The other day, I picked up Fallout 3 with a plan: play the game, pick it apart, and ultimately come away dissatisfied and disappointed.
In fact, I already had this whole blog post planned out. I'd write a pseudo-review of Bethesda's much-lauded reinvention of one of my favorite game franchises, culminating in a disdainful reproach for the way they betrayed the spirit of a true classic. It was going to be cleverly injected with discreet references to the first two games (and even to Fallout Tactics, which I dearly loved). I was going to be duly respectful, but skeptical, of this genre-breaking edition of a game series that didn't need to have its genre broken.
The bottom line was that although Fallout 3 is a good game - and expertly produced - its bleak, gritty landscapes and cookie-cutter inhabitants just didn't win me over the way they did the entirety of the mainstream gaming media.
Ha ha. Then I actually played it.
From 4:00pm yesterday until about 5:30am this morning, I did something I haven't done since high school: got completely lost in a game. Completely.
So after thirteen and a half straight hours of (almost) uninterrupted gameplay, I, uh ... yeah. Yeah.
