Speaking of studios that keep remaking the same game: in 1994, Bethesda Softworks released The Elder Scrolls: Arena (so called because, initially, it was meant to be a team deatmach-oriented actioner that saw you conquer gladiatorial arenas to become "grand champion"). It was a vast but shallow game with sophmoric writing, a procedurally-generated world, quests that alternated between "combat or fetch," buggy programming and gameplay that eventually "(became) mechanical and repetitious," was "no more than a very sophisticated dungeon crawl with minimal plot" and lacked "real role-playing elements (or) a solid storyline."

Truly, Arena's main appeal was its scale and technical improvements (such as a day/night cycle, dynamic melee combat and procedurally generated world) to a long-static genre, with its RPG credentials being largely a tacked-on afterthought.

And while, during its 37-year existence, Bethesda has acquired a score of new IPs (such as Flashpoint Productions or id Software) and successfully published some excellent games (like Dishonored, Wolfenstein: The New Order, The Evil Within or Deathloop); as a game studio, they never really moved beyond the Arena formula, with every new game (such as Morrowind, Oblivion, Fallout 3 or Starfield) merely rehashing what they already knew worked without much variation or innovation. And, for better or worse, Fallout 4 follows in the footsteps of said tradition.

What's it about?

In Fallout 4, you "play" (and I use the word loosely) the "Sole Survivor": the wife (or husband) of a family of three who, handily, get put on ice right on the brink of the nuclear apocalypse. The contrived plot sees you briefly, conveniently, awaken from cryo-sleep to see your spouse murdered and your child abducted only to then be put under once again. When you finally regain control of your character, you are released onto a vast map of the Northeastern United States and given free reign to pursue the main plot or engage in one of a myriad side "quests."

It's the same treatment you've seen in every Bethesda game to date (a brief opening vignette which serves as a tutorial and largely fails to establish an emotional investment) and it plays out about as well as you'd expect.

How's it play?

While the original Fallout games (or even the more FPS-inclined Fallout: New Vegas) were stat-driven RPGs, Fallout 4 is an odd mix of FPS and construction (?) that may be steeped in Fallout lore, but – gameplay-wise – has very little in common with what the franchise used to stand for.

Going by Interplay's (and later Black Isle's) standards, Fallout was meant to be a roleplaying game that offered great player agency. Regardless of whether you wanted to play a brainy technophile with poor interpersonal skills, a musclebound bonehead who let his fists do the talking, a sultry seductress who could turn every conversation to her advantage or Gun Guy who Shot Guns Real Good (small, big or energy), the game offered you the freedom to Play As You Want.

Fallout 4, on the other hand, is very much a shooter. Pretty much every perk you can pick affects combat – with even the persuasion skills requiring a gun – and although the Sole Survivor couple's better half is billed as a lawyer, if you head into the game expecting to talk, you will be sorely disappointed. Roughly 80 hours into the game, my lawyer had 49 successful persuasion checks, but had killed 3103 people (and not because she wanted to – just in the course of regular gameplay).

The game's dialogue is simplified to the point of being meaningless, with dialogue trees being a binary, "pick one of four ways to resolve this exchange" selection – which would be a shame if the writing was anything other than serviceable. As it stands, however, the only reason Fallout 4 dialogue exists is to tell you where you have to go and who you have to shoot at.

Shooting aside, the game uses five basic mechanics to keep you occupied, with Crafting, Construction, Lockpicking/Hacking, Companions and Quests as the only activities to engage in.

Crafting gives you a decent system to modify weapons, armor and Power Armor, which lets you customize said items to your liking. It's neat, but not really deep enough to serve as little more than a distraction. Unless you're Stat-Obsessed, you could go through the whole game using items you find on the way and be none the worse for it.

Construction lets you build structures, decorations, power sources and defenses, which sounds (and, up to a point, is) fun, until you meet the Minutemen (one of the four Fallout 4 factions), who promptly subvert it into an annoying, repetitive trudge that turns your character into an overworked landlord not only responsible for meeting settlement needs, but also continuously on the lookout for scrap required to build them. So while the mechanic is deep enough to be interesting, the way you are forced to use it is more of a recurring stumbling block than an enjoyable activity.

Lockpicking/hacking are minigames that let you open doors or containers and largely unchanged from Fallout 3. On their own, they are utilitarian and unobtrusive, but their oversaturation in the game world can quickly get annoying (especially once you realize that every new location is just an excuse for a safe, a locked door or a password-protected terminal).

Companions are a mixed bag of wafer-thin personalities – each with their own likes and dislikes – who can, eventually, open up to your character a little and even give you a unique perk (yay?). But not one of them (save for Dogmeat who's a Very Good Boy!) feels like more than a "wouldn't it be cool if" idea at a pitch meeting, with shallow backstories, formulaic interactions and a lack of overall impact that may beat traveling on your own, but in no way compares to the likes of a Misc and Boo, an HK-47, a Dak'kon, or a Jackie Welles.

Lastly, Quests are merely an excuse for more shooting. Honestly, I don't think there is a single "quest" in Fallout 4 that can be resolved without some shooting taking place... I'd like to blame this on Bethesda acquiring id Software/Doom folks, but – as we've established – substance has never been their strength. Worst offenders are the so-called Radiant Quests, which are essentially procedural "go to X and kill Y" "tasks" that never end. If Preston Garvey tells you to help out a settlement and you do it, don't go back and tell him as much: you'll just get more busywork as a reward...

The fact that the game insists on constantly saddling you with more of these endless annoyances may well be my least-liked aspect of the entire experience (although, to be fair, its existence is poor masking of the fact that the core experience of Fallout 4 isn't that much better).

Is it fun?

Not to be obtuse (said the triangle), but – it depends.

If you pick up Fallout 4 because you liked the deep interactions or varied gameplay of the original Fallout games, gird yourself for disappointment. The only Fallout fans I could recommend this game to are ones who liked Fallout 3 (which was even more boring). It's an inherently sad statement, but – in terms of writing? – even Fallout Tactics was more engaging than this...

In fact, the gamers who will most enjoy Fallout 4 aren't existing Fallout fans at all. The game has more in common with FPS+ (shooters with stats) open world exploration games like the S.T.A.L.K.E.R series, Dying Light or Far Cry. If you like exploring vast areas and don't mind doing the same six activities (but mostly shooting) in each, you'll like this game just fine.

Classified properly (as a shooter with a plot rather than "an action RPG"), Fallout 4 is not a bad game. But even within the ranks of fellow FPS+ games, it does get grindy, repetitive and boring quick.

Summation

Combining trends I'm not fond of (subverting a franchise to sell something completely different, watering-down writing in favor of Mindless Violence and tacking on side activities to cover for the lack of engaging core gameplay); with pretty good level design (as a former Boston native, I found myself recognizing many downtown areas from first-hand experience) and engaging action gameplay, Fallout 4 is a mixed experience catered to the action crowd moreso than the core Fallout audience. The gameplay may be repetitive and shallow, but – for what it is – it's good enough.

If you are looking for a huge time-sink (and don't get bored easily), this game'll occupy you indefinitely. Just don't expect to get anything deep or meaningful out of it.

29 years ago, a reviewer of The Elder Scrolls: Arena (having had expressed pretty much the same criticisms I just levelled at Fallout 4) wrote she hoped "a little polishing up of the basic engine, a little scaling back of the size, and the inclusion of some real role-playing elements ... with a solid storyline" were "well within Bethesda's abilities." And – I agree: I think, if they wanted to, Bethesda could easily elevate their games to a whole different level of complexity and engagement...

The fact they have still not done so must mean deeper, more involving gameplay was never their intent.

Pig Recommends:

• -if you do get into Fallout 4, acquaint yourself with some basic console commands (at the very least "player.modav carryweight amount" to increase your character's carry weight and "player.additem code" to spawn the junk you'll need for pesky settlement building); trust me — even with these aids, the game will still waste plenty of your time;