A radio show called Coast to Coast AM with George Noory had been discussing the topic of dreams when someone called in and described some dreams that he had been having that may just sound awfully familiar to anyone who has played Fallout 3. The guy calling in does a fantastic job of keeping a straight "radio face" as he describes his so-called dreams about blue jumpsuits, a vault and a wasteland. The host of the show is obviously completely oblivious to the fact that it is all a big joke and refers to the scenario as "scary", whilst asking the caller how far in the future the dreams took place. Bravo to this guy for pulling it off so well and not doing something like shouting "lol noob, PWnZoRED!" at the end. Maybe there is still hope for gamers.

Just yesterday, I wrote an article about how Fable 2 broke the one million copies sold mark in it’s first week on the shelves. As you all know, Fable 2 has a huge fanbase and is proving to be immensely successful. The smile on Lionhead’s faces can only go so far then they find out this next bit of news. …

You need to sit up and pay attention, because if you don't, you may very well miss out on what is quite possibly one of the most incredible titles to ever grace the modern gaming world.... Things start getting interesting, when your father finds a way to get out of the bunker, leaving you in all sort of trouble with the local head honcho, so you make an escape to the outside world to find out where he has gone.... Yes this game is huge and yes it involves more than just shooting anything that moves, but what Bethesda have done here is create something so incredibly massive, yet simultaneously made it so deep and intriguing that you will be hard pressed to find a moment of your daily life that isn't spent wishing you were on the couch playing the game some more.... While it does involve guns, it's not quite what you would call an action shooter but at the same time, with all of the action, you will not be able to sit back and call it a standard run-of-the-mill western RPG either. The Vault Dweller's Survival Guide While the entire game is handled from a first person perspective, a lot of the action will be handled with your V.A.T.S (Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System). Basically, you can use your own abilities to try and shoot at your enemies (although skill levels of your character still influence accuracy), but enemies are quite tough and ammo can be scarce, so you want to make every shot count.... The V.A.T.S system is really simple and allows you to select which part of the enemy to shoot at as well as telling you what kind of percentage you have of making the shot and how much damage it will do.... The greatest part of this game mechanic is that once you have accepted your actions, the camera switches to a dynamic external view, allowing you to watch the action unfold as your characters let's loose with his hand cannon of choice.... When it comes to character leveling, I don't want to go into too much detail, but you can be assured that the leveling and perks system has been polished as well, so that even those new to RPG's will not have any trouble figuring it out in minutes.... The game uses the same engine that was used for Oblivion, but when you see it in action you will wonder which one of the programmers had sold his soul to satan, just to get it to do the things that it's doing now.... Those who played Oblivion will also be happy to know that this time, Bethesda hired more than four voice actors, so you won't be running into tons of characters with the exact same voice.... In only a few days, I have managed to wrack up a massive 26 hours of game time and the truth is that I am only starting to get into the meat of the game now.... In Fallout 3 however, the story is so engaging and missions so interesting that instead of feeling like I am wondering around in one game, it feels like I have completed many little ones.... The truth is that I haven't been this drawn in to a game for years and to give you my reasoning, when I put the game in my console for the first time, I only managed to stop playing 14 hours later and it was only because a mean thunderstorm forced me to unplug all of my devices.... Besides those of you who have any issues with swearing and violence, I can fully recommend this as a must-have title that will add a considerable amount of value to your console purchase and could very well be my choice for game of the year.

Last week we had an article shoot through the roof because PSM has said that Fallout 3 does not look as good on the PS3 as it does on the Xbox 360 version. Well to help us make our own minds up, GamesRadar have released a comparison video showing off the two version running side by side. I do apologise for the squashed video but it is the way that they have uploaded it, so it does tend to mess up the graphics somewhat. So take a look for yourself and let us know which one you think looks better. All I can say is that it's looking damn fine on both at the moment, regardless of which one people think looks better.

As many of you will already know, Fallout 3, created by acclaimed developers, Bethesda SoftWorks, will be hitting South African shelves this Friday. With the current line up of games this season, it has become increasingly tough to decide on which game/games to spend your money on. While Farcry 2 has been quite popular, Fable 2 has seen massive sales and popularity in most regions. So which one to chose? Fallout 3 reviews are pouring out onto the net this week and the game is pulling in a current aggregate of 93/100 on Xbox 360 and PC and 90/100 for the PS3 on Metacritic. Perfect scores (100/100) have been given by some of the major sites and magazines such as 1UP, Gamespy, GamePro, Official Xbox Magazine and EuroGamer which really surprises me considering that a lot of the seem to be unusually negative and cynical when it comes to their review scores. Scrolling down also revealed that the lowest score given for the game was an 80, meaning that even the ones who didn't really like it, still kinda liked it. Is Fallout 3 the (not completely) unexpected overall winner across all platforms of this seasons line-up? With all the rest of the Xbox 360 and PS3 exclusives yet to arrive, we can't really tell yet. What I can tell is that this game looks like it's going to be worth the money and should keep a lot of us happy for quite a long time to come.

So... you have heard all these great things about Fallout 3, which is releasing at the end of this week. The game sounds really interesting but you really have absolutely no idea of what to expect. What happened in the first two games and why were they so popular? This awesome retrospective created by Gametrailers.com takes us back to the beginning and explains the whole deal. If you are interested in Fallout 3 but never had the chance to play any of the previous versions, check this out.

Notes on Pulling the Sky Down is a designer’s diary over at the official Fallout 3 website that takes a look at the soon-to-be released RPG’s level design philosophies,  there’s a taste of what to expect after the jump. Last Updated: October 17, 2008