Giantbomb.com Fallout New Vegas Review - 4/5 Stars

[shortylickens]

I've been reading the fallout wiki and apparently Imp is correct. (I havent been reading on the main quests until tonight.)

There are officially 4.
1. Side with Mr House, ignore Yes Man, or kill it.
2. Side with Yes Man, definitely need to whack Mr House.
3. Side with NCR completely, though you can still progress very far into the Robot leader quests.
4. Side with Legion.

Also, you can have help from White Gloves, Great Khans, the Omertas, Boomers, and Brotherhood of Steel in pretty much all of the main endings. As it stands I got full alliance from the Khans (which was a hassle) and whacked all of the Omertas, not yet done the white gloves, got the Boomers easy (one of the first things I did) and also allied with the Brotherhood.
However, no one has given me any power armor training yet and I'm getting pissed.

ALSO, Cass had a hissy fit and left me. Dont know why. I never did anything mean to her and in fact completed all her whiny quest options. Maybe my overall Karma was too low. She's awfully judgmental for being a lone gunslinger.

Still havent got Lily, but shes the only one left and I didnt even know I could have her.

 

[Mem]

Funny how I am watching Firefly at the moment .

I'm 35 hours into the game and haven't hit the strip or most of the northern parts of the map. The writing and quests are a definite improvement and the game is generally more fun to play than Fallout 3 IMO. I often find myself striving to stay within range of the Black Mountain radio frequency so I can listen to Best Friend Tabitha and Rhonda, haha. The ending part of Vault 11 was a real kicker as well, I had a feeling those stealthboys had to be used later on. I haven't even finished my first playthrough and I'm excited about starting another character and going through it again.

I have played about 10-15 hours so far, I think its better then Fallout 3,game seems more harder then F3(good thing).

Stability wise not too bad had a few more crashes but not often,normally when entering the odd building.

I hope the next patch improves things.

I did mess up my character build at start since I went with a melee build but as I played the game went more range due to weapons I had plus easier to kill at range.

 

[shortylickens]

OK, ending was better than Fallout 3, which isnt saying much.
Did NCR and Yes Man. Dont feel like doing Mr House and need to start a new game to do Legion. Dont even know if I wanna start that now or in a couple of months when I am willing to put up with the game again.

For reference, I did not get my first crash until after 18 hours of play time, but after that it happened a LOT. Dunno if it has something to do with all the crap I was carrying around or what. Come to think of it, I hardly used any of the weapons I held. Stuck with the gatling laser the whole game, once I bought it from Gun Runners.

 

[Liet]

Spoiler tags, ladies...

Picked it up during the sale and am enjoying myself, despite the IDIOTIC UI (gonna mod it tonight) and my general absolute hate towards Bethesda for fucking the Fallout franchise into the ground.

 

[shortylickens]

Spoiler tags, ladies...

Picked it up during the sale and am enjoying myself, despite the IDIOTIC UI (gonna mod it tonight) and my general absolute hate towards Bethesda for fucking the Fallout franchise into the ground.

Enemies or companions?
Cuz I've been irritated with both. Especially when I'm not doing anything wrong and I get attacked.

 

[Liet]

Not the AI - the UI. User Interface. The console-itis has been driving me up the wall! I HATE having to click 6 buttons to find out if I'm thirsty or not.

 

[sandorski]

meh, you want bad UI, play NFS Hot Pursuit. Fun game, annoying as hell interface.

 

[Wardawg1001]

Not the AI - the UI. User Interface. The console-itis has been driving me up the wall! I HATE having to click 6 buttons to find out if I'm thirsty or not.

The default UI (on the X360 at least) has a little indicator right on the HUD that you see at all times during the game that indicate your level of hunger, thirst, tried-ness, and radiation - among other things. Different for PC?

On another note - has anyone played the DLC yet? Thoughts on it? I'm thinking of picking it up after I finish some other games I'm playing right now.

 

[Liet]

Yes, if you're suffering from dehydration or starvation you'll get an icon. It's just poor design that each has it's own separate button instead of simply being listed on the main Status screen. That's my point.

 

[shortylickens]

meh, you want bad UI, play NFS Hot Pursuit. Fun game, annoying as hell interface.

This.
But they made it clear they were being nice just letting us have the game. Dirty computer peasants that we are.

 

[Patt]

Man, I never had one crash with Fallout3 ... but can't get more than 5 minutes at a time with NV. Frustrating. Oh well, I've got plenty of other Christmas goodies to play with

 

[Bateluer]

Man, I never had one crash with Fallout3 ... but can't get more than 5 minutes at a time with NV. Frustrating. Oh well, I've got plenty of other Christmas goodies to play with

Was the polar opposite for me. FO3 was completely unstable on Vista and 7 64. To finish it, I had to load XP onto one of m test machines and play through it there. 2Ghz Athlon 64 X2, 2GB of RAM, and a Radeno 4350. Big step down from the E8500, 8GB, and 4870 on my main machine.

NV has crashed a few times, but nothing like FO3 did.

 

[shortylickens]

Man, I never had one crash with Fallout3 ... but can't get more than 5 minutes at a time with NV. Frustrating. Oh well, I've got plenty of other Christmas goodies to play with

I had loads of Fallout 3 crashes and almost none with New Vegas.

 

[fatpat268]

I'm really digging this game right now. I've tried playing Fallout 3 several times in the years past, but I always gave up after a few hours in. What really kept me away from FO3 was the general interface and mechanics. But, now, the setting in Fallout New Vegas is so interesting that I'm now used to the interface and mechanics, that I think I'll be able to finally enjoy FO3 whenever I finish NV.

NV has been pretty stable for me. I've had maybe 3 crashes in ~35 hours of gameplay.

On a side note, some of the in game posters are pretty neat, so I got to searching, and I found this poster:



I think I'm gonna order it :awe:

 

[Rakewell]

I'm really digging this game right now. I've tried playing Fallout 3 several times in the years past, but I always gave up after a few hours in. What really kept me away from FO3 was the general interface and mechanics. But, now, the setting in Fallout New Vegas is so interesting that I'm now used to the interface and mechanics, that I think I'll be able to finally enjoy FO3 whenever I finish NV.

NV has been pretty stable for me. I've had maybe 3 crashes in ~35 hours of gameplay.

On a side note, some of the in game posters are pretty neat, so I got to searching, and I found this poster:



I think I'm gonna order it :awe:

Freakin' sweet.

Was that poster in McCarran? I think I saw it there, in the lobby...

 

[Bateluer]

Freakin' sweet.

Was that poster in McCarran? I think I saw it there, in the lobby...

Seen it in a number of NCR tents. There's usually a couple different propaganda posters in each NCR building/tent.

 

[Patt]

I had loads of Fallout 3 crashes and almost none with New Vegas.

Bizarro world. I've done nothing to the machine since Fallout3. Oh well, I'll keep poking at it, because I AM going to play this game

 

[fatpat268]

Freakin' sweet.

Was that poster in McCarran? I think I saw it there, in the lobby...

Seen it in a number of NCR tents. There's usually a couple different propaganda posters in each NCR building/tent.

Yea, I first saw it in McCarran, but I've seen it in other places as well.

There's other propaganda posters as well... some (most?) of them are parodies of old WW2 propaganda posters.

 

[Liet]

Bizarro world. I've done nothing to the machine since Fallout3. Oh well, I'll keep poking at it, because I AM going to play this game

Interesting... I had a TON of F3 crashes, most notably a reproducable crash when entering houses. Infuriating. However, New Vegas has barely crashed at all. Amazing!

 

[Bateluer]

Tips for fighting Deathclaws? Damn tough SOBs.

 

[Imp]

Tips for fighting Deathclaws? Damn tough SOBs.

Go for the legs. A crippled deathclaw is just a sad, sad affair. If your explosives skill is remotely competent, set mines and let them chase you. Otherwise, drop frags at your feet as your haul ass.

Otherwise, if you're stuck in close quarters, get something with armor piercing bullets, and pray that you kill it before it gets up to you... Shotgun Surgeon perk is amazing with slugs.

My level 30 melee/unarmed can go toe to toe with deathclaws, but I lose 3/4 of my health, even with power armor.

 

[namtran512]

Go for the legs. A crippled deathclaw is just a sad, sad affair. If your explosives skill is remotely competent, set mines and let them chase you. Otherwise, drop frags at your feet as your haul ass.

Otherwise, if you're stuck in close quarters, get something with armor piercing bullets, and pray that you kill it before it gets up to you... Shotgun Surgeon perk is amazing with slugs.

My level 30 melee/unarmed can go toe to toe with deathclaws, but I lose 3/4 of my health, even with power armor.

Gauss Rifle or .50 Calibur Rifle are reserved for Deathclaws for me.

 

[Bateluer]

My level 30 melee/unarmed can go toe to toe with deathclaws, but I lose 3/4 of my health, even with power armor.

Dang, I'm only level 18 atm. Took out a couple that I managed to pull away from the group and fight one at a time. Took all my stim packs and an array of chems too, so I had to retreat. I'll return later.

Did manage a sweet shot with the hunting rifle, modded with a scope, combined with psycho, jet, and steady. Single shot to the head of an adult death claw, exploded.

 

[Imp]

Gauss Rifle or .50 Calibur Rifle are reserved for Deathclaws for me.

Once you get the .50 cal/anti-material, it becomes a bit of a joke. Regular ammo can take one out in a single shot. If that doesn't work, break out the riot shotgun pre-loaded with slugs.

 

[cadred]

I've been trying to find some mods to enhance the graphics a bit but I'm probably going to stick with vanilla. My results so far:

Nevada Skies
I liked some of the severe weather options, but the over-saturated sky boxes look out of place.

Enhanced Shaders HD
Am I the only one that thinks the ENBSeries (Fallout:NV Enhanced Shaders HD Mod) makes the game look like ass? Out of the box a bloomy, contrasty mess. The Dynamic DOF idea has some promise, but it was still pretty unusable. SSAO looked nice but was way too buggy to use.

Nvidia SSAO Hack
Looks nice, but makes the grass shimmer in a distracting way

Depth Of Field Mod
Tanks my framerate but looks pretty good.