Fallout 4: Automatron Review

Fallout 4: Automatron is a quick side dish for those looking for new experiences in the Commonwealth. It adds a new story arc, weapons, enemies, and a brand new companion to explore the wasteland, but Automatron still feels shallow.

The villain never manifests into anything meaningful, and the new additions do add interesting dynamics to the standard gameplay mechanics. Automatron doesn’t have a lot of reasons to justify the $9.99 price tag.

Automatron starts with a distress signal from a group of traders looking for help against a group of robots that are attacking them. Eventually, you join up with a new robotic ally called Ada, and unlike other robots, Ada is complete with an entire personality, including human emotions.

After witnessing the death of her entire family, Ada asks you to aid her in taking revenge against the person responsible for the attack, someone called the Mechanist.

As you travel through the wasteland, you’ll encounter new robotic enemies and learn about the Mechanist’s desire to save the Commonwealth. Unfortunately, the payoff isn’t great, with the story being one of the most shallow experiences currently in Fallout 4.

With the exception of some delightfully funny dialogue in the form of a pretentious temporary robotic ally and Ada’s quarry between being more human than machine, the context of Automatron is dry.

The terminals do offer interesting stories, some of the darkest entries I’ve read in Fallout 4 so far, but nothing truly memorable happens. When it finally ends, you’re left with a hollow feeling of accomplishment. Not even the grand reveal of the Mechanist’s identity and motives was enough to give Automatron life.

It’s a shame, the Mechanist had a lot of potential of becoming a great villain but falls short. The pacing is too quick, with information being delivered rapidly. After finishing the main quest line, you’ll travel to a total of three locations, one of which is already in the core game, with little deviation from the same information given to you from the beginning of the adventure.

Everything you hear from the first hour of dialogue is all the information you’ll need until the finale. Compared to the Witcher 3’s Hearts of Stone DLC pack, which costs the same, this is shamefully small.

Customizing robots is the biggest and best new addition to Fallout 4. Here, players can create their robotic allies with a wide assortment of parts, armor, weapons, and voices. Each has its benefits and drawbacks, such as improved mobility, carrying capacity, or firepower.

Each robot can be built with varying cosmetic features such as voice, personality, and color. I spent a lot of time just mixing and matching different options to see which setup would prove ideal for each combat situation.

Fallout 4’s first DLC pack is an unfortunate misstep. Customizing robots and building an army of mechanical monsters is entertaining, but it doesn’t fill the hole left by the empty story.

The Mechanist has potential and Automatron could’ve been great, instead it’s simply mediocre. As of now I’m currently feeling buyers remorse for purchasing the season pass for Fallout 4 after playing through Automatron, hopefully the next expansion erase this uneasy feeling.