Fallout 4 Review (PS5) | Push Square
30.04.2024 - 01:35
/ pushsquare.com
Nearing a decade after its original release, Bethesda has ported Fallout 4 to PS5, promising the kind of improved technical performance that you'd expect from a generation-jumping upgrade. But does the once highly-rated, open world RPG still hold up in 2024?
That's a surprisingly difficult question to answer. Some would argue that Fallout 4 was never that good to begin with, but we've always enjoyed its addictive gameplay loop: the endless cycle of exploring, blasting mutants, and levelling up. Said loop has, in our opinion, stood the test of time, and Fallout 4 remains incredibly moreish with regards to character development, both through the acquisition of loot and the distribution of perk points.
Bethesda's greatest strength has always been its ability to craft worlds that constantly distract from your destination, and Fallout 4's post-apocalyptic Boston is no different. It's an impressively dense map, offering adventure at every turn. It's an open world that you can easily get lost in for hours at a time, especially when you factor in all of the character progression systems that we mentioned above.
But this is where the game starts to fall apart a little — at least by more modern standards. Fallout 4 is often hamstrung by technical limitations — limitations that were already questionable all the way back in 2015. For example, hitting a loading screen every single time that you enter or exit an interior location feels so unbelievably archaic, and that's with the PS5 version's vastly superior load times.
What's more, the game's overall scope is held back by similar limitations. Now, obviously, you wouldn't expect a radiation-soaked wasteland to be teeming with life, but Boston can just feel so… unambitious. There's a general lack of action as you move from place to place, and established settlements like Diamond City and Goodneighbor — supposed hubs of activity and trade — feel like total facades when the combined population count caps at around 30 NPCs.
It's an illusion that was almost acceptable in 2015, but nine years later, and the title's creaky old engine is at fault for a lot of its more noticeable flaws. Of course, no one in their right mind is playing the 2024 re-release of Fallout 4 and damning the developer for not having completely remade the game — but it's hard to overlook the more poorly aged aspects of its design, especially when the open world genre has evolved so much over the last decade or so.
Having said all of that, Fallout 4 does still boast an enticing atmosphere — a sense of eerie wonder that's become a hallmark of the series. There's nothing quite like climbing the ruins of an old skyscraper and gazing out across the wastes, soaking up the inherent loneliness as the game's