Fallout: New Vegas

[BasiliskWrangler]

I was all excited to wake up today and get myself a copy of Fallout: New Vegas. But then the very first thing I read was this: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/10 ... -obsidian/

Not too hopeful now.

[CrazyBernie]

Yeah, that's the sort of stuff I was worried about. Why they gotta be like that? >.<

I'm gonna go with:
1) "They were rushed." Frakkin' Corporate deadlines.
2) Frakkin' console ports.

Assuming those annoying bugs get wrapped up, I hate it when games suffer from consolitis. Crysis 2 actually has me worried about this.

Annoyances aside, at least it sounds like the gameplay/story is all right.

[Arkos]

Also worth notice:

360 Getting Exclusive Fallout New Vegas DLC

Sucks to be a PC or PS3 gamer, eh?

[BasiliskWrangler]

Also worth notice:

360 Getting Exclusive Fallout New Vegas DLC

Sucks to be a PC or PS3 gamer, eh?

Gaming is so damn political. Exclusive content, fixed pricing, backroom distribution deals, and let's not forget favorable reviews in exchange for huge amounts of advertising dollars. <sigh>

No wonder I have all but stopped purchasing AAA games. But, I've spent over $200 in the past year on indie/casual titles. Well, back to Minecraft until the first round of New Vegas patches come out.

[sirdilznik]

I was afraid it would be a buggy mess at launch. Even the highly positive reviews I've read point out the fact that the game is quite broken right now. That's the problem a lot of times when a team is hired out by a publishing company, they feel the need to make a deadline and rush out a product to the masses which is at BETA stage at best.

On the other hand I don't have the scratch to dish out on the game right now anyway and by the time I do it will likely be patched up into a much more polished state.

[BasiliskWrangler]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToKIkw3LIoQ

[sirdilznik]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToKIkw3LIoQ

I think we need to get Doc Mitchell an exorcist ASAP!

[Arkos]

Gaming is so damn political. Exclusive content, fixed pricing, backroom distribution deals, and let's not forget favorable reviews in exchange for huge amounts of advertising dollars. <sigh>

No wonder I have all but stopped purchasing AAA games. But, I've spent over $200 in the past year on indie/casual titles. Well, back to Minecraft until the first round of New Vegas patches come out.

I hear ya. If I hadn't discovered Basilisk Games, and then consequently, indie gaming in general, I probably would have just given up on gaming by now.

[sirdilznik]

I haven't stopped buying AAA titles altogether but I will say I've spent significantly more money on indie games than on AAA titles in the past couple of years. In my case though it's not so much for the reason of politics (though I hate the politics too) but because indie games tend to be different and imaginative, not to mention often times more fun. Indie developers are more likely to experiment or produce titles in a style that AAA developers consider long dead while AAA developers and publishers mainly just want to shove another Call of Duty or COD clone down your throat, and I need another COD clone like I need a hole in my head.

[Iane]

A HUGE disappointment and is worse than Fallout 3 - unoptimized engine - half finished scenery - fall through scenery - lifeless world (not many enemy's) - empty world (locations that have nothing at them and are meaningless and very little to explore - it's a boring World ) you have to shoot 5000 rounds at something to kill it AGAIN ?????? - you need HIGH skills to finish starting Quests ???

In all a very lifeless boring game so far

[BasiliskWrangler]

Decided to pick this game up. It's pretty good, and I am not seeing the bugs that early reviewers complained about.

I am about 15 hours into it. It's just not...uh..."super fun". It's not bad at all, and I have been in some cool shootouts, but I'm just not finding the game as exciting as Fallout 3 was. I'll have no problem seeing the game through to the end, and it definitely has a solid RPG feel to it.

One thing is for sure: if I ever hear anyone complain about "too much walking" in Eschalon I am going to suggest playing Fallout: New Vegas. I have spent more time walking across vast expanses of desolate wasteland than doing anything else. Don't get me wrong, I like exploration so I'm not complaining, but the minute or so it takes to walk across an Eschalon map is nothing compared to the distances you have to walk in F:NV.

[edit] Oh, and I will say the enemy HP thing is absolutely stupid. It's not uncommon for a "normal human" to take 4 or 5 close-range shotgun blasts to the torso or head and still come at you. Instead of allowing guns to perform realistically and adjusting the gameplay thusly, they just treat guns like long-range melee weapons.

[Iane]

Not to mention the engine bug that has been there since oblivion that they still have not fixed

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/s ... ?t=1525127

And yes I get this on my GTX 295 GPU ???? EPIC Fail Beth

[sirdilznik]

I finally splurged and got Fallout New Vegas about a week ago and frankly I think the game is fantastic. I don't know if the patch Bethesda and Obsidian put out fixed a lot of the issues but I haven't been seeing many bugs at all. More importantly I think the game is a blast. It will definitely feel very familiar to anyone that's played Fallout 3 but I think Fallout NV feels significantly more like Fallout 1 & 2 than Fallout 3 ever did. There are tons of references to locations, events, and characters in the first two games and even a few digs at those games. Also they brought traits back and there is a hardcore mode which forces you to sleep, eat, and drink regularly or suffer penalties.

Other things I like about the game are the companions: Rose of Sharon Cassidy is pretty awesome, Lily is flat out hilarious, ED-E is great because of the sweet battle music he plays whenever you go into combat, and Veronica's attitude is fun to have around... not to mention she punches things in the face... HARD. Those are my favorite 4 anyway. Boone is ridiculously useful because he's such a deadly sniper but his attitude brings me down so I generally leave him behind. Also I'm glad they made Deathclaws fearsome again. I mean Deathclaws were somewhat powerful in Fallout 3, but they weren't the nightmares they were in Fallout 2, well in Fallout NV they're nightmare worthy again. Another thing I like is all the different factions out there and gaining (or losing) rep with each. Oh and lastly the Vegas Strip is just plain cool. On the down side there isn't (so far) that single awe inspiring moment like there was in Fallout 3 when you first step out of the vault, but I guess you can't have everything.

So far I'm loving the game. It looks good with the settings cranked (although I hope Gamebryo gets put out to pasture soon and Bethesda uses idTech 5 or another new gen engine for Fallout 4 or TES V) and runs great on my machine (granted my machine is fairly beefy). While the Mojave Desert isn't exactly littered with enemies I'm finding plenty of critters and baddies to turn into molten goo [laser and plasma for the win b*tches!] and I think there is tons of stuff to do out there (how densely packed with creatures do people want the desert to be?). There are tons and tons of fun and different quests and interesting characters to meet. Plus there is all the standard Vegas gambling (Blackjack, Slots, Roulette) and Caravan (which admittedly I still don't completely understand the rules to). I can definitely see myself pouring 100 hours plus into this game (like I did with all the previous Fallouts) not even considering any future DLCs.

Bottom line, I think Fallout New Vegas is better than Fallout 3. It's hard to compare it to Fallout 1 or 2 because the games are so wildly different and from such wildly different eras it would be like comparing apples and microchips.

Edit: If you're using Veronica as a companion she is broken even with the official patch. Veronica does not level along with you like all the other companions so she will be weak at high levels. Luckily there is a community made mod that fixes the issue HERE. Just download the file, drop it into the game's Data directory and enable it. This will fix the issue and level Veronica accordingly (even if you've had her along for several levels)) and bring her up to the hit points and skills she should have. Hopefully Bethesda and Obsidian include this in their next official patch.

[BasiliskWrangler]

I finished F:NV last night. I was disappointed in the last 25% of the game.


[SPOILERS AHEAD]


The story seemed confusing to me. I wasn't fully sure which faction was supposed to be "good" and which was "bad", and so I wasn't sure who I should help. Then parts of the narrative actually led me in a direction that I later regretted.

I thought I was supposed to work towards a free, independent New Vegas, but going that path led to a bleak and somewhat uneventful ending. I actually missed some major end sequences simply by making bad dialog choices. At the end of the game, several NPCs talked about events that, for me, never happened. I felt really ripped-off that I didn't get to see some cool "big events" simply because of the path I chose.

Also, the game got ridiculously hard near the end. It was so hard that I had to cheat to finish it, and I never cheat the first time through a game. Despite having some very good weapons, many enemies I ran across took DOZENS of rounds of ammo to bring down. 6 Deathclaw creatures literally depleted 80% of my ammo reserves, and I had a LOT of ammo going into the battle. Level scaling sucks and Bethesda does it best.

Overall, I enjoyed Fallout New Vegas less than Fallout 3.

[Evnissyen]

Eh... I think I'll pass, for now. Especially if this is strictly FPS.

Basilisk: I was going to mention this clip, until I noticed that yours already linked to it, so you've probably seen it, as well as many others here. So I won't mention it.