Okay, let’s talk about Fallout. I never played the first two, ut I hear they are all time classics. Fallout 3 was interesting, 4 was okay, and as much as we’d all love to forget about 76, Bethesda fucks up enough to keep it in the everyone’s crossheirs. But I didn’t mention New Vegas, so you know which ones on the list.
New Vegas follows a young man or woman known only as the Courier, who happens to get roped into some bad stuff, involving a fancy dressed man named Benny, voiced by Chandler from Friends. Boy, how will the Courier get outta this one? He won’t. He gets shot in the head, but survives. Turns out, he was holding an important poker chip that could give the holder power over New Vegas and in turn, all of the Mojave. So, you have the choice of aiding the military group NCR, the crazed roman empire The Legion, the intelligent owner of New Vegas Mr. House, or the independent machine Yes Man to change the Mojave how you see fit. The game is a lot more fun to explore than say Fallout 3. 3 just had subways, subways, and more shitty subways. Like a fuck ton of awful fucking subways. Thankfully, there’s nothing like that in the Mojave. Just Cazadors…. Oh. But in all seriousness, I love exploring the Mojave Wasteland. You can run into all sorts of things mutated by the nuclear radiation, like giant bugs, feral dogs, soldiers sent to kill you from opposing armies like NCR or The Legion. And let’s talk about that for a moment. Like I said, you can decide who gets control of the Mojave. NCR wants to turn the country into support for their army to try and bring order to the chaotic Wasteland. Legion wants a powerful empire like Rome. Mr. House wants only New Vegas to survive and to damn everyone else. And Yes Man believes in allowing the Mojave to be truly free. Naturally, I got for Yes Man cause fuck listening to other people. But seriously, this game has a lot of moral choices. Not like that shit, “Do you wanna be good or bad”. No, it’s all bad. There is pros and cons to all sides, even the crazy, let’s crucify drug users Legion. That, mixed with the other groups like Powder Gangers, Great Khans, and Freeside, you will not be able to please everyone. Someone’s gotta try to kill you, because there’s always gonna be disagreements. And then there’s the companions in this game. Normally, I don’t care for Fallout companions, but these ones are a lot of fun. Gannon is a fun companion with his dry wit, Boone is a tragic character all around, Lily is a fun grandmother, Victoria sucks, Raul’s got a fucking textbook of a backstory, and Rex is a dog…. Rex is clearly the best companion. And the game, as is expected, is full of sidequests. And aside from the few that bore me, a lot of them are fun. Some of them have interesting characters, neat facts, and have a ton of dark stuff about them. You wanna see how truly fucked up the world of Fallout is, go into some of the Vaults or do the side quest involving the Raider Cook-Cook. That shit is messed up. And it’s all lore you can read on your own. It’s never shoved in your face. It’s only there if you want it and that was always a little touch I liked in these kinds of games.
New Vegas is what many consider to be the last good Fallout game, and while I do like 3 and 4, I can definitely say that New Vegas is the best Fallout game I played for it’s story, it’s moralities and the world of the Mojave just being so interesting to explore, if a little fucked up at times. If you want to play a Fallout game without having tried any, New Vegas is a good start. Not 76. Never play 76.