Fallout: New Vegas

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Description

Fallout: New Vegas, like its predecessors, takes place in an alternate timeline where a war over resources sprouts up in the 1950s and ultimately culminates in a nuclear apocalypse. The game is set in the wastes of Nevada, surrounding the city of New Vegas, the successor of the old Las Vegas, a gambling paradise seemingly untouched by nuclear devastation. A war is brewing in this territory between the NCR (New California Republic) and various tribes of raiders, including the Great Khans and Caesar's Legionnaires. The NCR is a group that wishes to preserve ancient weaponry as well as bring law and order to the wastes, no matter at what price.

The player takes on the role of a courier who is assigned to deliver a package to the mysterious and enigmatic Mr. House, the owner of New Vegas. However, once the package finds its way to its destination, a man in a checkered shirt and a pair of thugs intercept the courier and begin to dig an open grave. The courier is shot, buried, and left for dead, but is later dug up and brought to a doctor in a nearby town by a robot who saw the events transpire. The protagonist must now find out who tried to kill him/her, and why.

Gameplay primarily resembles its immediate predecessor, Fallout 3, utilizing the same engine, interface, and most features. Like the previous game, Fallout: New Vegas is open-ended and focuses on exploration. Although each game begins essentially the same, once the player has molded the protagonist's base stats, traits, sex, and appearance, the game progresses in a largely non-linear fashion. The player can pursue the main quest, or explore the wastes and take up side-quests from various NPCs. The main character will level up as he or she gains experience by completing quests, doing unique actions and defeating foes.

There are new gameplay elements as well. There is a larger variety of weaponry, and the player can now aim down the sights with guns, as well as change the type of ammo the gun uses. Different types of ammo have different effects on enemies. The player can also use workbenches, campfires, and reload benches to craft unique items, consumables, and ammunition respectively. There is an influence system in the protagonist's standing with various towns and factions. The influence rating will determine whether or not that faction or town is friendly to the protagonist or not, and his affiliation to some groups may affect this as well. The player can also try and fool enemy factions by dressing up as a member of that faction, but must use stealth to avoid guards as guards may see past the disguise.

There is also a new mode of play known as "Hardcore" mode. Hardcore mode is an extreme difficulty setting that alters the gameplay to make a much larger focus on survival. The changes in hardcore mode are as follows:

• Stimpaks will not heal the protagonist immediately, but over a period of time, and they cannot heal crippled limbs. Only a doctor bag can heal a crippled limb.
• Similarly, the RadAway chem does not remove radiation sickness immediately, but rather over a period of time.
• The protagonist must eat food, drink water, and sleep on a regular basis, or he/she will die.
• Ammo adds weight and encumbers the protagonist.
• Companions can be killed in battle.

As in Fallout 3, the protagonist levels up, gains perks (although perks now come every other level and instead of starting with a perk, the player starts with two special traits), and can use functions such as fast traveling, waiting or sleeping to adjust the time of day, and fight foes in action combat using the traditional first-person control scheme (although the third-person camera is still an option), or the V.A.T.S. targeting system, which allows the player to pause the game and target specific parts of the enemy's body.

Screenshots

Promo Images

Trailer

Part of the Following Groups

• Fallout games
• Fallout: New Vegas series
• Gameplay feature: Alchemy
• Gameplay Feature: Armour/Weapon Deterioration
• Gameplay feature: Auto-mapping
• Gameplay feature: Cannibalism
• Gameplay feature: Chainsaws
• Gameplay feature: Character development - Skill distribution
• Gameplay feature: Day / Night cycle
• Gameplay Feature: Drug Addiction
• Gameplay Feature: Equipment Quick Slots
• Gameplay feature: Gambling
• Gameplay Feature: House Ownership
• Gameplay feature: Hunger / Thirst
• Gameplay feature: Interior decorating
• Gameplay feature: Lock picking
• Gameplay feature: Multiple endings
• Gameplay Feature: Pickpocketing
• Gameplay feature: Radiation / Radioactive Poisoning
• Gameplay feature: Slavery
• Gameplay feature: Survival cooking
• Gameplay Feature: Targeting system
• Games made into comics
• Middleware: FaceFX
• Middleware: Gamebryo/Lightspeed/NetImmerse
• Middleware: SpeedTree
• Physics Engine: Havok
• Setting: City - Las Vegas
• Technology: FaceGen
• Wasteland universe

User Reviews

On the way to RPG perfection	Windows	Unicorn Lynx (181725)
New Vegas brings the role playing back to Fallout	Windows	Kaddy B. (791)
Huge, fun, buggy	Xbox 360	Jamie Mann (19)
Oblivion with revolvers	Windows	dorian grey (251)
Great Story and Great Gameplay!	Xbox 360	Scott Monster (1014)

Critic Reviews

Meristation	Windows	Oct 19, 2010	9 out of 10	90
Eurogamer.net (UK)	Xbox 360	Oct 19, 2010	9 out of 10	90
We Got This Covered	Windows	Oct 27, 2010		90
GameSpy	Xbox 360	Oct 25, 2010		90
Xbox Mag	Xbox 360	Nov 23, 2010	17 out of 20	85
Softpedia	Xbox 360	Oct 26, 2010	8 out of 10	80
Made2Game	Xbox 360	Oct 21, 2010	8 out of 10	80
Level	Xbox 360	Nov, 2010	8 out of 10	80
OMGN: Online Multiplayer Games Network	PlayStation 3	Jan 07, 2011	7.8 out of 10	78
Joystiq	Xbox 360	Oct 19, 2010		70

Forums

Topic	# Posts	Last Post
Teh Official MobyGames' New Vegas Top Quest Ranking!	2	piltdown_man (152108) Feb 26, 2011
So buggy its breaking my heart.	19	leilei (329) Feb 13, 2011
Which ending did you get? (Sopilers insides!)	11	DJP Mom (11391) Dec 01, 2010

Trivia

German version

In the German version blood and gore effects were removed. The latter, in contrast to Fallout 3, does not affect robots and animals.

Mods

There is an unofficial mod made by lead designer Josh Sawyer. It basically makes the game harder, e.g. by adding expired stimpacks, and fixes item values. It was not released as an official patch because of balancing concerns and technical incompatibilities with the console version. The mod can be found on Mod DB.

References

• The unique weapon YCS/186 is a reference to the Something Awful sub-forum Your Console Sucks (forums id 186)
• The dead mercenary Johnny, only found with the Wild Wasteland perk, is based on Johnny Five Aces from the cancelled game The Zybourne Clock which originated from the Something Awful forums.

References: Star Trek

Fallout: New Vegas draws attention to and often pays homage to the numerous Star Trek series;

• The perk Set Lasers for Fun is a reference to the phrase "Set phasers to stun" from Star Trek: TOS and subsequent series.
• The damage challenge "Beam (Weapon) Me Up" is a reference to the phrase "Beam me up, Scotty". Interestingly this is actually a famous misquote. The closest it ever came to being said was in the fourth Star Trek film when Kirk says: "Scotty, beam us up."
• The Jem'Hadar quote "Obedience Brings Victory" can sometimes be heard after upgrading the Securitrons to Mark II.

Van Buren

Fallout: New Vegas has some similarities to Van Buren, Black Isle's cancelled Fallout 3. While the plot is almost completely different, both games are set in the Mojave desert and use a war between the Brotherhood of Steel and NCR respectively the struggle of NCR and Cesar's Legion over Hoover Dam as backdrop. Also the "Burned Man" Joshua Graham, who plays an important part in the Legion's recent history and the DLC Honest Hearts, was a companion in Van Buren. He was supposed to be the statistically best companion with the downside of being very evil and causing problems for the player when interacting with tribal residents and towns.

These similarities are not surprising because some of Obisidian's staff used to work for Black Isle, including the original lead designer of Van Buren, writer/COO Chris Avellone, and his successor, lead designer Josh Sawyer.

Awards

• 4Players
  • 2010 – #2 Best Role-Playing Game of the Year

IGN

• 2010 - Most Bang for Your Buck
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  Related Web Sites

  • Fallout (The official website)
  • Fallout: New Vegas Hints from UHS (PC) (comprehensive strategy guide & gameplay tips arranged in question & answer format)
  • Wikipedia: Fallout: New Vegas (Entry at Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.)
  • X360A Achievement guide (X360A's achievement guide for Fallout: New Vegas. (English))
  Contributed to by Kaddy B. (791)