Um. How do you come to the conclusion that they're trying to "remove a lot of the dark and gritty stuff"?

Since everything points towards that not being true?

Because they removed killable kids, apprently removed prostitutes and slavers, and removed the drugs.

He can't murder children and it pisses him off.

Edit: Hahaha he ninja'd me but I was right! Also they're not removing the drugs at all, he talked about them a ton in the developer walkthroughs. I don't know about the rest, though.

Also, I don't remember reading about it before but from the hands on it sounds like we're going to get fairly detailed equipment slots on our character, ie hats and shirts and gloves and what not. If it's true, that's one feature from Oblivion I would gladly welcome. Even moreso if it's like Morrowind and you can have clothes under your armor.

So your knickers are in a twist because you can't kill kids? And when did they remove drugs, and where's any evidence for the removal of prostitutes and slavers?

I mean, prostitute removal would do zip on the game, because other than a few extremely minor things, they were just unnamed, untalkative NPCs that dressed slutty and wagged their hips while they moved.

EDIT: I think there's just a Head slot and a Body slot, though I could be completely wrong.

I don't think they've removed drugs. It's just Australia's board of game rating refuses to rate it with the drug use intact, making it unsellable in Australia. I don't think they're actually planning on removing it, at least, not in all countries.

That would explain why I was under that impression. I still kept hearing that there were no more slavers though, this makes me sad because thats how I made money in the first 2.

Yes, actually. The point isn't that I want to kill kids. It's that the fact that such options is there is part of what makes the other Fallouts cool.

Granted, I can't speak from experience because I haven't really played it much, but I know the amount of choices, and the fact that the story actually writes itself around said choices, is what drew me to try Fallout in the first place. But we aren't talking to each other right now.

I agree with you. I would rather have that in. However, killable kids is one, minor option. I find it kind of silly to nitpick over one detail.

No, but it marks a change in the approach to the gameplay; less concern for making things completely open-ended, and that makes me much more wary. Because it's a lot easier to have all those choices just add up to variations in the ending, rather than having an evolving plot.

Personally, I'm guessing the open-endedness will be watered down at best, but I suppose we'll see.

I hope you people realize if things like killable kids and prostitutes are not in when it comes out, modders will probably put them in. Bethesda is good for letting modders have free reign.