LogFAQs > #929146365

Any two of my playthroughs had Couriers who could say the exact same line, but in my head they were saying it in a different tone of voice for entirely different reasons. That gives more flexibility to a character than every option you choose being a variation of "yes", with a voice-actor delivering the line the same way every single time. And because each Courier felt different to me, I felt more invested in their stories. I was interested to see where they'd go, and what they'd do there, and why. Which side they'd pick. And how they might occasionally surprise me (on my first run, I was going to go House all the way, but balked when he demanded that I destroy the Brotherhood of Steel, because I'd already recruited Veronica and done the BoS quests and wasn't willing to murder all those people. But House won't allow you to progress unless you do, and by that point the NCR and Legion have categorically locked off their faction quests, so I was forced into killing House and going with Yes Man).

Character and alignment also sort of shaped which missions I'd do. Couriers inclined to support the NCR would do the missions that strengthen the NCR, while Couriers aligned to House or the Legion would generally tend to skip them. Some of my Couriers were diplomatic and cunning enough to try and play all sides against each other early on, to avoid conflict, but I also had Couriers who murdered Legion wherever they found them without hesitation in spite of the fact that would result in tough assassins trying to track me down all the time. I'd recruit different companions, go different places, do different things, for different reasons. And each run was interesting in its own way.

By contrast, in FO3, I felt like I had zero choice. Sure, I could choose to ignore the main story and just go exploring (which really isn't a "choice"), but the entirety of the main story itself basically boiled down to "follow your dad". Even after he dies, you're still just following in his footsteps, doing what HE wanted, achieving HIS dream. You get precisely two moments of actual choice, one of which is incredibly stupid, and one of which is absolutely flawed and asinine (namely, sabotaging the water purifier for the Enclave which also hurts you, and sacrificing yourself to stop the nuclear reaction even if there are people in your party who are 100% immune to radiation). The Broken Steel DLC fixes the second problem, sort of (but it still gives you an ending where it literally mocks you for not committing pointless suicide, because you refused to do your job like a good little puppet and fulfill the thematic arc the writer was so convinced was utterly brilliant), but ultimately you're still more or less the same character every time, doing the same things, for the same reasons, with no freedom, no agency.

FO4 attempts to ape the more meaningful choices of New Vegas by adding factions, but does so in the most inconsequential way possible. And most of the plot is still railroading right from the intro cutscene until you find Shaun, at which point you're really only being given a single choice with two forks - ie, do you side with the Institute or fight them - with the minor choice of which faction you choose to side with against them (because the other three are all technically mutually exclusive). And ironically, breaking the game technically gives you the "best" outcome - shoot Father when you meet him, and the BoS questline breaks, but they don't go hostile. The Railroad questline also breaks (forcing you into the Minutemen ending), but they won't go hostile either if you evacuate the Institute before you destroy it. This is literally the only way to keep all three factions peaceful - every other ending pisses off every faction other than the one you're in.
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"Wall of Text'D!" --- oldskoolplayr76
"POwned again." --- blight family