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Not bad, not great

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 6 / 8
Date: April 24, 2001
Author: Amazon User

First off, I'd like to say that I honestly do like this game and I think it was worth my money. I have encountered a few bugs, but nothing that would make me fling this back to the store, but I know how games can be (especially from Interplay), so I pity those who experience more severe problems. I like the semi real time mode the best. I think it's the best way to go from now on in the Fallout series. But if that's not your thing, you can go back to the classic Fallout mode, or even turn based squad mode (from the description, it sounds like X-COM, though I haven't actually tried it). Yes, enemy AI can be pretty dumb. If you just lie still for a while, a lot of times the enemy will just merrily go back to their little patrol path, begging to be shot down. But hey, enemies weren't terribly bright in the previous Fallouts, either. And yes, they do seem to have awful hearing problems in regard to full automatic gunshots. Story's a bit dry to me, from what I've seen so far. Maybe it'll kick up a notch later on, but the previous Fallouts grabbed me from the getgo. Not this one. Also, I wish there was a bit more flexibility in the missions. While there are various shades of success in each mission, you're not allowed to fail. It's either win or lose and losing means the end of the game, even if you live. That, I don't like. That said, I do enjoy the game. I like the huge variety of weapons, the fact that I can actually sneak up on a guy and can actually take him out with one well placed gunshot (there's something deeply satisfying in getting close behind to a prone raider and blasting him with a double barrel, but that's just me). The combat is great. There are all sorts of options to deal with the various situations thrown your way. Do you sneak in behind your enemy and gut him with your knife? Do you just rush up, guns blazing? Do you snipe from afar? Do you toss grenades over the cover the enemy's behind? Should you crawl away from enemy fire or just run for it? The flexibility in combat is unsurpassed. Basically it boils down to whether you like a good yarn or a good round of war. For a good yarn, play the previous Fallouts. For a good strategic fight, this could be good for a few late nights.

Not worth the money, IMO

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 8 / 13
Date: April 06, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I've been a big fan of the Fallout series since it's inception. Fallout: Tactics is the only title in this series I haven't enjoyed playing. To be fair, it wasn't intended as a role-playing game and so the NPC's and settings aren't as complex and detailed as they were in the first two games of this title. In addition, I am currently lacking an internet connection and so have been unable to play it online (which is how it was designed to be played). It may be fantastic when you can play others online but it certainly sucks from a single-player standpoint. The whole game is based on the combat system used in the Fallout series which had some major drawbacks but which they have tweaked enough here to make it playable (the choice of three combat options: team turn-based, individual-turn based and real-time was a real help). However, the NPC's are flat and boring, the AI is fairly stupid unless you set the game to the higher difficulty levels and the setting is rather hum-drum. In fact, I didn't even play past the first mission as I really didn't care who won. This game, although it visually resembles FAI and FAII, really isn't set in the same universe. So it boils down to this: this game is (probably) worthwhile if your favorite part of the earlier releases in this series was fighting or you want a fairly solid, multi-player squad shooter. Otherwise, don't bother.

A good game....

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: January 09, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Overall I have been very pleased with Fallout Tactics. I got the game right after it was released, and, ignoring the missing inventory bug, I have to say I enjoyed the game. In an interest in keeping this review as short as possible, I'll deal less with the storyline and more with the actual game mechanics.

First off, my gripes. I love the idea of a real-time tactical simulation game. While Fallout Tactics makes a good attempt at pulling this off, it comes off cumbersome and hard to control. The fact of the matter is that it is fairly hard to control 6 indivudual characters at the same time. Instead, I found myself using just one or two characters at a time while the rest of my "team" covered my advance team from flanking manuevers instead of pushing forward as a team to take and secure the objective. The problems with their real-time combat becomes even more apparent in multiplayer games where players who go for just one super-character tend to dominate those with teams. After all, if you can only order your characters as a group or as individuals, then it is much more difficult to effectively set up ambushes. What I think would have made this game better is if they had implimented some sort of pause button (as seen in Baldur's Gate), whereby you could pause the game when you were trying to spring that ambush instead of watching as the potential target slips through your fingers because you are having a hard time issuing the correct orders to all of your people in time.

The other main problem I had with the game was that the firepower needed to win the later missions tended to force players into using the big MGs, energy weapons, and power armor. While this can be enjoyable, it is also harder to sneak up next to a guy with your trusty ripper and have a chance at killing him before he or his neighboor turns you into swiss cheese with their gatling gun. I think this would not be as big a deal if the real-time aspect did not have the problem I already discussed. A solution that I think would work would be to have a longer time where the enemy forces were regular humans, and instead of beefing up their weapons/armor, make it a little more difficult for the player in the missions.

The vehicles in the game, although nice, were a big dissapointment for me. First off, they can only be driven in the mission where you get them. Instead of this you are allowed to fight with them in the random encounters as you travel to and from missions. I was really put off by this since I REALLY wanted to have some convoy assault missions (assaulting a convoy and defending one-and no, I don't count the Humvee mission as a convoy mission). I did, however, enjoy running around in my Humvee running over Deathclaws. You see, when you run over something, it becomes pinned beneath the vehicle. Since your melee weapons can attack anything near or under your vehicle....well, just imagine this vibrating humvee with the legs of a Deathclaw sticking out from under the hood as you hear this chainsaw sound. It almost looks and sounds like the humvee is eating the Deathclaw. Better than the experience is the fact that you don't use up any of that expensive ammo.

The good parts:
-A good storyline
-Well done missions
-Character development and skill progression
-Squad-based, real-time action with the ability to change to turn-based gaming in the option menu available in-game
-Decent graphics
-Sticks to the Fallout universe and its quirks

Bottom line: if you like real-time squad-based action games, this is a good bet for you. If you liked Fallout 1 or 2, and don't mind the lack of a dedicated RPG, this is a good game for you. If you are looking for Fallout 3, you might want to pass on this one.

NUKED CRUSADERS

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: May 25, 2002
Author: Amazon User

In the Fallout One the Brotherhood of Steel were a none too ethical bunch of military monks who have sent the Vault Dweller on a suicide quest for an initiation rite and then were shocked when he returned alive. Seventy-five years later in the Fallout Two, the Brotherhood has become a lot seedier and was merely one arms merchant among the many. But before that, the Brotherhood was apparently a force for progress in the Wasteland that was once the Midwest. The third series of Fallout games focuses on that period in Fallout history.

In this game you assume the role of one of the many post war denizens nuked back to the stone age who were levied as soldiers into the Brotherhood in exchange for the peace and stability that the brotherhood offered your community. The game claims to be less of a role-playing and more of a strategy game, but this is not necessarily the case. Just because you can't interact and truly speak with the other characters in the game world does not deprive this of being a role-playing experience. True, the game is centered on combat, and a great deal of work has been done to flesh out the tactics of the Fallout combat and a gazillion of sharp and stabbing and shooting objects have been added to make sure that players never run out of ammunition, but there is still an unknown world to explore, and you do interact with its non-combatants, though mostly they merely talk and shout at you, the way any sensible person would at a leader of a troop of armed gorillas. A great deal of work has been wasted from the role-playing standpoint, trying to convert a Fallout system of role-playing into a euphemism known as "real time strategy". As in most games of the type, the interface is neither real time nor strategy, in the sense that strategy is involved with logistics and positional development, whereas the real strategy game allows the computer's AI engine to let the characters slug it out among themselves with one side attempting to carry out player's orders. In that sense, the errors and the blind spots of the computer's AI will cancel each other out. Once you switch on the turn-based mode (a must for the Fallout aficionadoes who want to appreciate the graphics and the texture of the post nuke world), the weakenesses of the AI engine become apparent, but that does not preclude a good battle, given the fog of war, and especially if you set the game at the HARD level, where you will pay dearly for every tactical mistake that you make. Putting the game on the hardest setting, the INSANE level will not make the game more challenging, but instead stack the odds overwhelmingly against you in everything. So that you can stand and empty an AK-47 clip at a computer controlled enemy near point blank range and he will shrug it off at the INSANE level, while his shot will cause a critical hit to your character. The game's skill point and experience based character development system helps it retain its role playing capability. In that sense this game is a typically linear computerized D&D adventure, where you get six characters going along a linear script. One feature that takes away from the richness of the experience is that the game is set up as a zero sum environment as well as a linear adventure. Every battle map is limited and there is a set number of enemies in each adventure, and once you kill them, you can wander to your heart's content - the bad guys get no reinforcements. For that matter the bad guys have no real outflanking capability, and they can not counterattack or direct their forces in an organized and intelligent fashion in response to the player. Their battle remains challenging, however, because of some excellent traps and ambushes, and the topography of the game, which allows you to take advantage of and be destroyed by interlocking fields of fire as well as cover. The scenarios are well scripted, but are limited by the game's interface, for instance, escorting a truck convoy of medical and other supplies through a city of starving people is reduced to driving one vehicle through several city blocks laden with locked gates and ambushes. The storytelling is simplified, and you do not really get the quality and access to records and historical artefacts of the first fallout and the vision is made less complex as well, you do not get the texture and richness of the post nuke society of the first Fallout, nor do you get the artistic quality of the graphic design in the second one. Perhaps this was done deliberately to break away from the "role playing" feel of the game, but in the end this arcadization of the game took away from the quality of playing experience. Enough of the original Fallout universe remains however, especially over the span of twenty misisons, that the game is worth playing for anyone, who enjoyed the first two Fallout games; just switch on the turn based mode, draw off your leader's luck to boost his IQ or any other attribute, and switch it to HARD...

A Refreshing Departure From the Classic Fallout

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: September 20, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Fallout I was the first RPG that I feel in love with. When Interplay released its third installment in this successful series (Actually the second story in the Fallout universe, supposedly taking place between volumes I & II), I had to have it. A refreshing departure from the typical Fallout scheme, Tactics is a comletely squad based game. Being a fan of both Fallout and such games as Rogue Spear, this was the perfect hybrid for me. I found this game to also be a little more difficult than the previus Fallout games, as you are responsible for the actions and safety of up to six other characters simultaneously. Fan sof both Fallout and tactical games should find this game highly entertaining to say the least. This game also far surpasses the previus Fallout games in its rich graphics and its stunning gameplay features. Five big stars. Highly recommended.

Fallout Meets Jagged Alliance

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: September 26, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Have you played Jagged Alliance 1 or 2? If not do so NOW! Fallout Tactics is not some standard RPG. Rather it is a squad based tactical RPG whereby you create, equip, and level up your squad of grunts as you play. This game uses the SPECIAL system and simply rocks, it is a true hybrid.

Fallout Tactics

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: August 06, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Fallout Tactics is similar to xcom and jagged alliance games.

Pros:
+Characters are very customizable
+great death animations
+fallout universe
+good number of different/interesting enemies
+good looking graphics
+Cool maps/terrain/settings
+Lots of characters
+Various species (Ghouls, Super mutants)
+Tons of different weapons, explosives, guns w/various ammo
+cool weapon effects( lasers and such)

Cons
-gameplay can be a bit difficult to get the hang of at first
-linear story
-annoying comments made by enemies during combat
-music is kind of annoyoing
-very little NPC interaction or "side quests"
-when characters are equiped with different guns the characters look like they carry something different,every smg is an MP-5, every rifle an M-16( a shotgun looks like an M-16, for example)

Better than Fallout

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 5
Date: November 10, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I know many folks will disagree with that statement, but I had MUCH more fun playing this game than Fallout 1 and 2. The original Fallouts were too bogged down in dialog and role playing. I would quit playing Fallout at night and forget where I was when I started the next day. The journals were horrible and it took me days of playing to continue with the plot. Tactics, however, caters more to my tastes for action and tactical maneuvering. If you like the in-depth role playing and storyline, you'll probably like Fallout 1 and 2 better.

The option to switch back and forth between real time and turn based combat is awesome. I've played it both ways. This mixes a military-type game with a Balder's Gate-type RPG very well. Great job and I hope to see more of the like in the future!

Great game set in my favorite post nuclear war universe!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: April 13, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Set in the Fallout universe taking place between Fallout 1 and 2, you play the role of a Brotherhood of Steel Warrior. The BoS was that secretive order which helped fight the evil in the 2 Fallout2.

Using more or less the same combat system as in the 2 Fallouts, the game takes you mission by mission in eliminating the enemies of the brotherhood. Everything is more or less the same as Fallout combatwise. Even the weapons. This time however you get vehicles. From scouters to Hummers to even tanks!

Storywise, it's not bad but I didn't like the fact that the Brotherhood was portrayed as a kind of gang fighting for power in the wasteland.

The game is relatively stable as I only suffered one crash in about the 20 hours of play. Good game.

The Brotherhood of Steel wants you to clean up the Earth!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: June 29, 2001
Author: Amazon User

First of all, FTBOS is a terrific game!

Now that we got that out of the way, lets talk about this new edition to the Fallout Universe. The STORY behind BOS is basically you and your squad being charged to clean up the area and help expand the Brotherhood of Steel. Along the way you will have to battle Raiders, Deathclaws, Reavers and a assortment of Robots. I don't really want to dig to deep into the story as to not spoil it for future game players...

The GRAPHICS are not anything to write home about. Basically your standard 2D graphics come into play here with you basically seeing a overview of your squad and the map. However gunfights are very graphic and its a sad sight to see one of squad mates blown to pieces when walking over a mine or melting into goo when killed by a energy weapon. There are not too many FMV here, mainly the story progresses with still picture movies and dialogue.

The GAMEPLAY is pretty intense in many situations. The AI is not too smart nor is it dumb either. Although its funny to see a Raider get a critical miss when attempting to fire a rocket launcher at too close a target...its not funny when a Mutant with a Browning M2 loaded with depleted Uranium literally rip your well armored squad member out over 45 feet away with one burst. You can and will be able to literally equip your squad with a huge assortment of weapons and armor depending on your resources. It is soo very pleasing to equip your squad with power armor and actually enter a firefight where the enemy is unloading into you with small arms fire and the bullets literally bounce off you. Now don't think you can rush thru this game ( unless you cheat you loser ), because many mission sometimes take hours because this is Fallout Tactics....where strategy is the key to staying alive and completing the mission with as few as possible squad members dead or dying.

I have to admit that the SOFTWARE is buggy, but this is typical of most Interplay games. Many people complain of constant crashes, slow gameplay and rate this game based on that. I did have quite a few crashes myself, but one thing you need to remember in this game is three things : SAVE! SAVE! SAVE!. Save your game because you never know what might happen in the next few minutes.

Overall I really enjoyed this game despite how much time it took me to complete it! I hope I gave you some insight into this game and helped convince you that this is a worthy buy. If you like the Jagged Alliance games, then you will love this game for sure. Now get to work soldier..dismissed!

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