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War...War never changes. It really doesn't need to, either.
If you have been listening to the podcast, you probably don't need to read this review. Its all Tarth and I talked about for about three weeks. Despite some fairly major flaws, Fallout New Vegas is by far one of the most fun games I've ever played.
Fallout New Vegas is mostly just Fallout 3 with new characters, new weapons, a new story, and in a new location. Really that's all I was hoping for: more of the same with maybe a few new surprises. Even though a lot of the mechanics are the same as its predecessor, it still feels fresh, and manages to pack in its own brand of uniqueness.
Much like the other games in the Fallout series, your character is completely customizable. Everything from gender and facials features to skills, stats and abilities. Although you do have some limitations on stats, as you only have so many total points you can allocate. Still, you get enough for what you want your character to do. My character was sort of a classic cowboy type, a gunslinger and smooth talker. Also, every two levels your character gains, you get a perk. Perks do a variety of things, such as giving you combat bonuses, or special abilities.
Fallout New Vegas really feels like a game of cause and effect. Your actions have consequences. Mainly because pretty much every NPC is killable. So if you shoot a person who might be important later on...you're out of luck. News also travels fast, thanks to Radio New Vegas, (Wayne Newton is the DJ, how awesome is that?) so it’s not uncommon to hear people talk about the things you have done.
Which brings us to one of the new features in the game. Along with having a general “karma” score which tells how good or bad you are, there are individual faction reputations. So you can have one faction that thinks you are a saint, while another one thinks you are the devil, and the people will treat you accordingly. This was one of my favorite new additions.
Another new addition is the ability to mod weapons. Even a gun that seems pretty weak, can be turned into a powerhouse with the right mods, and guns that are already powerful are even more so. I added scopes to all of my rifles which helped with accuracy a bit. You can also add things to increase clip size.
So I've talked enough about the good things about this game, sadly there are some bad things as well. It seems as if Bethesda did not thoroughly test this game before shipping it. There are quite a few bugs and glitches. Nothing really too major, apart from a couple of side quest glitches, graphical errors and occasional freezing. I experienced very few of these, and there is a patch on the way that fixes many of these problems.
There is just so much to see and do in this game, its almost overwhelming. I spent over 50 hours just exploring and doing side quests before I even started the main quest line. Not to mention there are multiple endings. So yes, it is well worth the $60 price tag even knowing that in a year there will be a “Game of the Year” version with all the DLC.
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System: |
Xbox 360
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| Genre: |
First-Person RPG
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| Experience: |
Put in 50+ hours and finished one of the many main quest lines. |
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