Went with Fallout 1 as my entry into the series and I have to say I was not expecting it to be so punishing in so many different aspects. I can't say that I could recommend this game to anyone I know really even though I did enjoy it myself.
The sheer amount of ways that can permanently screw yourself or just straight up die is absurd. You can make your life incredibly hard without even knowing it just at the character creation screen.
I eventually managed to make my way to the water chip without a guide (I did look up a bit of info about character creation and re-created my character once) but after that I started relying on online help more because I could not for the life of me figure out that the Brotherhood wanted me to go to the glow or that the glow needed a rope placed on that one specific spot to be able to descend it. Just missing one dark set of pixels can leave you running around for hours.
I guess it's my own fault for not reading the 70 page manual. With all that said, it was still a fun experience but somewhat brutal experience due to how much knowledge plays a role in what your playthrough looks like. I'm sure if I start a new save right now things will be much, much smoother. Anyways, I'm off to Fallout 2 now. Hopefully, some of the knowledge carries over.
I'm glad you enjoyed the journey! I started with FO2 in the 90s. By far still one of my top ten games and best of the Fallout series up there with Fallout: New Vegas (not surprising since some of the FO2 team had a hand in FO:NV).