SiKboy posted:

Okay, this is gonna be a wall 'o text, which I will try to keep spoiler free.

First up, things that are in the manual, but you would be amazed how many people dont know about. Your pip-boy has a built in torch. On the Xbox you turn it on and off by holding down B. When you are hacking computers, move the cursor around and if it highlights a matching open and closed bracket select that, it will either eliminate a wrong answer or replenish your guesses. If you are drinking from a water source you can hold down the button to keep drinking instead of repeatedly pressing the button. You can fast travel to locations you have already discovered through the pip-boy map. VATS exists. That last one is because a couple of people in the "times you missed a vital game mechanic" thread somehow missed it, despite it being part of the manditory tutorial section.

Oh, and if you get a book that goes to your inventory, you can read it to gain a skill point. I was an idiot and didnt figure that out for like 5 hours playtime.

Secondly, general hints about the game.

1) Dont try to be a jack of all-trades. If you try to do melee AND energy weapons AND big guns AND small guns you will spread yourself too thin. Pick maybe 2 combat skills to specialise in. Small guns are the most powerful/plentiful near the begining of the game, energy weapons take over around the two thirds mark.

2) I would NOT recommend either unarmed or melee for your first play through. If you want to give either of them a go, you NEED to also boost stealth to get close enough to enemies, and you NEED a back-up combat skill (most people go explosives) because there are the occasional enemies that you just cant reach.

3) The tutorial starts with you as a baby, but you dont need to worry about any decisions you make until Amata wakes you up with news about your dad. At that point, if you want to have all options open to you, try to get out of the vault WITHOUT killing the overseer, and looting everything you can carry on the way. If you do kill him its not a huge deal, but a later quest has fewer possible outcomes.

4) On your way out of the vault, you may want to grab the medicine bobblehead from your dads desk. If you dont, you only get one other chance to get it in the game. If you are wanting to get all the bobbleheads, you NEED to get that one either during the initial escape or the trouble on the home front quest. The only other permanently missable one is in raven rock. You only get one chance to get that one.

5) The game autosaves just before you leave the vault, and lets you change all your skills and stats, how you look, everything. If you want another playthrough, just load that save and make changes and off you go.

6) Lockpicking and Science are both important if you want all the loot. Speech lets you bypass a few minor bumps, and get better rewards, but isnt vital. Similarly Barter. Repair is important, unless you are running an unarmed character.

7) It is possible to sequence-break the main quest. If you want to see all of it, there are a couple of places you do not want to go into if you find them through randomly exploring, before a quest directs you to them. DO NOT go into; the rivet city science lab, Caseys garage or Galaxy News Radio. Obviously once a quest tells you to go there, you can.

8) If you are thinking about getting the DLC for it, the general consensus in the Fallout 3 thread boils down to: Broken Steel is great (and extends the main storyline, without this the end of the story is game over, with this you can get back to the wasteland after completing the story). Point lookout is also great for high-level characters. The Pitt is decent. Operation anchorage is linear and pretty much just combat, but with fantastic rewards. Mothership Zeta is frankly missable.

9) Dont bother taking the perks that give you +10% experience (swift learner). There is more than enough content in the game to have you hitting the level 20 (30 with broken steel) level caps without them. Similarly, I personally find the perks that give you +5 to 2 skills to be a waste of time. On the other hand, the perks that give extra skill points every level or everytime you read a book (Educated and Comprehension) are well worth taking as soon as possible.

10) You can stash things in containers and come back for them later, however most containers arent secure and the stuff you put in them may vanish. The only secure containers are in your house. There are only 2 houses in the game you can obtain, and you can only get one or the other, not both. Which one you get depends on your resolution of the "Power of the Atom" quest. Personally for a first playthrough I would recommend saving the town to get a house there, but whatever floats your boat. If you decide to go the other way, remember to loot the place before you do it. Including the strength bobblehead in Lucas Simms house. If you blow it up, its gone. You can get his key by pickpocketing him or by killing him and looting the corpse

Lastly, if you are wanting to break the game over your knee and make it your bitch:
Get the Operation Anchorage expansion. It scales to your level, I've run a level 5 character through it before without significant problems. The rewards for this mission include a laser sniper rifle, power armour training, power armour that doesnt degrade and the chinese stealth suit, otherwise known as the easy mode armour. You can also do the quest in rivet city to find the runaway robot ridiculously early, get his gun (the best energy weapon for about 75% of the game) and then the reward for turning him in.

If you come across frosted sugar bombs, pre-war books or scrap metal, stockpile them until you find the characters who will buy each off you for signicant amounts of caps.

If you have a lot of patience you can leave the vault, go up the hill to the barn behind the vault enterance which is a random encounter spot. Reload until you get a good random encounter (either the one where you find a wounded deathclaw and a wastelander with the dart gun schematics, or the crashing alien ship).