Fallout 4 Locks An Important Mechanic Behind DLC & It Hurts The Base Game

Summary

• The base game of
  Fallout 4
  lacked ammo crafting, a key feature included in the
  Contraptions Workshop
  DLC.
• Hiding a core mechanic behind a settlement supplement pack is frustrating.
• Fallout: New Vegas
  included ammo crafting for free, showing up the
  Fallout 4
  approach.

There’s a lot to enjoy in the base version of Fallout 4, but one particular feature that didn’t show up until DLC definitely should have been included for free. Fallout 4 has always had a somewhat contentious space in the franchise, and a big part of it is a feeling that the game falls into a one step forward, two steps back problem. Enhanced gunplay and settlement building are just a couple of the significant new attractions, but missing Fallout roleplaying elements and fewer narrative complexities can be disappointing compared to prior titles.

When it comes to DLC, Fallout 4 follows the other games in adding several significant story expansions, and Far Harbor in particular certainly has its share of fans. Less fundamentally involving are the several workshop add-ons available for Fallout 4, which mostly add extra content for settlement building. These can be exciting for fans of that particular aspect of the game, but anyone who doesn’t spend much time on the settlement side of things might easily look past them. Unfortunately, however, ignoring the workshop add-ons entirely ends up missing out on a key game feature.

Ammo Crafting Shouldn’t Be In Fallout 4 DLC

The Contraptions Workshop DLC Features A Core Mechanic

The mechanic in question can be found in the Contraptions Workshop DLC, which grants purchasers access to the Ammunition Plant in-game. True to its name, this provides the only method of crafting ammo in Fallout 4, a nice complement to the weapon crafting options found in the base game. It’s hard to understand why it’s locked behind an extra purchase, however, as ammo crafting would have been a useful feature to have in the base game. At any rate, it’s a feature with wider appeal than additions focused purely on settlements, making the way it’s bundled a generally frustrating choice.

Befitting its inclusion in Contraptions Workshop, ammo crafting gears itself toward being a large-scale affair. An ammunition plant unit can be deployed solo, but it’s still going to need to draw power from a generator and receive orders from a terminal. Committing to a series of ammunition plants makes it easy to build a whole factory dedicated to the purpose, with conveyor belts and storage helping to ensure that the entire process can run smoothly even when the Sole Survivor isn’t around.

An ammunition factory will still need to be fed enough materials to keep production going, but it can tick along on its own as long as that requirement is met.

If ammo was something that essentially rained down in Fallout 4, crafting might seem somewhat irrelevant, but maintaining a stable supply can take some effort. Scavenging is a valuable part of the wasteland experience, so the fact that acquiring ammo isn’t all that easy is generally a good thing. Being able to craft ammo with the right materials feeds into the concept of scavenging rather than detracting from it, however, so it feels like it should be a given inclusion.

Fallout: New Vegas Includes Ammo Crafting For Free

Fallout 4 Regresses From One Of The Best Fallout Games

An unflattering point of comparison can be found in Fallout: New Vegas, which showed Fallout 4 up by including a robust ammo crafting system in the base game. It’s an improvement from Fallout 3, which also stuck the feature into a DLC, and returning to the DLC approach feels like a regression in a series that should continually be moving forward. New Vegas was developed by Obsidian Entertainment rather than Bethesda Game Studios, but considering its rushed development, this kind of addition should serve as a challenge for the in-house games to meet and exceed rather than a development to ignore.

In the case of Fallout: New Vegas, the lack of settlement features means that ammo crafting is handled at a standard workbench, integrating it a little more deeply with the principal gameplay loop. While Fallout 4 tends to split each possible category for crafting among unique tools, New Vegas workbenches shoulder a heavy load, as they can also be used to make weapons and aid items. Ammo can be made with the usual raw materials and recycled shells, and leveling up the Repair skill makes it possible to craft unique ammo types that make the system worth using.

Fallout 4 Evolves The Series In The Wrong Way

Bethesda Has An Inconsistent Grip On Which Features Matter

It’s only natural that a game series will gain some mechanics and lose others as it progresses, and shedding some features to make way for the new isn’t always a bad thing. In the case of Fallout 4, however, the focus on settlement building over mechanics that integrate more evenly feels like more of a regression in design than anything. Selling back a cut feature in the form of DLC later on also proves that it still has its place in the affair, which makes the pill especially hard to swallow.

More recently, Bethesda has received plenty of criticism for the space-faring RPG Starfield, which felt incomplete and under-baked at launch in a number of core areas. Months going by without any major updates made this situation especially frustrating, but new features have finally started to come to Starfield, and the fact that many are getting added for free rather than bundled into the upcoming Shattered Space DLC is definitely a good thing.

At the same time, the path to improving Starfield is a reminder that Bethesda remains a bit lost on what features to prioritize. Community feedback shouldn’t have been necessary to understand that additions like land-based vehicles would be nice to have in a planetary exploration game. Re-orienting to focus on the essential gameplay concepts will be necessary for games like the inevitable Fallout 5 to evolve in meaningful ways instead of tossing more valuable features by the wayside.

The lack of ammo crafting in the base game definitely isn’t a breaking point for Fallout 4, and the Contraptions Workshop DLC comes in at a modest $4.99 price tag that isn’t likely to break the bank. It’s still a sore point, however, and it’s unfortunate that many players may never even know it exists by merit of skipping out on the DLC. Fallout 4‘s approach to DLC overall isn’t a terrible one, but when it comes to ammo crafting, there’s just no good reason that it shouldn’t have been there to begin with.