I've been wanting to start writing some reviews of newer games that I've been playing, but haven't been able to find the time to 1) complete a game that merited a review and 2) take time out of an increasingly busy schedule to write up a review. I've finally been able to do both those things and have just finished Fallout: New Vegas. I know it's old as of now, but since Fallout 3 was one of my favorite games ever I felt like this was a good place to start. I'm going to give my review in five parts: story, design, game play, presentation, and overall. So, without further adieu let's get down to my first video game review.
Story: Fallout 3 and it's predecessors made up an amazing world for a player to live in and provided us with a great story that fit the world. New Vegas' main story line isn't as good as Fallout 3's, but the world as a whole has a much deeper, fleshed out story to tell. While playing through the game I found myself refusing to do the main story quests just because I wanted to see what was happening out in the Mojave and do all of the side quests. The best of these were the companion quests, which might be the best in the game. Without spoiling anything for anyone, Veronica's quest that involved the Brotherhood of Steel was one the longest, but most enjoyable quests I've ever done. It had me going from secret bunkers under a sand storm to irradiated vaults that I could barely even walk through. Another quest that I must recommend is Arcade Gannon's companion quest, which doesn't really take a lot to do, but has a great pay-off, that I won't spoil, in the final mission. My final must see experience is anything involving the Super Mutant's of the area. You simply must go see best friend Tabitha and her friend Ronda. As I said the main quest didn't draw me as much as Fallout 3's did, but it's still very good and worth at least one play through to see the Legion and NCR's final conflict.
Design: The major new design element in New Vegas is the introduction of factions into the game. These kind of act as a better representation of Fallout 3's good/bad scale. Basically what happens is depending on your choices and actions in the game you will gain or lose the trust of different factions. Doing something for one faction might lose trust with another faction even if you might not think it does right away. This makes the game feel much more real and dynamic. This design is evident from the onset of the game as I found myself being attacked by a faction right after I left the first town because I had saved that town from the faction that attacked me. This faction scale sometimes was frustrating because it sometimes closes off some quests for you if you're not friendly with a certain group. In the end though, that gives the game an ever-changing world that feels much more real than many games that simply provide you with a good/evil scale.
Gameplay: In Fallout 3 it was usually necessary to use the game's V.A.T.S. targeting system in order to kill enemies because of how terrible the aiming was. New Vegas improved the gun combat a lot by adding iron sights to the game. I was surprised by the amount of time I started spending out of V.A.T.S. because it was easier to kill things just using my iron sights, which is something I would never do in Fallout 3. This change may of caused me to use more bullets because of the many times I just sprayed bullets at approaching enemies, but the better control over where those bullets were going was well worth it. The other major gameplay improvement was how well the companions controlled this time around. There were many times in which I didn't even notice an enemy on the screen before my companion had taken them out. Sometimes this almost felt like getting cheap experience, but overall it was very helpful in keeping my character alive. The gun play and companions drastically improve upon the last game's which make New Vegas very enjoyable.
Presentation: This is the biggest area that New Vegas fails to improve upon Fallout 3. I only encountered three or four game crashes that all came past the 40 hour mark. That said this game is littered with bugs all the way through. For a Fallout or RPG fanatic this wasn't really that big of a hang up, but it was a problem. The graphics engine didn't look that bad, but it didn't really perform as well as one would expect from this big of a release. A game that has this much in it is going to come with it's share of bugs, but this one was just ridiculous. That said, sometimes these bugs were hilarious and I actually found myself hoping I would get the glitch in the beginning of the game that finds a players head spinning like the girl from The Exorcist.
Overall: I mostly felt that this game was at best a little better than Fallout 3 and at worst just more of the same, which is never a bad thing with a game that good. New Vegas has to be down ranked a little because where it improves on the last game it just does a little bit. I would've liked to see some bigger improvements, but I can't complain about getting to play through even more Fallout. This game should probably be bought as it took me 70+ hours to complete and it would be hard to put in that much time with a single rental. Either way I'd encourage most people to at least check it out and if you're a Fallout fan, get ready for some great story and gameplay that only a Fallout game can provide.
Final Score: 8.75
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