One can only hope that with Angry Joe’s review there will be more space for an honest discussion about why Fallout 4 is disappointing to so many consumers. Not to say that we aren’t playing the game. To face instead where it falls short of what we should expect for a AAA and especially what should have easily been Game of the Year.

I am 100+ hours into the game (I will try to avoid any story spoilers post the first 5 hours or so). I will probably sink hundreds of hours more. On the other hand, this is the type of game I like the most, and beyond going back to the handful of MMOs that I’m currently bored by, there’s nothing else on the market to compete with Fallout 4.

Today, I’m going to focus on the addition of Minecraft to the game. I mean Settlements. Now to be fair, I’ve played more than a bit of solo and Faction server Minecraft. And a lot of other players might not have that as a baseline for how functional Settlements ought to be. Still, to be a significant offering in a AAA, there’s a lot more work that should have been done to make Settlements more accessible to the average player. Like, TUTORIALS.

I would  have settled for a sponsored line of tutorials on Bethesda’s YouTube channel. Seriously, you can’t assume that most of your players have extensive experience building in Minecraft to draw on.

So at any rate, here are 10 things that Fallout 4 should have included, which I came up with after constructing 10 Settlements:

1. Way more work on Settlements bugs. For example, Settlers not doing their tasks, or not sleeping in their own beds. Also, my Spotlights never function unless I go into Build-mode, and replace them. They then stop functioning once I go through a loading screen. Seven times I have “failed” Attacks that either never occur or in which I actually kill all the enemy NPCs, but that the mission won’t complete except as a fail the next time I go through a loading screen. And over half of my planted crops never turn into food generating interactibles, forcing me to overplant.
2. NAMES! Seriously, a random name generator that names each of your Settlers. Or even outdo that like a Game of the Year should, and let people rename their own Settlers. So I can add Prisoner Number 24601.
3. A sand table map room that you can build, where you assign the person you want to lead each settlement, who then gives you the radiant missions. And also way more control over how expansion for Settlements occurs. So that you can “play more how you want” and not be faced with opening a new Settlement while you are still working out lighting for the last one.
4. An Emergency Broadcast System that will run over your own Radio, and that you can use to communicate back to your own Settlements. It’s extremely annoying to miss “Attacks” on Settlements during an hour long build session, when you don’t see the tiny and brief notification on the corner of the screen. Or if you miss it because you looked away at your iPhone or got up to get a beer without pausing the game.
5. The ability to turn off the Snap function. I know that there is a PC mod at this point to build in the red, but both PC and Console players should have before mods the ability to turn off Snap when they want to do so.
6. A few doors you can use to make rooms in your Settlements inaccessible to your Settlements. I hate coming home to find some sleazy guy in my bed.
7. A line of gap-fillers to cover up those little places where things don’t quite match. Like hanging moss, shelf fungi, barbed wire, old tires, etc. Also, an open frame “floor” that snaps between a first and second story wall, allowing you to create more ceiling space in buildings for things like indoor markets and barns.
8. Major building lines in both leather and glass. You should be able to build Greenhouses up on really high structures, and put in tents if you want. Even metal form walls with stretched leather canvas walls would have been awesome. Only wood and an a really small line of metal don’t feel Game of the Year.
9. More localization to Massachusetts and New England. Thatched roofs, fish ponds, a way to milk your Brahmin and make milkshakes (which you could only do if you developed your Settlements). Some radioactive-twist to maple syrup and cranberries and turkey would have been great (especially given when it was being released). Also, it’s colder and darker in New England compared to the Capital Wasteland and the Mojave. So a lot more sources of light and fire, especially trashcan fires, would have helped players make their Settlements feel like they were at all near Boston. Certainly, more effort could have been made with even containers and wall art.
10. Actually functional items. What happened to being able to make ice-cold Nuka-colas like in Fallout 3? Why can’t we build a bar where you walk up and get to go through the animation of drinking like you take Stimpacs? And how cool would it have been, if you could collect Pulowski Preservation Shelters while exploring, installed them in your Settlements, put fast-travel mats inside them, and use them like a Tardis?

 

TL;DR: Settlements is too underdeveloped a feature for a AAA, let alone Game of the Year. To be honest, the only reason why they are fun is because you can get around the build limit. If that hadn’t been exploitable, or if Bethesda fixes it in a patch, my overall playtime would have already reached its limit.