Hi

I took a pretty big break from this. There are two major QUIRKS I have with games like this:

1. I don't like getting locked into endgame and will delay it as long as possible for my first playthrough. If I hit a point of no return, whether I revert the save or not, I start losing interest even if there's still a lot to do with or without getting an ending locked in

2. I'm weirdly purist about only doing the base game at first. Something about mods and DLC feel WRONG to me so I very rarely ever start them. They always have a very slightly different feel and it just feels OFF. Like you can just tell that it was made by slightly different hands.

The first quirk is why I took a break. I ended up unwittingly hitting a point of no return for two factions to get locked out and I really didn't want to lose out on content so I reverted but then felt kind of directionless. Then I picked a side quest to work on and I hated it. So I took a break.

Decided to pick this back up. Still don't want to continue the quests I was on, though, so I decided to get over my DLC quirk. After all, Far Harbor and Automaton were both P GOOD, with Far Harbor being half the reason I wanted to play this some more.

So I've started Dead Money! The recommended level is 20, and I was only 17, but it's been fine. I try to speech check my way out of anything that can be speech checked away. I'm also a fan of shitty pistols.

So far I've assembled a team, but I'm not sure what's up next. It's fun! The feel is a little odd but it doesn't feel or off place overall. I like it.

It never bothered me to get locked into the endgame on NV. It's a game that rewards several playthroughs, so I figured I would see anything I missed in the following playthroughs. It's amazing how you can still find new and interesting things 10 characters later.

It does bother me with most other games though. With other games when I'm near the end I usually rush to each unexplored location on the map, or try to complete all the remaining quests, and I end up getting very bored.

Hey fuck the vault part of Dead Money. I HAVE DIED SO MANY TIMES. WHAT DO

Thoughts so far tho:

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Damn this is great so far. I'm really enjoying it! For the most part the mazes and traps have been really fun and really hide how small this map actually is. I think I only found about half of Dean's stashes. I also haven't heard Dog/God's backstory and missed the window for it, but it seemed like bad timing to ask questions when Dog was going to torch the whole place in a suicidal rampage. That was also my first time meeting Dog since I only dealt with God the whole time. I talked Dog down and convinced the two personalities to merge. Not sure if I'll end up regretting it since they said they won't be able to help me out if I did it. MAYBE they would have been companions for the remainder? Doesn't feel like it. I can't imagine it changes/hurts me too much, though, since the other option was to put the beast down. Dean Domino and I were pals, so once I got to him there was absolutely no conflict whatsoever. He was happy to see me, and aside from passing a few checks to get him to help guide me to him a little better, I had no issues with him. Totally compliant. And his advice I got for the checks I could pass wasn't really useful. KNOWING THE DOOR WAS TO HIS LEFT, NOT MINE, WOULD HAVE HELPED. I have high speech and repair and perspective but my intelligence is pretty low and I guess that was the check that sorts out that nonsense. Aside from that, though, Dean loves me so there was never any risk of having to hurt him. He just said hey whats up and told me his life story. He does seem like kind of a sinister dick though! Didn't have many problems with Christine. I think maybe I was supposed to convince her to let Father Elijah live/resolve his sins or something, and since I'm basically St. Courier that was probably the most peaceful option. But FUCK THAT. I'm not a strict pacifist and she deserves some vengeance. If I can speech check Elijah down if/when I meet him, I'll definitely do that. But Christine can do what she wants. She's earned it. Just hope she doesn't set off the collars! I definitely feel like she could! Keeping all three companions alive FEELS GOOD. I really feel like I made the right choices but I guess we'll see!

Hopefully there isn't a lot of combat in the final area/boss/whatever's up ahead! So far there hasn't been, but the few times Ghost people have caught me off guard I've suffered quite a bit of damage. It's those damn gas bombs. I am also extremely low on ammo. I'd run out entirely before I got to a stash in Dean's dressing room. I have a super-heated knife, but I completely neglected non-guns combat skills so I'm kinda screwed once I run out of bullets. And I'm still pretty low level for this DLC! I just hit level 21 now, and recommended starting level is 20. And even with low intelligence I leveled up about 4 times in this hellhole.

Also I have a crippling addiction to cloud sludge and junk food stew. But I spent a not-insignificant portion of my chips on junk food so I'm carrying about 40 martinis down with me. Should be good for a while.

DONE

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I was having a lot of trouble with the vault last night but right after posting I started the game up and immediately figured out a way past what I was stuck with. I was just being silly. That was great! Not sure what the ending slide show was talking about since I haven't completed the game ever yet, or any other dlc, so I'm not sure what battle I'm going to be getting myself into. HOOVER DAM? I guess I'll have to find out. The final battle was a blur. I killed Elijah and escaped without dying though, so i guess it went well. ALL THAT GOLD THOUGH! That was a brilliant way of hammering in the theme. BUT THE GOLD!!! Oh well. I've got more prewar money than I know what to do with so I can't complain! 10 luck is great! It seems like Christine and Dean were both helping out in some way during the final fight... But I'm not sure how exactly because they were talking over each other while Elijah was screaming at me and things were beeping. I guess God/Dog would have had some part too had I gone a different route with them. Anyway, really great. I really like the slide show ending that these fallouts do. Feel like that would have been nice to have during FO4. An idea of our impact on the world.

I guess I might do Old World Blues next. IIRC that's tied in with this a bit, and it's the other NV DLC that's been hyped up a lot.

Old World Blues is so good

I redid the final fight just to get one more gold.

I'm not good at letting go.

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I know that getting all 37 is POSSIBLE with some manipulations of the mechanics, but I'm just not very good and don't have the patience.

I'm delaying the DLC stuff a bit and trying to tie up loose ends in New Vegas. I just discovered the Silver Rush has a cool little side quest where you get to sit around on guard duty. Really nice touch. Feels weird standing around taking orders from some guy named Simon for 200 caps when I am one of the richest people in Vegas. The only reason I even went in Silver Rush was to find a place to unload one of my gold bars and asked about work out of curiosity

I just got a Pimp Boy 3 Billion

Hey Freeside is a glitchy waste of prime real estate. Why does it exist?

A few areas in it are corrupt save level bad for me right now, but I almost never go there so I dunno if it IS a corrupt save or if its just a giant glitch of interconnected worldspaces. It started with the flying garbage can projectiles taking out Kings, then becoming a pimp underservingly. Next, unmarked quests were suddenly becoming marked, then CTD in a section.

When I am Vegas I will replace Freeside with anything else and basic all the broken riffraff

I love Freeside, it is one of my fav locations! It's so sleazy...I actually prefer it to The Strip.

It's too bad the shitty engine didn't allow them to fully realize it, like so many things in the game. I mean, they couldn't even make it one continuous space.

It is very buggy though. I had one which prevented me from meeting The King because his lackey spazzed out and wouldn't unlock the door.

How do you rate this compared to Fallout 4 Rose?

Wikey @ 23/7/2016 12:21

How do you rate this compared to Fallout 4 Rose?

TRICKY QUESTION!

I haven't finished NV or even a big chunk of it yet, so it feels odd to fully compare, but I don't think my opinion so far would change:

They are both much better than FO3.

If you look at FO4 as a sequel to NV, it's very disappointing. There is so much cool stuff in NV that's not in 4. But if you look at both as rival sequels to FO3, they're two separate and very different branches of the same franchise entirely.

Comparing each other, it's tough because they're just so different. Same universe, but two very different parts of it. Different atmospheres, different stories, different mechanics really, and vastly different stories even if the power struggle is kinda similar. They're also by totally different writers and companies. They both definitely have their STRENGTHS compared to each other. I don't think I could make a definitive answer on which I like better without completing NV's main story and the DLC for both. It's going to come down to the better/more memorable experience and at the moment, they're pretty close for me. Just in very different ways!

New Vegas has a much more well-written story. There are more branches to everything, quest-wise and dialogue wise. FO4 you can be a saint or a sarcastic asshole and people generally won't give a shit. You get the same consequences and relationships aside from companions' opinions of you. It's probably that games' biggest weakness. You can be a total dick to Nick (those sarcastic lines are fucking brutal) and he'll still open up to you about his identity crisis. On the other hand, apparently most people didn't get a friendly Dean Domino in Dead Money because they did some minor thing to bruise his ego. My Dean loved me because my character is a lucky idiot who's not really good at anything except shooting and soothing people's egos. It's a bit better in FO4's Far Harbor, but still not enough to even start closing the gap.

CHARACTERS/COMPANIONS wise I'm giving edge to FO4, but I haven't gotten too deep with what NV has to offer with the companions. I mostly just roll with ED-E, who is superior to everyone. I did really like my Dead Money pals, but the combat in New Vegas is kind of shit so I like going alone. As far as non-companions go, EH. Still pretty even but NV gets the edge because most story characters aren't companions and the dialogue allows them all to be fleshed out about the same.

Atmosphere/Worldbuilding are too different to compare. They're both really strong in very different ways. Bethesda is really good at small stories in little corners of the world, and the game and engine are built to allow Bethesda the exact atmosphere they wanted with FO4. New Vegas is using a lot of recycled assets, and had such a short production time that a lot of far corners are neglected, but it really pulls what it has to work with into a cohesive theme. Basegame FO4 was kind of lacking in this at times. AGAIN FAR HARBOR ETC. FO4 wins out ultimately though, because exploration is more fun, and the map is much less linear. New Vegas (arguably by necessity) has a very SET path and uses its mountain/cliff barriers a lot. It's not nearly as much fun to explore. And if you wander the wrong way, deathclaws and those poison hornet things will kill you. I dislike this.

Fallout 4's combat is better. 1000000x. THANKFULLY NEW VEGAS DOESN'T NEED YOU TO KILL LITERALLY EVERYTHING YOU MEET. On the other hand skill checks are barely a thing in FO4 (seriously whats up with that? Why do they exist when there are like 5 total basegame?) and I'd say that evens it up a bit more.

And finally, I like being a courier better than I like being one of Mr. or Mrs. Tool. I care about delivering my goddamned package than I do about my terrible disappointment of a son.

For now: tie.

Definitely agree about the companions, but I did really like Veronica (really the only good one in NV). I was more invested in her story than probably any companion in either game

I got Veronica right before I took a break so I haven't gone out with her much. She's following me for right now though. I like her so far. I also want to eventually get Arcade to open up since I just like his voice actor but he seems a bit prissy and judgmental so I don't really know what to do with him/ don't want to accidentally piss him off

The AI is so silly. I found vault 3, and convinced the fiend at the gate that I'm just here to resupply some chems. So this entire vault full of fiends is non hostile. They have 3 prisoners, and the prisoners ask me to let them out. I do that, and the fiends don't care one bit. They stand there as the prisoners sneak out. Then I found a hidden area with an NCR guy, convince him to leave, and he sneaks past the gate without anyone freaking out.

Also I sold all my jet to the fiends. Jet is worthless in this game.