I miss the random encounters such as the crashed Federation shuttle, the Guardian of Forever that sent you back to Vault 13 to crash the water chip. Or who could forget that one in FO2 where you meet the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse with them venting about their lot in life.
shareWell, wild wasteland was always just a opportunity to throw in some pop culture reference easter eggs on the level of "memba this." The ones from classic fallout seemed more robust, but they also "took the good ones." It is too bad they were absent from 3. And NV's were either kinda dumb "nuking the fridge" or a little obscure these days like "Romanes eunt domus."
However in all of the games, in a serious playthru I never took it. I favored useful traits over cosmetic ones.
"Who built this f#(%!^g police station." -- Leon Kennedy