I’ve been waiting, not very patiently, for news of the next Fallout series game for some time now, just like all the other fans (I’ve been annoyed with Bethesda, the developer, over their related court battles though, too).  My son texted me today about it, with this image personifying his feelings over how Fallout 4 looks in the trailer (and with XCOM coming out, E3 coming up [June 14], and Doom, too  . . .  his body is looking to explode):

 

Yes.  Finally.  It’s real.

So, like everyone else, I’m sure, I think the trailer is awesome.  It’s a real game trailer–not a theatrical or made-up-in-some-other-way-that-is-not-the-game way.  Fallout 4, according to a Forbes article, is indeed going to take place in Boston.  One could guess from the trailer that the game will take place in the East, since there are orange autumn trees and there’s a grounded ship; I was assuming that a large body of water was nearby.  A Time author guessed that it might be released at the end of this year, and the preorder page at Amazon says it will be released on December 31, 2015.  “Gopher” posting at YouTube shared a source, since been removed from the world, that the release date is October 23, 2015.  This would be neat since it would be the in-game anniversary for the nuking of America.  UPDATE:  Fallout 4 will be released November 10, 2015.  An iOS phone app game, Fallout Shelter, is out now.  (Not for Windows phones, Bethesda?  Cries . . . )

 

The author of the same Forbes article is really excited for the addition of the player’s characters’ voice.  As he says, newer games just have that now, whereas the past Fallout games did not; your character was silent and you chose written dialogue that the in-game character you’re talking with voiced an answer to.  Personally, I don’t care.  I almost like my character being silent better.  Why?  Because I might not necessarily like the voice!  I don’t especially like the “American” accent voice of the female character in Dragon Age: Inquisition, for example.   Would it be better if I just imagined my own voice conversing with the other characters?  I’m not sure . . .

Another Forbes author tries to get us fans to not pre-order Fallout 4, and I agree with him.  I’m not completely sure I’ll be able to stop myself from preordering this particular game, but I agree with him.  I will not preorder . . . I will not preorder . . . (apparently, pre-ordering is a possibility now, if you can get the official site to load for you!  Fallout4.com).  Fallout 4, and possibly the next Elder Scrolls series game, are the only games I would consider preordering.  I learned a lesson from preordering Destiny:  unless you are very sure about a game and its developer, you should not preorder.  We shouldn’t be “voting with our wallets” prior to actually knowing fully about products.

What else do we know about Fallout 4?  Not much.  The music in the trailer is beautiful and continues the Fallout tradition of using well-chosen music that creates a certain atmosphere–melancholy and sadness, interspersed with the intermittent and fleeting beauty of humanity.  The song, “It’s All Over but the Crying,”  by the way, is sung by Ink Spots.  The absolutely perfect introductory song in Fallout 3 (2008) was all by the Ink Spots.  I love that song and its accompanying cinematic.  So, I’ll share that here in case you don’t know it (this video also contains the game introduction after the song):

I’ll update this post as I find out more about Fallout 4.

Update:  For a detailed review of Fallout 4, Fallout 4. Sometimes Bigger Isn’t Better (Overview) and Fallout 4. Sometimes Bigger Isn’t Better (Story).  Thanks for checking them out!