Thoughts on Fallout 4

Fallout 3 was such an intense time sink for me. I spent so long doing everything but the story line of that game that 3 months after I ‘finished’ it I finally went back and beat it. In fact I remember so much about that game but very little about the story of it.
Fallout 4 is not going to be the same. Four is different in that you get to see some of the world before the war, before the vaults. Your character was a war veteran and on the morning that the bombs are dropped that wipe out/change the world you are just hanging out in your house getting ready for a speech. After creating your character (which if you enjoy that sort of thing will take you a minimum of 20 minutes) you go through a few basic ‘about me’ type of situations then shit hits the fan. You hear of bombs falling and then your character and your wife/husband, bearing your infant child, make a run for the nearest vault.
There you are cryogenetically frozen, something you had no idea would happen. Shortly after that (in play time) the triggers begin for the story. Eventually you wake up 200 years in the future.
      Predictably the game doesn’t hold your hand. You get thrown right in there. You get a pretty nice vault suit and you’re handed some weapons and ammo. After that it’s up to you what you do. My brother-in-law complained early on that he died too much, he got lost in high level zones. My husband and I joke that we’ll never beat it. We get lost in the scavenging and building.
That for me is the big draw of this newest game. The building. You’re given chances to befriend and make outposts and towns. You maintain these by providing food and water and defenses. You can make supply lines between them and recruit more people to them. You can build the houses and things you need. Google ‘buildings in Fallout 4’ or check the FO4 subreddit. Some of the things people build are crazy.
Bethesda has also done the thing it’s always done, the moral choices. You have to choose ultimately between three (sort of four but the Minutemen from  my understand are cool with most others) factions that change the way the game end. The Institute, the Railroad, or the Brotherhood of Steel. I’m still working on this and trying to pick, but I’m leaning to the Railroad. My brother-in-law picked the Institute. I’m interested to see why.
Honestly I’m still working through it, slowly, but my initial thoughts? I love it so far. I love roaming around and seeking what I need. I love the quests, how they can be small simple things (“Clear out the library, I used to like it there”) to ridiculous (The Silver Shroud!) to deep and fraught with meaning (the whole damn main story line?). Don’t buy it unless you
are ready for a new commitment and relationship though. Seriously. The jokes about people not seeing their SOs because of this game do not exaggerate. If I didn’t live with my husband and also play the game it’d be weird here.
And… DOGMEAT IS BACK! LONG LIVE DOGMEAT!