Rather hard to advise if you have not played a prior as knowing what to compare it too is difficult, if only i had bought Witcher 3. So far i have only encountered one bug but it seems this varies wildly as some people seem to be reporting the entire game as broken and unplayable but most people i know who own it around 20ish only one has had issues relating to the FPS/terminal bug that can make the game nigh unplayable due to a crash.
From a technical standpoint as before i have had no issues but many people have so waiting for the inevitable patches that will be flooding out in the near time frame (there has already been two) may be a decent idea to fix the more common bugs. Graphics menu and options are really quite disappointing, i'm well aware of how to change my FOV and FPS limiters but having to do so from outside the in-game options is really disappointing for a 2015 title and is a downside.
Gameplay is a mixed bag, as above the options menus have on the surface been dialed down to a mass effect esque style with a tree option system in regards to conversations. Honestly while i dislike the presentation of it (Reeks of made for a console and couldn't be arsed with PC) the actual complexity of responses in terms of options when speaking to NPC's is very akin to F3 and NV and has not really slipped down, in addition the voice acting and some of the responses are bloody hilarious. Anyone owning it i recommend you make a character who's goal is to use the sarcastic option in every conversation as it reminds me so much of the original Fallout's great sense of humour. The only real complaint i have with the new dialog system is that it makes actually telling what your character will say too hard to tell so overall its decent.
Shooting is leagues ahead of where it was in prior games and combat is actually fun and feasible without VATs for those who don't like the concept, add in the fact grenades actually work now and customisations allow you to tweak guns i'm actually having a blast with it. I can't really think of any other open world RPG with a better combat system. (Minus Witcher but i was thinking gun play and things such as Far Cry which is just a glorified FPS don't really count) So combat overall gets a win from me but it has to be said if you really want an RPG with fantastic combat mechanics its worth trying any of the 3 Witcher games if you have not, they all have a different system and style for it but they really are quite excellent in that department.
The world and characters you encounter are good there's no doubting that in my mind, the cast is varied and mostly well executed but the problem is nothing quite stands out as great. In terms of the game world Bethesda have still not been able to top Fallout 3 and the NPC's you encounter don't manage to stand head and shoulders above them either. A bit disappointing to be honest as so far i still prefair the older games as so far as the people you encounter which considering half the new games characters are just "New" versions of old ideas sucks quite badly. Overall disappointing on the character front, the world is cool not to take anything away from it, it's simply that some of the prior games seem to have been better.
My two cents, if you are not dying to play the game but do want to play it holding off for a few weeks would't be a bad idea as AAA games on release are often patchy and that goes double for RPGs. If you don't care at all and are simply contemplating it you could hold off until December as you may get a 10% off or something and every little counts.
Overall i like the game and while i doubt it will be my favourite in the series it makes enough good changes and welcome ideas to make it a worthwhile purchase that i can get a lot of fun from.
But when reading any of that remember i love a lot of the prior games and it may influence my opinion. (Did not however stop me from thinking that Fallout New Vegas was trash, so hey)
