History FranchiseOriginalSin / Fallout

** By a similar count, the first few games dipped themselves in a RaygunGothic aesthetic that conjured up visions of old-school [[TheFifties 1950s]] [[{{Eagleland}} Americana]] and PatrioticFervor. But they were also a dark and twisted satire of that ideal, and Pre-War America was near-universally treated as hypocritical, violent, imperialistic, and prejudiced. While Pre-War America is still treated as such as the series went on, the patriotic fervor elements of the series became increasingly less satirical. Though there were still attempts made, such as the Mass Fusion subplot in ''4'', they were counterbalanced by the cartoonishly overblown nationalism and associated imagery being either played straight or [[DoNotDoThisCoolThing treated in such a manner that they might as well have been]]. Compare the treatment of Frank Horrigan and Liberty Prime, for an example. Both are marvels of old American super-science and in-universe {{Memetic Badass}}es with cartoonishly violent personalities that embody the warlike nature of America, but where Frank is still treated dead seriously as the ultimate villain and FinalBoss of ''Fallout 2'', Liberty Prime ''assists'' the protagonist while spouting propagandistic lines in such a cartoonishly-overblown fashion that it becomes endearing, so much that even though he's technically utilized ''against'' the genocidal [[TheRemnant remnants]] of the American government [[UnbuiltTrope in his first appearance]], [[MisaimedFandom not many people remembered him that way]].

* ''VideoGame/Fallout4'':
** The protagonist's rather heavy backstory and motivation to rescue their son was widely criticized, with people noting that it constrained roleplay heavily and [[PlotTumor consumed the plot]]. But providing the protagonist with some level of backstory and an overarching goal they set out to achieve was the case in every prior ''Fallout''. The difference was that in the prior games, the level of backstory had essentially been "you are a vault dweller/tribe member/courier", and there was enough leeway in dialogue to have your character [[RefusalOfTheCall just not really care about that goal]]. ''Fallout 3'' is where the issue of a character having a defined backstory began, with the player character having their life before leaving Vault 101 detailed as the tutorial and having a father who they can interact with in the story. However, while the game was pushy about finding your father, the game also allowed you to back off from the main quest without it feeling unnatural since your character had no idea where your father went, and players were still free to roleplay their character as potentially not really wanting to find their dad. ''Fallout 4'' more decisively defines your character's background and their feelings on their missing baby, which disappointed anyone who wanted to roleplay as something besides a concerned parent. Furthermore, because the game pushed your character to find their missing son, it created a major source of disconnect between the player and the character, as it made no sense to do sidequests over finding your son. In ''3'', your character can ignore finding their dad if they wanted because while they do want to know where he went, their actual initial objective is just to survive, and spending time doing anything other than the main quest can be brushed off as your character figuring their dad can probably take care of himself, with it being possible to have conversations even with people directly related to the main quest without ever bringing up your missing father. A parent searching for their baby who was kidnapped, however, is a far more emotionally urgent task than a legal adult looking for their father who willingly entered the Wasteland, on top of any conversation with anyone related to the main quest [[RailRoading practically forcing you]] to ask if they know about your missing son, making this disconnect harder to ignore.
** ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'' downplayed the importance of the KarmaMeter, with a player's karma only affecting which of three mutually-exclusive perks they can get at level 50, their relationship with one companion out of the eight available, and whether the ending describes them as a prick or not. It was widely seen as a good move, as it helped get away from the many StupidEvil and BlackAndWhiteMorality moments of ''3'' (where most of the "evil" options consist of simply killing named [=NPCs=] on sight, driving yourself by nothing more than bloodlust and spite), and moved the game in the direction of the more intriguingly grey factions, where the question is less between "good" and "evil" and more between a free but [[ObstructiveBureaucrat inefficient]] democracy, a stable but [[WellIntentionedExtremist authoritarian]] dictatorship, or [[TakeAThirdOption kicking both of them out]]. When ''Fallout 4'' did away with the karma system entirely, though, it became a real problem, as the developers were no longer obligated to provide "good karma/bad karma" opportunities in the game. Without the need to let the player act out and be a jerk, a lot of other roleplay aspects fell by the wayside, leading to ''4''[='=]s [[ButThouMust memetically railroaded conversations]] where your options to someone's requests almost universally boil down to "agree", "make a sarcastic quip the other guy [[SarcasmBlind takes as an agreement]]", or "put it off until you're ready to agree". It didn't help that ''4''[='=]s factions just weren't as popular as ''New Vegas''[='=]s, meaning defining oneself by faction loyalty felt like a lost cause.
** The ending got a universally cold reception for being seen as barebones, but really, pretty much every ''Fallout'' game has a pretty barebones ending, usually being little more than a slideshow of still frames and a narrator. The difference was that prior endings tended to treat themselves as a checklist for the player's actions, hence the "slideshow" presentation. ''4''[='s=] ending lacked that checklist, and as a result ended up being two very similar dull-looking cutscenes, with the only choice that made a difference being whether the player joined the Institute or not. It also didn't help that the individual [=DLCs=] of ''New Vegas'' also had their own slideshows for each one, and these could be pretty intriguingly different depending on the player's actions and alignment, and were pretty much the only "proper" potential evolution that the [=20th=]-century ''Fallout'' ending model could go down.
** The number of quests that amounted to "go there, kill those" or "go there, find this, kill those along the way" were generally lambasted, but every game has had its fair share of them. The difference was that the majority of prior quests tended to let the player [[CombatDiplomacyStealth resolve them in a variety of ways,]] while most quests in ''4'' lacked that flexibility. The addition of randomized and repeatable "radiant quests" that were ''universally'' the above two didn't help at all.
** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5YnT_ktwho This video]] by [=ItsJabo=] argues that this is a problem with the early quest "When Freedom Calls", wherein the player acquires a suit of PoweredArmor and a [[GatlingGood minigun]] to take out several Raiders and a Deathclaw. Even specifically among the 3D ''Fallouts'' it's not the first one to give the player ATasteOfPower to deal with a much stronger enemy than they're meant to be taking on at the level you're expected to be doing the quest at - ''Fallout 3'' has "Following in His Footsteps", an early-game quest which famously climaxes with the player acquiring a Fat Man mini-nuke launcher to take on a Super Mutant Behemoth. ''Fallout 3'' handled it better for several reasons: the quest takes you quite a ways into the heart of the Capital Wasteland for that setpiece, meaning you invariably have to spend time doing sidequests just to acquire the gear and reach the level where you can reasonably survive the regular encounters in that part of the game, and it evens the odds by giving you a powerful weapon that is [[AwesomeButImpractical highly limited in its uses outside of that setpiece]] between the cost of keeping it in serviceable condition, the rarity of its ammo, and the fact that it's highly wasteful on anything smaller than another Behemoth, of which there are only four others in the game outside of that quest. In contrast, ''Fallout 4'' puts this setpiece in an area that barely takes ten minutes to reach from where you start the game, meaning you haven't contended with anything more dangerous than a few nearly-harmless bugs and poorly-equipped raiders, and it gives you both power armor and a gun with a thousand bullets in the second-most-common caliber in the game, neither of which are limited in their use beyond the need for fusion cores found in every other building and the second-most-common ammo type in the game, which [[DiscOneNuke trivialize everything you deal with from that point]], even once you break out of the low-level opening area, unless you make a conscious effort to ''not'' use it.
** On the subject of power armor, ''Fallout 4'' isn't the first one that lets you get a suit of it far earlier than you'd expect, as ''Fallout 3'' again has the "Operation Anchorage" DLC that you can take on almost as soon as you enter the wastes, the end result of which is free power armor training and a nigh-indestructible suit of it. Again, ''Fallout 3'' handled it better: this requires you to buy and play through the DLC in question rather than being in the base game, which still means it's a few hours of gameplay between you leaving the tutorial area and getting power armor, and power armor in ''3'' is simply less broken on principle than in ''4'', treated as a regular suit of armor (as in, worn in place of your regular outfit) that just happens to have a minor Strength boost and noticeably higher defense than most other options (the only truly broken aspect of the suit you get for completing the DLC is its sky-high durability, which [[GoodBadBugs wasn't even intended]]), rather than an armored exoskeleton worn over your existing outfit that boosts your Strength much higher, makes you immune to falling damage, and makes you nearly impervious to weapons fire and radiation alike.
* One of the more common critiques of ''VideoGame/Fallout3''[='=]s story is that you have no option to join the Enclave and are effectively {{railroad|ing}}ed into wiping them out. This was true in ''VideoGame/Fallout2'' as well, but the Enclave in ''2'' are established as more or less a death cult [[MyCountryRightOrWrong worshiping the old United States]], and they regard everyone other than themselves in the wasteland, the player character included, as degenerates who must be exterminated for the good of humanity. Asking to join them would effectively be [[PressXToDie asking to immediately die]]. Even in the original game, joining the mutants simply results in a NonStandardGameOver. By contrast, the Enclave in ''3'' are nowhere near as evil, have nowhere near as much reason to hate the PC, and seem to just be another imperialist power among many in the wasteland. They do have a plan that approaches the genocidal nature of their plan in ''2'', but most of the Enclave is not on board with it, and you can stop it halfway through the game and they'll keep going. Indeed, bafflingly, you can ''help'' the most unreasonable factions of the Enclave accomplish that plan, ''which will kill you'', but you can't join the more reasonable factions that only want to control the water supply without irradiating it (which, not for nothing, is the ''exact same goal'' that the Brotherhood of Steel, aka ''the Good Guys'', have), making it an even more baffling place to draw the line. Tellingly, both Bethesda and Obsidian would respond to this in future games, allowing you to join every faction, including the ones set up as the most obvious villains of their respective stories - even the Enclave, in ''76'' - while giving them [[WellIntentionedExtremist logical reasons for their villainy]] rather than a Saturday-morning cartoon motivation of being evil [[CardCarryingVillain just because they're evil]].
* ''VideoGame/Fallout2'' is generally very well-loved, but if there's one ''very'' vocal complaint about it, it's the [[ReferenceOverdosed excess of pop culture references]] [[DenserAndWackier and humor]]. The first game had its fair share of this, like being able to randomly encounter the [[Series/DoctorWho TARDIS]] or troopers quoting movies on occasion, but these were more {{Easter Egg}}s than anything, and they were used fairly sparingly or still made some sense in context. In the second game, they show up a lot more and are much easier to find, which often damages the game's dramatic tone and story -- after all, it's a little hard to feel sorry for the plight of a slave when they're blatantly quoting ''Franchise/BackToTheFuture'', or take the backstory of an in-game army base seriously when it's got a [[AIIsACrapshoot rogue AI]] canonically named ''[[{{Franchise/Terminator}} Skynet]]''. It's not for no reason that ''New Vegas'' essentially provided the option to turn many of the pop-culture references off by locking a lot of it behind the "[[WeirdnessMagnet Wild Wasteland]]" trait. The "Bethouts" not doing this is often seen as a case of not getting the memo.