolent, 4 definitely paints them in a worse light and it's tough to swallow some of their talking points without remorse, let alone side with them. It's a pretty interesting subject actually.

They're certainly pretorian or authoritarian based on the lore, though it depends on the chapter or faction. I think they're consistently undemocratic and ambivalent about local governance where they do operate, and some of the background chatter in Fallout 4 implies that members think of local residents as lessers or worse. Some of the characters the player runs across are not so awful, to be sure, but the organization at large is a very restrictive one.

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Definitely this, in my opinion. They may depend on who's leading them in each game, but there's inherent behaviours and attitudes that are pretty authoritarian and anti-government.

EDIT: It's nice they are adding this to the game. Still haven't finished Wastelanders as my gaming sessions with the game end up in boredom due to the grind required to upgrade equipment and find/craft ammo once you reach level 50 and beyond. Still, It's a buggy, janky but very enjoyable game.

 

[Marano]

You're never gonna see Fallout 1 and 2 inspiration in modern Fallout. Ever. New Vegas was the closest we got.

And that makes me damn sad.

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Who knows at this point really, you are likely right, but add MS manpower to the equation and someone there having the will to do it, it could happen, zero chance it is called fallout 5.

MS already has wasteland and p.o.e so they might not want it due to that if they absolutely make a crpg (I think they will it just might not be fallout).

 

[Captain Tuttle]

You're never gonna see Fallout 1 and 2 inspiration in modern Fallout. Ever. New Vegas was the closest we got.

And that makes me damn sad.

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This is true and it's a shame.

 

[Transistor]

Who knows at this point really, you are likely right, but add MS manpower to the equation and someone there having the will to do it, it could happen, zero chance it is called fallout 5.

MS already has wasteland and p.o.e so they might not want it due to that if they absolutely make a crpg (I think they will it just might not be fallout).

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It's not about manpower. It's about bottom dollar. Just like how Elder Scrolls will never go back to the greatness that Morrowind had, you'll haver see Fallout go back to anything before Fallout 3.

Even if they did something like it, I doubt it would carry the Fallout name.

 

[bbq of doom]

this game it's not for me so i hate it's existance and will downplay it! crazy right?

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I don't hate it!

 

[Marano]

It's not about manpower. It's about bottom dollar. Just like how Elder Scrolls will never go back to the greatness that Morrowind had, you'll haver see Fallout go back to anything before Fallout 3.

Even if they did something like it, I doubt it would carry the Fallout name.

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If it is a matter of what will sell the most you are right, fallout 3, new vegas and 4 sold more than previous games, skyrim more than the other elder scrolls games.

As it is, even with 4 studios bethesda cant handle starfields, ES and Fallout at the same time, let alone an extra classic fallout, that is where manpower helps though, expect a new modern fallout for sure, but a crpg is possible because then it wont be an either/or situation.

 

[BoxScar]

I played this on PC a few months ago, and there was insane gaps between me shooting something and it registering as being hit. I have a wired connection and good internet so I don't think that was the cause. Put my off the game completly.

Does this happen on the Series X and does progress carry over between platform? I did like the world but the lag killed me.