Fallout: New Vegas Ultimate Edition

Obsidian's New Vegas was a return to form for the franchise. The game takes the first person 3D perspective from Bethesda's Fallout 3, alongside plenty of its mechanics, and on top of tweaking them (for the better) adds new features of its own, like traits (from the original Fallouts), gun customization and iron sights (inspired by mods for Fallout 3), a Hardcore mode with basic needs (food, water, and sleep), survival recipes, a reputation system that almost entirely replaces the flawed Karma system of Fallout 3, and factions you can side with in order to alter the plot. The writing, in addition, is top notch. New Vegas isn't a perfect game. Engine is almost the same as Fallout 3's, so you can consider this game as an "expansion" to Fallout 3, though New Vegas stands perfectly on its own as a full release. It was very buggy on release, and most importantly, it isn't as challenging as the original titles were, which takes away from the experience. jsawyer is a mod developed by the game's Lead Designer, Joshua Sawyer. It makes the game considerably more challenging and in-tune with the classics. If you must play New Vegas and you have experience with Fallout 3 or slightly hardcore RPGs, I suggest you get that mod and play the game as Sawyer would have intended you to. The difference it makes to the experience is huge, and you won't regret it. If after that you decide you want a tougher wasteland experience, Vicious Wastes (from the Nexus) is an excellent, punishing alternative.

Fallout New Vegas is my favorite RPG of all time. I love exploring New Vegas, the soundtrack is incredible (and not just a retread of Fallout 3, looking at you Fallout 4). There's something incredible about walking through the wastes where everyone is a potential enemy or friend with your trusty companion(s) or alone while Billie Holiday sings that I just can't forget. It feels like a lived in world that isn't driven solely by murder but people trying to survive in a harsh future.

I love New Vegas because it is an extremely well done role-playing game on so many levels with great characters, progression, quests and locations. At the same time I absolutely hate how much of a technical mess it can be, even after installing some of the essential stability and bug fixing mods. Especially endless loading screens happen far too often.

New Vegas is definitely the best 3D Fallout game, and one of my favorite games of all time. Still, it's not flawless. The gunplay is janky, travelling without fast travel is boring and tedious, and the graphics and animations were outdated even on release. Oh, and the game is unstable as hell, there are a ton of bugs. But New Vegas has the guts to be amazing in spite of all this. The narrative is the backbone of the whole experience. The world and its people are written super well, and you'll get lost for hours in the stories they've got for you. The range it offers you go from generic action pieces (which fall a bit flat due to the janky gameplay) to political intrigue to hilarious black comedy and satire of our real world. A nuclear apocalypse happened 200 years ago, and society has more or less rebuilt itself. You are put into a very special position, where you get to choose the direction where it grows. This is why I think New Vegas is an interesting post-apocalyptic story: it doesn't dwell on the apocalypse too much, but instead asks how we can move on from it. While the action elements of this action RPG are more than lacking, the RPG elements more than make up for them. You really can make any kind of character you want, and the game has unique reactions to nearly every character type. Each narrative element is very interactive, and you can change almost every storyline to fit the story you want to tell. I think playing New Vegas can be compared to making and telling a story to yourself. It's really hard to break the narrative in any way, because the developers have really accounted for nearly everything you can do at any moment of any quest. If you can get past the awkward gun fights, the outdated visuals, and all the bugs the game has, this is going to be one of the best action RPG experiences you'll find. Highly recommend. And this game has a huge and active modding community, so you can always try to mod the flaws away. Do yourself a favor and try it.

I read people who complain about how buggy it is. It IS buggy af indeed. But the thing is: Bethesda came to Obsidian months before release and told them: "Hey Obs bro, we're going to rush Skyrim next, so since we don't want to compete against ourselves you will release New Vegas in 3 months. Yeah we don't give a damn about what you started, thinking the release will happen 9 months from now, what we love is righteous indeed, it is $$$. Make sure you do a good job, and remember than you will only get your bonus paid if you reach 90% on Metacritic. What? You don't think you will be able to reach 90% under these conditions? Aah... Too bad, bro, that's too bad... But not my problem." This is the story. Obsidian had other problems, and one of their games got canceled late in dev by Sony if memory serves right, and this is how the company almost bankrupted before launching their Kickstarter for Pillars of Eternity as a last ditch effort to survive. So yes, New Vegas is ugly and buggy, and many things have been cut and some feel awkward as a result. To top it off, it uses a buggy, outdated engine that Bethesda never cared to repair because it costs money. I still like Fallout 1 and 2 better, but New Vegas manages to make good use of 3D for its purpose and to restore into the game some core aspects of Fallout, despite Bethesda's reluctance ( NV could make their crappy FO3 look like the crap it is *ahem*). New Vegas has been a major success for a game that had so little staff and time. So, why did Bethesda refrain from contracting them again for another spin off Fallout game? Well, think for yourself. NV is the only 3D FO that is a proper RPG with proper Fallout dark humour and impertinence. They understand the brands they use, like Nuka Cola or the Brotherhood. They understand their themes and fun and caricature. It is the only 3D FO that asks proper questions and gives proper roleplay opportunities. Bugs? For once, they are not the devs' fault. Use mods on the Nexus.