I have around 20 hours of gameplay, played through FIXT so Steam doesn't count it.


As technically impressive and influential as Fallout 1 was in the 90s, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who hasn't played it already, or has historical curiosity.

The game is PAINFULLY slow. I mean every ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ action takes so long, the game has like a few hours worth of content that you may stretch over weeks worth of artificially bloated gameplay because every action takes either seconds to perform or several clicks to initiate. You will also reload a lot, an action that takes about 10 times longer than it should.

My annoyance with Fallout 1 is further compounded by it's awful scripting. The game will tell you what to do, you will understand the assignment but not have a clue as to how you're supposed to execute it within constraints of game mechanics. Most (if not all) of the struggle I've had with the game stemmed from it's poorly explained and convoluted mechanical expectations. Don't get me wrong though, I like (encourage, even) complex, convoluted and hidden mechanics in video games. Exploring and mastering them in Fallout 1 just wasn't fun, it was tedious.

Some other complaints include: Awful completely outated party / companion system, awful inexcusable sluggish turn based combat (right around time when Jagged Alliance 2 came out, btw), no map, TERRIBLE grid based traveling system, bad dialogue system...

Give it a try if you have the patience of a saint, are willing to use a guide (which is a sin) or are a curious historian like myself.

Poor man's cRPG. Traded good combat and in depth leveling systems and mechanics for a bunch of character drama and MMO garbage tier combat in a glorified social sim.

Complete casual slop, not for me.

love it

Gameplay is good the setting is just so painfully uninteresting, I just couldn't get into it at all.
I will say again the combat is good, it's actually difficult, which I would say for very few games of this genre.

I like this game. It reminds me most of Salt and Sanctuary and Dark Souls made 2D.
That is perhaps my favorite game niche so I could recommend Vigil off that alone.

It's not perfect however, I took issue with late game writing (it went from the usual souls-like cryptic to pure absurdity) content recycling, combat being too floaty (issue that plagues almost all souls-likes, 2D and 3D) and a couple other tiny ones such as the save system. (You manually save the game, wtf)

It's like a poor man's Salt and Sanctuary.

This is a recommendation with a caveat.

The writing and themes are genuinely top-tier, easily the strongest part of the game. The lore and overall concept are extremely smart and well thought out.

Unfortunately, the gameplay seriously overstays its welcome. Combat is repetitive and juvenile, and while the setting is amazing to look at, it’s surprisingly tedious to explore. Too much of the lore is delivered through scattered documents across huge areas, which turns discovery into a chore.

Brilliant ideas and atmosphere, dragged down by mediocre, overlong gameplay.

The game starts off great, falls off terribly. One of the worst endings I've seen in gaming, not to mention technical problems on modern systems and horrid late game puzzles. Do yourself a favor and skip this one.

safe mediocre casualslop, nothing good or bad worthy of mentioning... and those games, in my opinion, are the worst.
Id honestly rather play something bad than something this bland and safe.

wokeslop

You follow NPCs around, watch cutscenes and the few times you actually engage in some gameplay it's really old, unresponsive clunky combat. It's not even fully voiced. Not exactly how I would describe "a good game".

This thing came out the same year as Witcher 3? Embarrassing.