Forums > Game Forums > Fallout: New Vegas > Which ending did you get? (Sopilers insides!)
Slug Camargo (583) on 11/29/2010 3:04 AM · Permalink · Report
So I finished New Vegas, finally. I decided to cut short the sidequests and just go for the ending and see what's what. And, much as it happened in my very very very beloved Fallout 3, I found the main quest to be pretty shitty.
First off, I'll give you that Obsidian are very ambitious and have a lot of good ideas and whatnot, but they are pure shit when it comes to designing quests. Seriously, I spent most of my time either running from one end of a given map to the other carrying messages between two NPCs so fucking lazy they couldn't get up their fat asses to have an adult conversation; and the rest of the time wandering aimlessly trying to randomly guess what was I supposed to be doing.
Now, in FO3 there was plenty of errand-running as well, but at least they made you travel through slightly different maps, even if you were traveling through metro stations, they were different metro stations and you could find the occasional rare item or funky enemy you didn't expect, or even you could find new places to go on a tangent and start new sidequests --NV made me run around the same f'ing couple square meters for hours on end.
Also, back in DC there was the shooting to heat up things a little. In NV I don't think I ever ran out of ammo, the action sequences were so few and far between, and by the time I got to the ending I had only found about three different weapons. Now I'm all for clever games that make more emphasis on dialogues than action, but if you're shooting for that at least get some good writers, or at the very least models that can act halfway believably. Enduring these living sock puppets droning on and on about uninteresting garbage in the most painfully lame lines I've seen in quite a bit is not my idea of a good time.
Finally, the so-much-talked-about freedom of choice. I went with the Yes Man way because once I was forced to get involved in the whole political thing I figured I might as well go all the way to the top myself, and the Yes Man questline seemed to be the most open-ended one. At first. As it turned out, I was running with the most uncomfortable training wheels and my choices were painfully limited, and the options never reflected what I actually wanted to do: I wanted to enlist the Brotherhood so I got as good a reputation with them as I could --no can do, I just could ignore them. I wanted to destroy the Omertas --no can do, I could either do their quests or ignore them altogether. White Gloves --same story. In fact, it was even worse, since they wouldn't give me any quest until I had a good reputation in the Strip, which I couldn't get even after I owned the f'ing Lucky 38.
All in all, the Yes Man story ended up feeling like I was playing someone else's game and by the time I got into the Hoover Dam fight I didn't give a flying shit about anything that was happening anymore (and by the way, retaking the Washington Memorial with Liberty Prime felt way more epic than this). Apparently I can only stand so many broken dialogue trees, uninteresting quests and non-freedom of choice before my suspension of disbelief dies for good. In fact, right now I'm stuck in the fight with the Legion masked guy and I have to make quite an effort to muster the interest to go get done with that.
I plan on starting over and go get as many sidequests as I can, so to see whether those are at least on the level of the FO3 ones. Some of them do sound interesting in theory, so here's hoping. With any luck they'll involve a little less conversation, a little more action; as the former owner of my freaky robot-dog would say. But right now I'm pretty disappointed on this game overall. Obsidian sure could have spent less time shoehorning card games simulators and more time thinking up interesting quests, goddamnit.
So, anyway, what ending did you get? Are any of the other storylines any better than what I describe? Should I bother with another version of the main quest or just shoot for the sidequests?
Unicorn Lynx (181780) on 11/29/2010 3:26 AM · Permalink · Report
Well, it's a bit weird that you complain about the quests in New Vegas - in my opinion, they make the quests of Fallout 3 look ridiculous. But I guess that's because you aren't really coming from an RPG angle. Fallout 3 is in a way very linear - if you follow the main plot, you get a nice "from town to town" progression, like in Japanese RPGs - or shooters, for that matter. That's how Bethesda always did that. In New Vegas, on the other hand, it's all about how you shape the main story.
Anyway, I sided with Mr. House. It was hard. I mean, morally hard. I liked him in the beginning. I agreed with much of his New Vegas vision. But then... he asked me to kill all the members of the Brotherhood of Steel. It was terrible. I didn't want to do that. I wanted to betray him, side with somebody else... but NCR and Legion already hated me by then... I was all alone... and I did a cowardly thing. I did kill all the Brotherhood. And stuck to Mr. House till the end, hating him...
Now, your words make it even more painful, because now I realize I did have a choice: I could just go to Yes Man and figure out a way to kill Mr. House. But I was a coward. Yes, that's what I was, am, and always will be...
Anyway, after that, it was a pretty straight road. Securitons Mark III and I faced an army of Legion followers on the dam. And then I had to face the crazy Legate alone. Interesting psyhiatric case. A very tough final boss battle, but I did it.
The NCR vice-president tried to kill me, but Securitons made him understand very quickly that as a corpse, he won't be able to do that.
Mr. House coldly congratulated me. I wanted to kill the bastard, but the game was over.
Slug Camargo (583) on 11/30/2010 12:57 AM · Permalink · Report
[Q --start חד-קרן·山猫 wrote--]Well, it's a bit weird that you complain about the quests in New Vegas - in my opinion, they make the quests of Fallout 3 look ridiculous. But I guess that's because you aren't really coming from an RPG angle. Fallout 3 is in a way very linear - if you follow the main plot, you get a nice "from town to town" progression, like in Japanese RPGs - or shooters, for that matter. That's how Bethesda always did that. In New Vegas, on the other hand, it's all about how you shape the main story. [/Q --end חד-קרן·山猫 wrote--] I guess we're talking about two different things. You seem to be praising the structure of the quests, whereas I'm whining about the actual content. In that aspect, New Vegas is pretty soulless. The main quest doesn't offer any timeless classics you'll talk about for years, in retrospect everything just merges in a shapeless, generic blob. There's certainly nothing anywhere near as imaginative as Tranquility Lane, or as funny as Little Lamplight, or as epic as the battle with Liberty Prime. The battle of Hoover Dam, in fact, was a gigantic letdown, I was running down a rather obvious corridor, fighting about 7 enemies because that's as many NPCs as this version of the engine can manage before breaking down, with a couple of explosions going off in the background unsuccessfully trying to divert my attention from the blandness of it all.
There are even unmarked quests in FO3 that have way more personality and depth than anything I've found so far in NV (The Dunwich Building and the L.O.B. Enterprises come immediately to mind --hell, pretty much everything in Point Lookout does too and that was just a DLC).
There are some sidequests in NV I did like though, and that's what I'm aiming for next. "Come Fly With Me" was awesome, and the one for the Boomers was pretty good too, and I'm really intrigued about the radio hosts at Black Mountain and that Vault near the Kahn's valley (not giving any details because I just realized I sopiled about half the game already, heh).
But, like I said, I didn't feel the structure was all that open either. I took the more "anarchist" path, if you will, and still I was limited to a set of choices that not only were too few but they rarely reflected what my anarchic ass actually wanted. Maybe following one of the more hand-holding storylines will make me appreciate whatever freedom I can get more.
By the way, I don't want to sopil it either, but you should load a previous game and go kill Mr. House. One of the best moments of the game (surprise-wise) happens when you take that route.
Unicorn Lynx (181780) on 11/30/2010 4:33 AM · Permalink · Report
I guess we're talking about two different things. You seem to be praising the structure of the quests, whereas I'm whining about the actual content. In that aspect, New Vegas is pretty soulless. The main quest doesn't offer any timeless classics you'll talk about for years, in retrospect everything just merges in a shapeless, generic blob. There's certainly nothing anywhere near as imaginative as Tranquility Lane, or as funny as Little Lamplight, or as epic as the battle with Liberty Prime.
Well, I disagree with you, Doc. I repeat, in my opinion New Vegas's quests make those of Fallout 3 look ridiculous. Tranquility Lane is the only quest I remember fondly from that game. In New Vegas, most of the quests were interesting, with plenty of moral dilemma involved, and that's exactly what I want from an RPG.
Indra was here (20756) on 11/29/2010 7:14 AM · Permalink · Report
[Q --start Dr. M. "Schadenfreude" Von Katze wrote--]Now I'm all for clever games that make more emphasis on dialogues than action, but if you're shooting for that at least get some good writers, or at the very least models that can act halfway believably. [/Q --end Dr. M. "Schadenfreude" Von Katze wrote--] I abandoned the adolescent RPG fanboi dream right after Troika's Arcanum. Since good writing apparently means buggy gameplay (really). Not that it was good writing to begin with, just a lot of dialog options.
Became more into gameplay mechanics after that.
Unicorn Lynx (181780) on 11/29/2010 7:17 AM · Permalink · Report
I abandoned the adolescent RPG fanboi dream right after Troika's Arcanum. Since good writing apparently means buggy gameplay (really).
Sorry to hear that. I guess I got the better deal: I am able to enjoy a RPG with good writing even if it is buggy.
Not that it was good writing to begin with, just a lot of dialog options.
The writing in Arcanum was very good. So is the writing in New Vegas, by the way.
Indra was here (20756) on 11/29/2010 8:24 AM · Permalink · Report
I seem to enjoy stories from JRPGs nowadays. Don't think I can get than sensation of grandeur from western RPGs.
Good dialogs from western RPGs: yes (e.g. Mass Effect 2). Overall story: zzzz.
Good dialogs from JRPGs, zzzz. Overall story: Huzzah! (e.g. Final Fantasy)
Less forgiving when you get older and grumpier. Like our good doctor. :p
Patrick Bregger (300054) on 11/29/2010 4:49 PM · Permalink · Report
I strongly disagree with every statement you made. Except that there are way too many "go from point A to point B, then to point A, then to point B and then to point A again" quests.
To took the Yes Man path. First I wanted to help the NCR but the prospect of power was too strong...
Slug Camargo (583) on 11/30/2010 1:07 AM · Permalink · Report
[Q --start Patrick Bregger wrote--]I strongly disagree with every statement you made. [/Q --end Patrick Bregger wrote--] You're not making a very strong case for such a strong disagreement :P
[Q --start Patrick Bregger wrote--] To took the Yes Man path. First I wanted to help the NCR but the prospect of power was too strong... [/Q --end Patrick Bregger wrote--] More or less the same here. I actually wasn't so much enticed by the power as I was disappointed once I started learning about the horrible bureaucracy behind the NCR (the straw that broke the camel's back was the way they were going to deal with the whole Cass Conspiracy thingie). But like I said, one of my main goals was to wipe out the other families in the Strip, and that wasn't even an option =(
Though I would have rather sided with the Followers because they reminded me of Deus Ex's Tracer Tong, but that wasn't an option either.
