How much control over the "camera" when using a third-person perspective will players have?

The game can be played in first-person or third-person. Third-person uses an over-the-shoulder view similar to Resident Evil 4 or Gears of War, that allows you to aim and target things without your character’s big head getting in the way. You can zoom the 3rd person camera in and out and position it vertically, but I wouldn’t say that we’re supporting a full isometric view. The camera is tethered to the player and has collision, so if your character goes through a door or runs under a tunnel, the camera will snap in close.

How much freedom will the player character have in dealing with NPCs and how significantly will the consequences of the characters actions affect the game world?

We’re striving to give the player as much freedom as possible, while maintaining a high standard of quality. Evaluating a game by freedom becomes difficult, because people are always able to imagine a level of freedom greater than whatever level we provide. In real life, every situation has infinite possibilities. We, on the other hand, have to pick and choose our battles. We aim to provide as many opportunities for being a Good Samaritan or being Supremely Evil. And of course, as much tasty gray area in between as possible.

Some have criticized the PC version of Oblivion for having a UI that was too much like the console game, not taking enough advantage of higher PC resolutions for things like the inventory UI, etc. How different will the UI for the PC version of Fallout 3 be, compared to the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions?

The interfaces will be very similar in terms of art and layout. We are more sensitive to the PC side of things this time around, and as such the default font is smaller than what we had in Oblivion. We have a number of other things we’re doing to make the PC interface better.

The PC version of Oblivion, obviously, was very mod-friendly and there has been enormous support from the gaming community in producing mods that significantly alter how the game plays. To what degree is Fallout 3 for the PC being designed to be just as community friendly?

The data structure of the game as a whole is similar to Oblivion, so theoretically a modding tool in that vein is possible. The issue becomes that it’s actually a fairly significant amount of work and testing to prepare a tool like our editor for public release, as well as making the game work well with mods. We’d love to do it, but just can’t promise it’s going to happen.

What aspects of Fallout 3's gameplay do you think gamers will end up really latching onto? For example, three months after the game's release, what do you think gamers will be crowing about as their favorite feature or aspect of the game?

My hope is that they’ll be comparing gameplay experiences and talking about the different choices that they made and how it changed things for them. I think we’ll get a lot of talk about particular great VATS sequences that people see. Mostly I hope people get into the game and just get lost inside experiencing the world that we’re creating.

There's been some "controversy" in various gaming forums from fans of the first two games that have reacted very negatively to the direction they perceive this game to be going, relative to the original games. Have you seen any of the negativity and what has been your reaction to it given that this game won't even be released for another year?

I read lots of message boards all over the place, even if they’re negative. I find that even the negative reactions vary quite a bit. You definitely get some people that start to get a bit maudlin or melodramatic, but you can also find a lot that are well-reasoned and very deeply passionate about the series. I think whenever you have something quality that can whip people into a frenzy, it’s a good thing. I would be much more disappointed if we were simply ignored.

Do you think many of the concerns fans of the original Fallout have voiced will be assuaged when they're able to get their hands on the final product?

That’s the hope of course. As you mentioned, there is quite some time to go before this game is actually out there, and we’ve got a lot more info to reveal in a desperately slow trickle, as we’re (in)famous for. I do believe strongly that we’re making a worthy successor to the originals, and I hope that becomes more and more evident as the Big Picture reveals itself.