That was by far my favorite part of FO3, because it’s just so stupid. You get a companion who would literally be the best person for the job, and they go “That’s gonna be a no from me dawg. It’s your destiny to go kill yourself for the sake of the wasteland”. What the fuck dude, do you want me to die?
I’m pretty sure the Broken Steel DLC added the option for Fawkes to actually go in the chamber, but then the game gets all pissy about you not killing yourself. To this day it makes no sense to me, but I’ve grown to accept that Fallout 3 (and by extensions all modern Bethesda titles) is filled with literary nonsense.
I think part of the game berating you for making the followers do it might be because Bethesda couldn’t get Ron Perlman back into the studio to voice more endings for Broken Steel, so they reused the ending lines for making Lyons activate it (in which case it rightfully tells you off for selfishly sending her to die) and made different slides for the new endings with the followers.
Then they killed Lyons off screen anyways to turn the Brotherhood full fash, despite the Lyons definitively leading the Brotherhood to their greatest ever victory and their induction of Wastelanders giving them a loyalist core against exactly that…
But, no, apparently a couple of jackass Exiles were secretly more popular.
Like, don’t get me wrong, perfectly natural development for them to go fash, just don’t do Lyons like that.
The BoS should turn fash, it was one of the writing elements of Fallout 4 I actually enjoyed. The Brotherhood is entirely dull and uninteresting in 3, and their 4 rendition is the natural consequence of rapidly expanding a cult-like insular worship of technology and superiority messiah complex. 1, NV, and 4 had the only interesting forms of the Brotherhood.
I disagree that they were boring, but ironically enough they’re mostly interesting precisely because Elder Lyons was going against the grain to make them the good guys (mostly). Especially when you talk about them in the context of an arc that does end with Maxson’s coup.
I think they came across as boring because the player is somewhat groomed to look at them as the good guy faction, doing mostly good guy things in a situation that desperately needs someone like that, and we go “obviously this is the right thing to do” but, as you mentioned, the BoS shouldn’t be those guys.
Which is kind of funny, because FO3 was designed to introduce a new generation of gamers to the Fallout world but you won’t really understand why Elder Lyon’s decisions are unpopular with some Brotherhood unless you’ve seen the before and after.
I also liked the parallel between Lyons and the Fallout 1 Elder. In Fallout 1 they aren’t quite as fashy as an organization yet but even when faced with an opponent that is everything they are clearly sworn to fight against, actually doing their job is unpopular, going by the comments of the council and the rank and file in the base.
They just want to steal tech and live in bunkers, man, none of this “protecting humanity from the perils of mad science” business.
Your third paragraph is the big point I’m trying to get across, actually! 3 did a lot of reintroducing and playing against type, yet also boxed into a new corner, for many subjects. Super mutants are present for some reason, but are also completely different, as a quick example. It’s familiar yet completely different, it’s aesthetically in line with the classics even if every element is subverted, and I’m not as much of a fan of that. I think it’s better to either stick with the classics for such a reintroduction, or move beyond them and imagine new classic factions, New Vegas only works well because it plays off 3 and 1/2 for a fanbase of both.
Also not a fan that you have to side with them unless you decide to commit genocide, but that’s neither here nor there.
1 is probably my favorite portrayal, but I like how 4 subverts expectations and I like how NV takes the issues of 1 to logical conclusions.
That was by far my favorite part of FO3, because it’s just so stupid. You get a companion who would literally be the best person for the job, and they go “That’s gonna be a no from me dawg. It’s your destiny to go kill yourself for the sake of the wasteland”. What the fuck dude, do you want me to die?
I’m pretty sure the Broken Steel DLC added the option for Fawkes to actually go in the chamber, but then the game gets all pissy about you not killing yourself. To this day it makes no sense to me, but I’ve grown to accept that Fallout 3 (and by extensions all modern Bethesda titles) is filled with literary nonsense.
I think part of the game berating you for making the followers do it might be because Bethesda couldn’t get Ron Perlman back into the studio to voice more endings for Broken Steel, so they reused the ending lines for making Lyons activate it (in which case it rightfully tells you off for selfishly sending her to die) and made different slides for the new endings with the followers.
Then they killed Lyons off screen anyways to turn the Brotherhood full fash, despite the Lyons definitively leading the Brotherhood to their greatest ever victory and their induction of Wastelanders giving them a loyalist core against exactly that…
But, no, apparently a couple of jackass Exiles were secretly more popular.
Like, don’t get me wrong, perfectly natural development for them to go fash, just don’t do Lyons like that.
The BoS should turn fash, it was one of the writing elements of Fallout 4 I actually enjoyed. The Brotherhood is entirely dull and uninteresting in 3, and their 4 rendition is the natural consequence of rapidly expanding a cult-like insular worship of technology and superiority messiah complex. 1, NV, and 4 had the only interesting forms of the Brotherhood.
I disagree that they were boring, but ironically enough they’re mostly interesting precisely because Elder Lyons was going against the grain to make them the good guys (mostly). Especially when you talk about them in the context of an arc that does end with Maxson’s coup.
I think they came across as boring because the player is somewhat groomed to look at them as the good guy faction, doing mostly good guy things in a situation that desperately needs someone like that, and we go “obviously this is the right thing to do” but, as you mentioned, the BoS shouldn’t be those guys.
Which is kind of funny, because FO3 was designed to introduce a new generation of gamers to the Fallout world but you won’t really understand why Elder Lyon’s decisions are unpopular with some Brotherhood unless you’ve seen the before and after.
I also liked the parallel between Lyons and the Fallout 1 Elder. In Fallout 1 they aren’t quite as fashy as an organization yet but even when faced with an opponent that is everything they are clearly sworn to fight against, actually doing their job is unpopular, going by the comments of the council and the rank and file in the base.
They just want to steal tech and live in bunkers, man, none of this “protecting humanity from the perils of mad science” business.
Your third paragraph is the big point I’m trying to get across, actually! 3 did a lot of reintroducing and playing against type, yet also boxed into a new corner, for many subjects. Super mutants are present for some reason, but are also completely different, as a quick example. It’s familiar yet completely different, it’s aesthetically in line with the classics even if every element is subverted, and I’m not as much of a fan of that. I think it’s better to either stick with the classics for such a reintroduction, or move beyond them and imagine new classic factions, New Vegas only works well because it plays off 3 and 1/2 for a fanbase of both.
Also not a fan that you have to side with them unless you decide to commit genocide, but that’s neither here nor there.
1 is probably my favorite portrayal, but I like how 4 subverts expectations and I like how NV takes the issues of 1 to logical conclusions.