“Ghouls and Boys”

Ghouls don’t tend to make conversation with Bob. Most of the time they’d rather tear humans’ insides out like sheets of paper from a spiral notebook. But at the entrance to an abandoned REPCONN rocket factory, a distressed ghoul used an intercom to bark a series of orders at Bob. The courier thought that was a wacky turn of events.

Bob was startled by the detached voice, which told him he had to come upstairs right away and to watch out for danger. He listened to the ghoul’s raspy smoker’s voice; his survival instincts had already kicked in.

The REPCONN factory looked like any other abandoned building from the years before the nuclear holocaust. Bob thought those old Americans must have been really big on their accomplishments because REPCONN and other companies’ headquarters always had some sort of massive statue in their parking lots. Bob calculated in the time it took to walk around the long-defunct company’s space rocket monument that all the metal wasted on that thing could have built lots of armor suits. What a shame.

A dead civilization’s hubris notwithstanding, the halls of the dilapidated REPCONN building would teach Bob that appearances, and even voices, can be deceiving.

After hearing the ghoul’s instructions, Bob nearly tripped over a few robed corpses sprawled on the ground beside the receptionist’s desk. They were ghouls, who Bob assumed the one from the intercom probably looked like, and each one was wearing dark monk’s robes with the name “Bright Brotherhood” stitched inside them.

The courier rubbed the formless cult-looking robes between his fingers and found that they were made of 100% cotton – a breathable alternative that, coupled with such loose fabric, would have flattered any apple or pear-shaped body type. Bob’s sister designed costumes for pet mole rats, and the courier had picked up a few tailoring tips over the years. Unfortunately for her, his sister was eaten by a pack of pissed-off mole rats who were tired of playing dress-up.

Bob draped a spare robe over ED-E — now more or less the courier’s pack mule — in the event that infiltration into the Bright Brotherhood was required.

Feral ghouls and Nightkin stalked the floors of the REPCONN facility. Though tough and numerous they all met the business end of Bob’s new rebar and concrete beating stick. Between smashing skulls and crushing limbs, Bob looted the rotting desks and cabinets of the numerous office desks in the building to find ammo, Nuka Cola caps and even a shiny new pistol.

Eventually Bob stumbled into the site’s manufacturing wing, where a hectic battle between Nightkin and ghouls had destroyed a large steel blast door and caused the dismemberment of several limbs. Bob, occupied with his investigation of the carnage, managed to step on an arm and a jawbone. It took him a week to get the gristle out of his boot tread.

A series of creaky metal stairs took Bob to the top level of the factory and a locked door with another intercom. The chatty ghoul answered Bob’s buzzing and told him to watch his shit if he wanted to live. His rebar club holstered on his back, Bob walked in the door, not expecting the face that greeted him. A decidedly non-ghoulish human turned toward Bob — it was the voice who guided him to safety. When Bob tried to convince the man that he wasn’t actually a ghoul, the guy told the courier (who was trying not to laugh by that point) that he’d heard all the jokes before, and he was clearly not human.

Bob shook the awkwardness off and headed upstairs to the actively busy computer center to talk to Jason Bright, the leader of the ragtag group of sapient ghouls calling themselves the Bright Brotherhood. Jason Bright was a sharply dressed green-glowing ghoul. The soft-spoken Bright told Bob that their religion required its members to “take to the stars” based on his “visions.” Hoping to see at least a few religious nut jobs get blown up in a botched rocket launch, Bob agreed to help Bright and his brotherhood prepare the last three REPCONN-era rockets for their destined trip into outer space.

Image courtesy of Bob the Courier

The first task asked of Bob was to eradicate all the Nightkin left in the basement. So Bob did. He smashed every one of those blathering mutants into tiny, chunky bits, and even scrounged a few crudely crafted swords made out of car bumpers.

Not satisfied with the courier’s genocide, Bright asked Bob to talk to their chief technician, the human in denial about not being a ghoul, about the brotherhood’s need for rocket fuel and a rare replacement part for a broken rocket ship. The zealots, trapped by the aggressive Nightkin forces, couldn’t be bothered took look for such essential shit on their own. Bob begrudgingly set out to do their dirty work for them. He kept thinking about how nice it would be to punch one of the ghouls’ deformed, irradiated faces in…even though he knew he couldn’t.

Four days later, Bob had accomplished nothing. It wasn’t until he took an afternoon’s reprieve in a dingy Novac motel room that the fate threw him a bone.

When Bob woke up from his lazy midday nap he decided to take a stroll to stretch his legs. When he walked past Dinky the giant dinosaur outside of his motel room next door and noticed there was a general store inside the metal carnivore, his plans changed. See, Bob had recently started picking locks. It was a hobby, and he reasoned that the theft of some useless wasteland junk now would be good practice in case he had to pick a lock that would save his life later.

The shopkeeper greeted Bob, and then walked in front of the counter to sort some goods on the display shelves. Bob smiled at the man, unable to look at him in the eye because he knew he’d soon be stealing from him, and if things got bad he’d have to kill the dude. As quickly as possible Bob crouched down and waddled behind the counter, moving silently but really looking like an idiot. He looked up before he could search for a safe and saw a locked door, which he proceeded to pick.

Though the courier was hoping for ammunition he managed to find pure nuclear combustion: behind the door was a trove of at least a hundred miniature REPCONN rocket souvenirs, each containing a small amount of atomic rocket fuel. Bob almost fell flat on his ass in shock, but composed himself enough to grab a few armfuls of the replicas and stuff them into both his satchel and ED-E’s cavernous storage compartment.

Bob ran out of the store without looking back and headed toward the REPCONN compound. However, the directionally challenged courier started heading far north and away from the facility. Before he could get too lost, Bob saw an old woman sitting outside a shack off the road. Bob looked around and found that the place was a junkyard. Opting to try his luck twice in one day he asked if she had the part the ghoul cult needed for their rocket. She did. The problem was it cost 500 caps – Bob sighed deeply.

He thought about breaking into her house and taking it, but he argued with himself that pushing his luck could work both ways, and one of those ways could be deadly. So he did the nice thing and paid for the part out of his pocket, and desperately wished the ghouls had given him a few purchase order forms.

Bob made it to the launch pad’s control room an hour later thanks to the old woman’s directions. The courier found a convenient sewer entrance to the launch pad outside the REPCONN building, and once inside he gave the wannabe ghoul the replicas and the part.

The space-faring ghouls finally had everything they needed to be shot into the stars. Preparations for the rocket were to commence shortly, and Jason Bright thanked Bob personally for working so hard to fulfill their hopes and dreams. Bob was instructed by Mr. Not-a-Ghoul to head upstairs to the rooftop viewing booth so he could push the ignition button in some kind of thankful gesture and reward. Bob clearly wasn’t going to get his money back. Once he was on the roof, Bob noticed that a destination programming computer for the rockets was placed next to the launch button.

Now Bob hasn’t done a single very bad thing in his entire life. Aside from theft, he’s never hurt someone who didn’t try to hurt him first. Hell, he always paid his New California Republic taxes on time while he lived there. So it was with much internal debate that Bob mulled over sabotaging the ghouls’ launch sequence to send them crashing into the ground somewhere in the Mojave. Even though his lack of computer ability kept him from knowing what he was doing, the destination software was wide-open and unencrypted. A few ham-fisted presses of the keyboard should have done the trick.

In the end Bob pushed away his evil thoughts. He knew what it was like to search for something, to make certain principles his driving convictions. If he blew up the ghouls because he didn’t get paid as their errand bitch, well he’d just have to suck it up and realize that someday he too would need a stranger’s help in getting revenge on the bastards who shot him.

Bob didn’t exactly like the idea of someone blowing up his own metaphorical space rocket.

Image courtesy of Bob the Courier

Bob the courier pressed the big red button in front of him. Giant doors opened on a domed structure in the distance. Three rockets came into view. They powered up, and bright smoky fire spewed into the air around the facility. Before the rockets launched to their cosmic destiny, the sounds of “Flight of the Valkyries” could be heard playing on a shortwave radio next to the computer console. Jason Bright and his followers blasted off into space that day, and Bob the courier could only imagine where they were actually headed.

As he turned around to leave, Bob heard the discomforting sound of machine parts grating on one another. He flipped his head around just in time to see one of the rockets violently zigzag in the sky before it shot off in a different direction than the other two. Bob left the control booth with a sly smile on his face, determined to find the wreckage someday and scavenge his 500 caps from those stupid ghouls.

But Bob would earn his money back long before he would have to sort through the burnt corpses of a few failed intergalactic pilgrims. Bob the courier would next shack up with the New California Republic; money, influence and bad ass clothes were going to be his reward for taking a side in the battle for Hoover Dam.

New Vegas would have to wait just a little bit longer. Bob decided that he needed to make a favorable impression on the NCR first, and the battle of Boulder City would help him do just that.

“Chupacabras with Automatic Weapons”

Computers and science stuff never came easy to Bob. He didn’t grow up in one of those pre-war Vaults, where kids got real education. Bob was raised to think not with his mind but with his hands. He could fix a computer just as easily as he could arm wrestle a Super Mutant — that is to say, not very well.

So Bob was pretty damn surprised when, in the middle of going to recruit an incarcerated former sheriff for the town of Primm, he discovered a heap of broken robot on the desk of a vacant general store. Though Bob the Courier distrusted most machines since he could remember, he always indulged his natural curiosity when it came to anything that might help him blow more shit up.

Bob expected this round, odd thing to be a Powder Gang trap which would blow up in his face. If that didn’t happen, Bob assumed it would at least pluck his eyes out with some kind of evil robo-claw.

But what Bob actually got from this chance encounter in the Wasteland was something he didn’t anticipate: companionship.

Together Bob and his new automaton accomplice would soon save the livelihood of a small settler town called Novac. Yet before this odd-couple of the Mojave could go on their first adventure, Bob would have to figure out how to fix a robot with his hands, and a brain that vaguely remembered what the “on” button of a computer looked like.

Like most everything in the desert wasteland Bob was now calling home, this scrap heap of a robot was rusty, dingy and broken. Afraid to crack it open and see what was inside, the courier opted for a much more simplistic option: instead of hacking into an electronics system he would be confused by, Bob hoped that stuffing handfuls of scrap metal and sensor modules into the little ball would prove a workable alternative. After all, he told himself, what’s a robot but a bunch of nuts and bolts with some wires holding it together?

Unfortunately, Bob didn’t have the necessary materials for a proper repair. He only had three tire irons and a few bottles of water on him. Then Bob remembered that he was supposed to be heading to a prison to find an elusive ex-sheriff; a prison guarded by the Powder Gang, whose material stores would likely contain all the robot-fixing parts to bring 10 of these contraptions back to life. So Bob set out with a new goal, and newly found determination.

Getting into the prison’s storeroom was more difficult than Bob planned. Powder Gangers happen to get their name from a shared love of dynamite, a weapon they wield with confidence and accuracy.

Despite a broken arm and severe blackouts from a cracked skull, the intrepid courier managed to scavenge enough scrap metal from the prison grounds. Sensor modules, however, were going to be much more difficult to find. The ex-sheriff found and recruited for Primm, Bob hobbled back to the doctor in Goodsprings for well-deserved medical attention.

Hours later, his head cleared, Bob suddenly remembered he already had all the essential components locked in a container at the doc’s house. It seems that years of severe head trauma had not benefited the courier.

Bob rushed back to Primm’s vacant general store, a toolbox of parts in his hands, and got to work. Within minutes of duct taping all the random electronics and metal he could find into the robot, it beeped to life and introduced itself. Its name was ED-E, and it began quietly hovering at Bob’s side. Bob liked that it was the strong, silent type — they had a lot in common.

Image courtesy of Bob the Courier

Over the next week Bob tested the limits of ED-E’s programming and combat proficiency. ED-E’s laser cannon barbecued dozens of gang members, mole rats and coyotes. The robot even carried the human’s hundreds of pounds of loot, and the human protected the robot in return.

Bob was so impressed and inspired by the results of this chance encounter that when the pair found a cache of primitive, handmade art supplies in a shack deep in the wastes, Bob began watercoloring the various and strange events on his vengeful path to the city of New Vegas. His first finished work was of ED-E, his new friend and sole cohort in desolation.

Late in the afternoon one day, not long after ED-E had joined Bob, the travelers spotted a giant green dinosaur in the wavy heat of the distance. Made of metal, and thereby harmless (but still scary enough to trigger Bob’s latent reptile phobia), the giant structure was a remnant of a pre-war motel once known for its trademarked mascot, Dinky the Dinosaur. Dinky and the motel just happened to be attached to the small town of Novac, which was struggling to keep its territory safe from Caesar’s Legion, a murderous gang of slavers known to raze entire settlements for general raping and pillaging purposes. But these settlers warmly greeted Bob, and the sniper watching from Dinky the Dinosaur’s mouth paid no attention to the courier.

The only resident of Novac who had anything interesting to say was the local coot, lovingly known as No-bark Noonan. He told Bob about the sinister chupacabra stalking the streets of Novac and killing brahmin each night. The chupacabra also had an assault rifle, according to No-bark, who swore he saw the creature. While Bob had never heard of a post-apocalyptic, firearm-wielding mutant chupacabra, there was at least one grain of truth in the codger’s story. Every morning the brahmin ranchers had been finding the fresh corpses of their livestock. Bob told No-bark he’d look into it, and ED-E beeped in eager agreement.

They only had to wait for midnight to solve the true mystery of Novac’s wave of cattle murder.

Bob and ED-E sat outside the brahmin pen until midnight. Bob complacently sipped from a bowl of squirrel stew and watched ED-E float back and forth in silence. He wondered if a robot could look (or for that matter be) bored.

At half-past midnight Bob was ready to call the investigation a wash, when all of a sudden an eight-foot tall Super Mutant came out of the darkness spouting gibberish at the brahmin. Frozen in surprise, Bob could only watch as the clearly insane Super Mutant perforated another cow with a minigun. The mutant then vanished back into the darkness, seemingly invisible to the naked eye. But Bob had seen that so-called invisibility before, and he knew to look for the sheen of light reflection which would tell him where the mutant was. He spotted it hiding behind a rock near the cattle pen, talking to itself.

Bob leaped and bludgeoned the mutant in the head with his tire iron, but that only pissed it off. Bob took three more swings at the mutant, all of which missed, until his torso was nearly punched clean through by the monster. As Bob waited for the final blow, ED-E shot the Super Mutant, destroying the skull and reducing everything above the neck into mush. A single eyeball, propelled by the force of ED-E’s shot, landed at Bob’s feet with a poignant squish.

After injecting himself with three stimpacks, Bob managed to crawl to the headless corpse. He found a hastily scribbled note that proved how insane this particular breed of mutant, called a Nightkin, really was. It was mad at the brahmin for mooing so much that they kept him awake…in his dreams.

Next to the body was a giant club made of rebar and cement, which Bob found to be a suitable replacement for his rusty tire iron.

Image courtesy of Bob the Courier

Novac saved of any more unnecessary cattle deaths, an appreciative population decided their new savior could help them out with another problem. A pre-war facility west of town once belonged to an American rocket manufacturing company called REPCONN, and it was the likely source of a recent influx of feral ghouls. The town already had enough to worry about with Ceasar’s Legion in the east, and No-bark was convinced that these “commie ghouls” were planning to turn the Moon into a pink-hued tribute to Lenin. Bob was determined to help these poor settlers, crazy theories and all, in exchange for information about the men who shot him. Bob would get that information, but only after he solved Novac’s ghoul problem.

The courier and his robot pal would soon learn that sometimes the best way to deal with a ghoul is to put it in a rocket and shoot it into space.

“Off to a Bloody Start”

Bob is a courier. Bob was shot in the head by a few New Vegas thugs just for doing his job. Bob, a simple man (but by no means dumb — he knows a thing or two about mechanics and survival techniques), was rescued by a cowboy robot and fixed up by a small town doctor in the Mojave Wasteland. This doctor even asked Bob what some inkblots looked like, just to make sure Bob’s brain hadn’t been fried during surgery. One of those inky stains looked a lot like a vagina, but Bob, the last modest soul in a cruel world, was too embarrassed to say so. One did remind him of a mushroom cloud, though.

And that’s how Fallout: New Vegas began for my avatar, Bob the Courier. While every character has to go through the psychological evaluations and distribute their S.P.E.C.I.A.L. points using a machine that resembles a 1920s arcade game, each character’s life will be unique after leaving Doc Mitchell’s house in Goodsprings. Significant decisions and paths open up in the first hour alone. Some might track down the men who shot them while others will begin looting — or “prospecting” — throughout the Mojave Wasteland. Bob didn’t do either. Instead, I decided that Bob needed to find some sunglasses. See, Bob’s a four-eyes, a trait I tacked on when creating his character. Without glasses Bob has a minus one point to his perception skill; with them his perception increases by one.

On his humble quest for eye-wear Bob became the patron savior of Goodsprings, declared war on the Powder Gang, saved a deputy and stormed into a prison compound controlled by inmates in revolt. Bob also broke his legs four times, nearly died from dehydration twice and ran away from the same raging pack of radscorpions on a dozen separate occasions.

Such is life in Fallout: New Vegas’ Hardcore mode.

The first stop on my quest to bequeath Bob with snazzy shades was the local saloon in Goodsprings, the town your Fallout courier wakes up in after he, or she, was left for dead. It’s not much to look at, which is disappointing compared with the impressive first steps taken into Fallout 3′s Capital Wasteland.

Bob talked to some locals, learned how to shoot using iron sights, and discovered that the recently formed Powder Gang was threatening his new hometown. It was a typical introductory quest, one where the good or bad paths meant either protecting or attacking the town. What wasn’t expected were the influence points Bob immediately gained after killing the Powder Gang’s leader. For his heroic efforts, the town soon “idolized” Bob, meaning my courier will receive significant discounts from Goodspring’s merchants. On the other hand, the Powder Gangers weren’t exactly pleased with this newcomer’s do-good attitude. New Vegas’ faction system can greatly change the way characters interact with the world around them. Entire quest lines will disappear just by associating with a particular crowd.

After searching high and low for glasses in a one-brahmin town and coming up empty handed, Bob decided to move on. His path through the desert brought Bob to the brink of death. Forgetting to bring fresh water along, Bob made the mistake of sleeping in an abandoned trailer overnight, and woke up dehydrated in the morning. His vision blurred, Bob managed to find a bottle of dirty water in a nearby box. Thirst quenched for the time being, Bob pressed on to Primm, a town split in half by bloodthirsty convicts and its defenders, the New California Republic. Bob managed to disarm the mines blocking the way into the heart of Primm, stabbing a few enemies along the way. Melee seems to be very effective in New Vegas, even on Hardcore. Limbs are more frequently hacked off, and some melee weapons give bonuses to arm and leg-based damage.

Deep in a rundown hotel was the last lawman of Primm, taken hostage by the escaped prisoners and tied up for ransom. The deputy needed a hand to escape from his prison, and Bob was happy to help. This act of good will lead to a new quest, and perhaps Bob’s best chance at finding his much-needed spectacles. Primm’s sheriff was hacked to pieces by the invading criminals, and now that the town was safe the important task of bringing law back to its remaining inhabitants fell to Bob. The deputy mentioned that a former sheriff was serving time in the New California Republic’s prison to the northeast — which was now swarming with the Powder Gang. Fairly certain that he could kill a few bad guys who were trying to look cool by wearing sunglasses, Bob set out to find his treasure.

After “infiltrating” the prison by throwing 10 sticks of dynamite at a group of enemies herded into the pen at the entrance gate, Bob went inside and, to his great surprise, found a pair of aviators on the corpse of a prospector, a dead man locked up in a cell full of giant mutant mantises. It took a lot of firepower to make it that far — two gang leaders and their cronies managed to cripple Bob’s limbs, and the poor courier had to hobble around while scavenging the bodies. Despite the hardships, Bob’s goal had been achieved. Combined with the deceased sheriff of Primm’s cowboy hat, Bob looked pretty damn good. And yes, it really took five hours to find those sunglasses. Recruiting the ex-sheriff would have to wait for another time.

My attempts at narration aside, New Vegas has made a distinct impression so far. The Hardcore mode is only as difficult as a player’s memory is poor. It’s not hard to find water sources and food, and your character doesn’t have to eat or drink as much as I initially expected. What’s most frustrating about playing with Hardcore rules is the reduced effectiveness of the healing items. Instead of an instant gain of hitpoints, all healing aids will only restore health over time, making it pretty difficult to fight a deathclaw one-on-one.

New Vegas is much bigger than I expected, and I haven’t even started to peel away its outermost layers in these first five hours. I’ve yet to see the Vegas strip, which is something I hope to discuss in the next entry. That will just depend on the amount of time I continue to spend outfitting Bob.

What clothing item should Bob hunt down next? Leave your suggestions, questions and anything else that strikes your fancy about the format of this article in the comments. I look forward to reading your feedback. So does Bob.

That’s why we’re trying something new with our reviews. Over the next month (or less, depending on however many nights I deprive myself of sleep) Silicon Sasquatch will run a series of weekly articles I’m penning on New Vegas to investigate and dissect its noteworthy aspects in set blocks of hours, a section-by-section travelogue if you will. To attempt to review New Vegas after rushing through its campaign would only serve to dilute the experience of the game itself. Traditional reviews may work that way, but we have the opportunity to pace ourselves for this website.

Expect my first entry in the “New Vegas Travel Guide” this Friday, October 22. The initial post will highlight New Vegas’ beginning five hours, and will focus on whatever I see or do that strikes me in a good — or bad — way. Some reviews are painting New Vegas as a near-carbon copy of Fallout 3 but with more noticeable technical issues (at least in the Xbox 360 version, which I will be buying today). Glitches or not, my underlying aim with these articles is to break the game into chronological segments and fairly determine whether or not Obsidian’s efforts overcome any similarities to Bethesda’s work to make a distinct, legitimate product by the time the credits roll.

I’d like to let our readers know that I’m taking open submissions for questions, concerns or hopes you may have regarding Fallout: New Vegas; things that I should keep in mind for subsequent articles. Simply leave your cogitations in the comments section.

Why hello there, future purchase

What a week it’s been. The inaugural Gamescom in Cologne, Germany opened on Wednesday and guess what: Sony kindly unveiled the new PlayStation 3 Slim. Media outlets weren’t exactly surprised by the announcement, but I think we’re all glad the rumor mill has finally ceased its incessant turning about the damn console. Looks like I finally need to go get a PS3.

Oh, and a little event in Anaheim, California called BlizzCon flung its +10 Doors of Nerd Barricading open to the (literally) unwashed masses of Blizzard fanatics today, and so far we’ve already been made privy to the next World of Warcraft expansion, a new Diablo III class and StarCraft II being confirmed for release in 2010.

You know, as a gamer I like it when these big gaming-related events run back-to-back with one another. The ESA might as well wedge E3 2010 between next year’s Gamescom and BlizzCon to mentally and physically destroy every games journalist in existence. That could be Silicon Sasquatch‘s in!

An image so good it makes the prequels look half-decent

Aaron:

For some odd reason I’ve devoted a large amount of my gaming time this week to Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga. I’m under the deluded notion that I can reach 100% completion in the game without going insane. It’s not a particularly hard title, it’s just tedious…incredibly tedious. Still, I have to hand it to Traveller’s Tales for making what’s overall a fun and goofy title. Just don’t ruin the experience by trying to do what I’m doing.

Other non-block-themed bytes I consumed this week were Fallout 3′s Point Lookout and Mothership Zeta — mostly for review purposes. Go ahead and check out each write-up for my impressions of Bethesda’s final two post-nuclear roleplaying simulator DLCs. Now, to be completely honest, I’m glad to wash my hands of the game. Hundreds of hours sunk into one title (that’s not an MMO) makes you feel way too involved. Strange, I know. I’m ready for Fallout: New Vegas, though. Get to it, Obsidian Entertainment!

Next on my gaming queue: Halo Wars, Shadow Complex, Batman: Arkham Asylum (which is getting many glowing reviews) and…more Lego Star Wars.

Doug's local sports pride is fantastic. But why are they called the Vikings anyway? Vikings usually burned and pillaged, I recall.

Doug:

This week has been busy — class Monday, finishing homework, quizzes and team projects for accounting on Wednesday, then a test in Finance on Tuesday, more class Wednesday, being social (bars, basketball and more bars) and finalizing some back-end paperwork stuff for grad school. I haven’t fired my 360 up since…maybe Monday. All I’ve done gaming-wise is play with the NCAA 10 TeamBuilder — it’s super powerful and, being the kind of person to toil over minor details regarding team jerseys, it’s right up my alley.

Above is a photo for the work-in-progress team I’ve created; the fun part will be editing the roster from head to toe. Thankfully, you can now do that through a web browser instead of on a console.

Nathan Drake/The Prince takes flight in Shadow Complex for Xbox Live Arcade

Nick:

With this scorched-earth Oregon summer winding to a pleasantly breezy conclusion, my gaming backlog is finally getting the attention it deserves. Having made my way through the wonderfully crass House of the Dead: Overkill and Namco’s doting recreation of PlayStation platforming classic Klonoa, I’ve almost finished clearing out my GameFly queue. I hope to finish Killzone 2 and Punch-Out!! this weekend.

Of course, that all depends on whether I can release my vice grip on Shadow Complex. Chair Entertainment created a game that went right for my Achilles’ Heel: side-scrolling, Metroid-style adventures. While I’m not convinced it’s the greatest game of its kind, it’s a pleasant surprise and a nice homage to some of the finest games ever made.

And hey, it’s always nice to hear Nolan North playing another character who looks an awful lot like Nathan Drake; maybe it’ll hold me over until Uncharted 2 struts in and dictates how I live my life for the next few months.

But, I’ll be honest here and say I’m completely fine with not playing Fallout 3 in any capacity for a few months.

Please, Vault Boy…no more

Today’s batch of industry news has annoying legal teams crushing fan-made dreams, enough Japanese DS owners for Nintendo to start a conscription-based army, one announced title that no one really is surprised by and a perplexing possible addition to the English language that all gamers love to hate, but also use incessantly.

Unless it's a paid-for DS re-release, Square Enix doesn't approve of this gang having additional adventures

It’s a sad day for Chrono Trigger fans as  Square Enix’s legal team has terminated fan-made ROM project Chrono Trigger: Crimson Echoes. The collaboration, a five year long effort nearing its release date, was supposed to add to the original Chrono Trigger experience with 35 hours of brand new content written and created by devoted fans.

This is certainly not the first case of “Squeenix” cease-and-desisting fan projects for fear of copyright infringement. Chrono Resurrection is another perfect example of how much passion and effort can go into projects doomed for cancellation by intellectual property holders. These talented people simply have a lot of love for a particular title made by a profit-seeking company, but that doesn’t mean much to the suits. It’s not to say Square Enix is heartless, but the truth is these projects seek no monetary gains–really they’re no more than elaborate love letters from a cadre of fans who worship the original creators’ work.

If I were the company, I’d be enormously flattered. But I’m not, because if I were the human embodiment of an RPG development powerhouse I’d have deported Wakka from Spira and made another Vagrant Story by now.

20% of Japan having DS units pales in comparison to the 50% of college-aged American women wearing Ugg boots

According to internal Nintendo sales numbers posted by Kotaku, one-fifth of the entire population of Japan owns a Nintendo DS. And here we were thinking Nintendo was surely down in the dumps. Comparing the population sizes of Nintendo’s other key markets of the United States and Europe–who each have a much higher number of people living in their respective territories–truly makes the Japanese consumption numbers a staggering statistic.

And while the DS has remained extremely popular to gamers and non-gamers alike since release, the fact that the DS has sold nearly the same number of units in a country almost three times smaller in terms of population than the United States is quite impressive indeed.

So that's who Altaïr gets his fashion sense from

Eidos has finally confirmed the development of Thief 4, something known to–or at least expected by–most of the gaming community for quite awhile now. Although I’ll be the first to admit I’ve never actually played a Thief title, I’ve always heard great things about the series’ stealth-based gameplay. Plus, it’s wonderful to know Eidos is working on projects other than further Tomb Raider sequels.

Let’s see what the company’s new overlords (and fan project deniers) Square Enix can do for a series that hasn’t seen a release since Thief: Deadly Shadows in 2004.

Lastly, multiple websites have reported today that “noob” just might become the unofficial millionth word in our poor, dear English language. Don’t expect to see the online trash talk favorite appear in any notable dictionaries in the near future. Still, an Austin, Texas-based piece of analytics software known as the Global Language Monitor analyzes word trends by tracks the number of usages of a particular term throughout thousands of legitimate online sources like magazines and news feeds. If a linguistic newcomer is used enough, the Global Language Monitor declares it a word.

I don’t intend to sound snobbish about the word, because in truth language changes daily and is meant to change. Without adaptations, we wouldn’t have such wondrous gems as “blog” and “tweet.”

Oh god…what have we done?

Broken Steel succeeds because it caters directly to Fallout 3′s central plot without weakening it. There are no diversions or trips to less-important locales in this add-on—players are brought back to the Capital Wasteland, continuing the quest that led them out of Vault 101 in the first place.

Truly, Operation: Anchorage and The Pitt were fleeting crescendos meant to build up to Broken Steel. It’s just a shame it took two tries on Bethesda Softworks’ part to get everything right.

Before Broken Steel, Fallout 3′s major flaw was its ending. After successfully pumping fresh water into the parched landscapes of the Capital Wasteland the game cruelly fades to black. The decision makes little sense considering Bethesda’s track record with its Elder Scrolls series—in the games, players could continue exploring the surrounding world at their leisure. Thankfully, Broken Steel rectifies the disappointing ending and fulfills players’ innumerable hours of investment in the main plot.

The waters of life return to the ruins of D.C.

Players can now see the pay-off of chasing their digital father’s dream to offer fresh water to the people of the wastes. Barrels upon barrels of “Aqua Pura” are carted out to the surrounding communities by way of Brahmin caravans. No need to rely on a voice-over movie to fill-in the blanks anymore.

After finishing Fallout 3′s main quest, players wake up under the care of the Brotherhood of Steel and Elder Lyons. The aging leader explains that two weeks have passed since Project Purity came to fruition, and Enclave forces, outside of a few pockets of resistance, have been largely dealt with. For once in a Fallout 3 add-on there’s no distress signal to tune into—the new content begins right away.

Broken Steel’s first mission takes players to one of the remaining Enclave strongholds outside of the regular wasteland map. The combat starts immediately with full units of both the Brotherhood and the Enclave exchanging an array of bullets, beams and bombs. Along for the destructive ride is that shining beam of Democratic pride Liberty Prime, who shows up to vaporize what it (always) thinks are Communist Chinese forces.

Unfortunately for the Brotherhood’s robotic super weapon, an Enclave orbital strike makes short work of the propaganda machine. Funnily enough, Prime’s decapitated head stops just short of the player’s feet to gasp out its poignant last words: “Death is a preferable alternative to Communism.”

Thus begins the main quest of Broken Steel: find the Enclave command center responsible for ordering the missile strikes. This is how players end up in the brand new (and final area) map of Adams Air Force Base, reachable by a tram system located underneath the White House.

Battle at the Adams Air Force Base–the Vertibirds lose.

The Air Force base is a sizable chunk of land, though it’s mainly a bunch of hangars and fortified Enclave positions. If anything, Bethesda could have done more than offer an extremely wide and flat section of land. It’s also easy to fight through thanks to usable artillery strikes and tons of cover.

However, actually reaching Adams Air Force Base isn’t a simple proposition. Broken Steel is a difficult piece of downloadable content in most other areas thanks to new enemies like the Enclave Hellfire Troopers and Feral Ghoul Reavers, who aren’t pushovers even at higher levels. The Reavers in particular are quite challenging, but it’s a welcome shift in difficulty from otherwise being able to kill most enemies in one to two rounds of V.A.T.S.

Broken Steel’s main story, lasting around six to seven hours depending on the player, is a strong addition to Fallout 3′s core plot. At it’s most basic, Broken Steel is not much more complicated than letting players become Rambo, essentially going all-out to get revenge on the Enclave; even so, it’s a perfect fit with story threads left unwoven in the regular game.

The last mission objective in the DLC is to storm the Enclave’s gigantic Mobile Crawler, and what a finale it is. Special squads of soldiers, numerous Vertibirds and deadly turrets guard the outside and inside of the base. The interior of the crawler offers a vast treasure trove of supplies to plunder for those who can carry the load–scrounging has always been one of the most satisfying parts of the Fallout experience, after all.

Once players have shot their way to the control center and discovered the computer used to order the orbital strikes, they are once again confronted with difficult choices. One payload of missiles remains, and there are several targets to choose from, including the Citadel. As always, each choice has its consequences. But really, who hasn’t thought of bombing those righteous Brotherhood bastards?

Tesla Cannons don't take no mess

Broken Steel is enjoyable because it returns players to the Capital Wasteland and adds content without changing the overall cosmetics. The new weapons, the Tesla Cannon in particular, are superb. Enclave Vertibirds aren’t at all safe from a projectile beam of electricity, but it’s curious that players don’t receive XP from destroying the aircraft. Unfortunately any additional armor selections are quite lacking outside of the new Enclave units’ equipment.

The new level cap of 30 introduces some fantastic perks. “Puppies!” prevents Dogmeat from really ever dying as his offspring spawn outside Vault 101 to take his place. It’s little additions like that which show Bethesda’s commitment to improving their game. Another useful perk, “Quantum Chemist,” converts every 10 Nuka Colas into one Nuka Cola Quantum—a very desirable option for high-level explosives experts.

On the surface not much has changed in Broken Steel, but that’s what makes it Fallout 3′s greatest DLC. It’s all about preserving the feel of the Capital Wasteland while opening up an endless story for players and their personal Lone Wanderers. The quests, weapons, armor and level cap are just bonuses. And while it may sound unfortunate to have to pay $10 for the simple luxury of continuing characters’ journeys, Broken Steel is worth it.

Hopefully Broken Steel will be Bethesda’s model for future Fallout 3 content. It might have taken the development team a few attempts to deliver a quality gameplay experience in-line with the best parts of Fallout 3 proper, but what matters most is gamers and fans finally have an add-on worthy of the Fallout name.

Now if we can just get Liberty Prime up and running again, that would be great.

Recommended for:

• The best Fallout 3 DLC Microsoft points can buy; a significant value as well over Operation: Anchorage and The Pitt
• Being able to play past the original game’s ending
• Fun weapons and entertaining quests
• By buying this, hopefully you’ll encourage Bethesda to make better and better DLC packs for Fallout 3

Not Recommended for:

• $10 for new content still sounds high to you
• Fallout 3 doesn’t mean anything to you…you savage!
• Low-level characters not close to the end quest really don’t need to purchase this content until they’re at that point

Read our policy on reviews here.

This time around, Bethesda Softworks ditches the virtual reality pods and simulation gimmicks seen in Operation: Anchorage; instead, the developers have crafted their interpretation of a post-apocalyptic Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and in the process manage to create a locale as equally nightmarish as any seen in the Capital Wasteland.

It’s a satisfying return to the best parts of the Fallout 3 world, and despite The Pitt’s technical flaws, it’s a significantly more impressive experience than Anchorage.

Just like in the last DLC, players begin The Pitt’s content by receiving a broadcast distress signal from an unknown source. After reaching the source of the message, the DLC introduces its quest-giving main character, Wernher. This mysterious new character recruits the player into saving his people–slaves forced to work for Ashur, the boss in charge of the Pitt’s foundries and building projects–by infiltrating the slavers’ town and stirring up some trouble. To do that, the eye patch-wearing rogue asks for help stealing a rumored cure to the genetic mutations running rampant across the slaver-occupied town.

Precioussssss…

Although Pittsburgh wasn’t nuked during the war, 200 years of three separate rivers drumping in other cities’ radiation mixed with an incessant cloud of industrial toxins have created a special kind of degeneration for humans in the Pitt. When exposed long enough, people begin to morph into “Trogs,” which look like Fallout’s version of Gollum. Trogs are also the new Super Mutants of The Pitt, replacing them as the main flavor of enemy, and it’s actually a welcome change.

The story and setting are clear tonal shifts from Anchorage’s vision of American wartime prosperity, and though the plot is still razor-thin (it’s hard to believe even evil characters would care enough about a town of slaves for a few lousy caps), players are likely to accept The Pitt’s content because it feels like Fallout 3.

Pollution's never been so pretty

If Operation: Anchorage was a serene landscape of blues and whites, The Pitt is a hellhole colored with oranges, reds and yellows–both inside and out, Pittsburgh’s ruins look like one continuous foundry pumping rust, blood and smog into the air. It’s a perplexing (and cool) sight to gaze upon active industrial smoke stacks in what’s supposed to be a de-industrialized waste of a world.

Reaching the new area is as simple as activating a railroad handcart located outside of a train tunnel, though players are warned they will be stuck in the Pitt until the main quest is finished–a nearly five hour commitment. Travelers will want to be sure they’re ready for the Pitt before taking off. Once inside, Wernher informs players that their equipment will be temporarily taken from them. Wernher does offer to hide either a gun or knife on the Lone Wanderer (don’t ask where), so players won’t be entirely unarmed.

The first and last time you'll see the word "welcome" in The Pitt

Getting to the slaver camp requires traversing one of the more impressive pieces of architecture in The Pitt: a bridge leading into the ruined city. And although it’s technically nothing out of the ordinary, the haunting “Welcome to The Pitt” sign along with the husks of cars, dozens of frag mines and a new type of rabid dog make for a superb introduction to the new content. The experience continues to be largely solid throughout, though the occasional technical problems hamper an otherwise more-improved example of DLC.

Twice during the first mission alone the game froze in the middle of using V.A.T.S., and it crashed again a handful of times during various loading screens. It’s been widely noted that The Pitt had significant problems at release, but many seem to persist.

At the time of this review, a few textures and random geometries noticeably stick through buildings and the odd clipping of character models appear here and there. That said, The Pitt is still a fantastic-looking piece of DLC thanks to Bethesda tweaking the engine’s lighting effects. The characters may still look rather lifeless, off-colored and poorly textured, but gamers have been dealing with Bethesda’s style of modeling since Oblivion.

What The Pitt does best is adhere to the example set by Fallout 3′s main content: force players to make tough choices and give them ambiguous answers. Without spoiling it for readers, the “cure” referred to by Wernher and his accomplice Midea isn’t just a simple item to steal. In fact, if players don’t listen to some key holotapes they might believe they’re making the right decision, only to regret it later. The Pitt is by no means a masterpiece of emotional storytelling, but it does a much better job of providing complex options to problems and offering realistic consequences. But, who really cares about “feelings” when there are things to kill, right? Right.

The Auto Axe: A favorite of the post-apocalyptic Tim "The Toolman" Taylor

The most impressive piece of weaponry found in The Pitt is the Auto Axe, which is basically what a mad scientist would create if he fused a lawnmower and power saw together. Non-melee characters might not replace their projectile weapons with the brutal Auto Axe, but weed-eating a few dozen raiders and Trogs to death is grotesquely satisfying nonetheless. Unfortunately, no type of additional damage modeling for characters made it in into the DLC, as limbs still come off like they do in Fallout 3 proper. It would have been a great time to introduce more complex dismemberment animations with such an excessive weapon available.

Clothing in The Pitt receives better tending to than in Anchorage, as there are 18 new wearable pieces ranging from headgear to body armor. It’s great that characters have more opportunity to explot the “role-play” aspect of Fallout 3′s RPG side, whereas before the costume choices felt limited to a few decent options that weren’t post-apocalyptic belly shirts.

Perhaps the Pitt wouldn’t be this enjoyable if it wasn’t preceded by Operation: Anchorage’s weaker content. Still, on its own The Pitt simply works because it’s a faithful extension of the Fallout 3 world’s gritty fantasy.

With a larger and more interesting area to explore, better quests to complete and an overall impressive experience to be had, it’s not hard to recommend The Pitt, even when taking Broken Steel’s significantly more robust additions into consideration.

Players with Broken Steel will still get a lot out of The Pitt. Outside of experience points, weapons and armor–equipment useful even in Broken Steel–The Pitt’s quests, while separate, compliment Broken Steel’s if for no other reason than they both act like Fallout titles are supposed to. And that’s exactly what any DLC should have done from the beginning, anyway.

Recommended for:

• Those burned by the other DLC’s content; The Pitt steps things up significantly
• It’s Fallout 3 presented in a new light, and that’s what makes it work
• New weapons, armor and a view of somewhere other than the Capital Wasteland
• One interesting quest involving a so-called “cure” for the Trog mutations

Not Recommended for:

• There are still bugs, and mileage will vary from gamer to gamer. Still, make sure you don’t rely on autosaves–corruption does happen
• Some shoddy design here, with textures being out of place, buildings clipping into each other and so on
• Gamers on a budget that have to choose between this or Broken Steel. The Pitt’s almost as good, but this isn’t so much a negative element as a practical judgment call

Read our policy on reviews here.

Operation: Anchorage isn’t exactly a waste of time, but it’s close.

Bethesda Softworks’ first Fallout 3 DLC is by no means lacking polish or the studio’s high production standards, but it’s truly not much more than a three-hour treasure hunt with a few unwelcome gameplay additions and a shiny, non-wasteland setting to cover its overall shortcomings.

This lackluster nature makes Anchorage a frustrating piece of content to plod through as Bethesda certainly isn’t new to the idea of extending their core titles. The numerous releases for their last game, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, first began with pointlessness but later ended with something epic; it certainly appeared that the company learned from its initial mistakes and mastered the delivery of DLC packages.

Unfortunately for Fallout 3, the development team manages to repeat its history of initially poor downloadable content with the uneven and unsatisfying Operation: Anchorage, which ends up looking like a failed attempt at streamlining Fallout into a first-person shooter experience.

In Operation: Anchorage, the Brotherhood of Steel Outcasts have found a locked cache of 200-year-old weaponry and are desperately trying to unlock the tasty tech treats within. The only problem is a door locked via a virtual reality program, a program which runs a simulation of the pre-apocalypse Chinese invasion of Anchorage, Alaska. Only when the training sim is complete will the vast treasures within be available to the Outcasts.

Players showing up to the Outcasts’ hideout in the D.C. ruins are told that their familiarity with the Pip-Boy 3000 is integral to interfacing with the V.R. program, and as such are suited up for the simulation pod with the promise of sharing whatever lies behind the doors.

Bethesda clearly wants to get the DLC moving along here, as the process of arriving at the Outcast base to getting into the V.R. program takes less than five minutes. It’s certainly one welcome change to the sometimes overwhelming exposition found in Fallout 3 proper.

While cool, this screen is from one of the only decent missions in the DLC

Once inside the simulation, Operation: Anchorage as a piece of content begins a systematic destruction of most of Fallout 3′s more enjoyable mechanics. While the battle for Anchorage is a virtual reality program and thus Fallout 3′s typical rules are free to change, players nevertheless shoot weapons that don’t degrade, access infinite ammo supply containers and recharge their life with unlimited health stations.

Because of these gameplay changes–new approaches intended to speed up the Fallout experience–Anchorage feels like Fallout: The FPS, and that’s not a good thing.

For the first add-on to a game all about the utter hopelessness of carving out some sort of existence in a ruined, mad world, it’s certainly a strange change of pace technically and visually. Fallout is a world of tans, greys and browns–the colors of death and destruction.

So, while Anchorage is certainly impressive with its snow-covered tress and blue-hued color palette, it’s unsettling considering the visual rules Bethesda created in the Capital Wasteland. To be fair, players are dropped into a different world 211 years prior to their stepping out of Vault 101, but it’s easy to see why the developers forgo the alien look of Anchorage and return to familiar nuclear wasteland scenery in The Pitt and Broken Steel.

With unlimited health and ammo available at every turn and guns that won’t break, literally blasting through the content is nearly effortless even without the easy-to-kill enemies. The Chinese forces in Anchorage are basically the same with a few variations as the content progresses. There are snipers, stealth units called Crimson Dragons (which look like Raiden from Metal Gear Solid 4), flamer-wielding enemies and a few Communists with missile launchers.

Chimera tanks: dead before they can do any damage

The only interesting adversaries are the Chimera tank and spider drones. Yet the drones are porcelain-weak, and the Chimera, for being described as an insurmountable death machine by U.S. troops, can be taken out by an explosives expert using three standard hand grenades. It’s a shame that one of the only non-human or mutant enemies in the entirety of Fallout is a complete pushover.

By the time the last mission is finished, it wouldn’t be a stretch to assume a lot of gamers think, “Wait, that’s it?” Anchorage comes to a full stop in the middle of the most exciting mission in the entire add-on. After exiting the V.R. pod, the Outcasts are ready to open the door to the stash. Inside are likely the main reasons for purchasing this DLC: the Gauss rifle, an electricity-charged Chinese sword, winterized T-51b Power Armor and the Chinese stealth suit.

The new weapons and armor are certainly both fun and powerful, but they’re all simply upgrades to Fallout 3′s other devastating weaponry. Anchorage can’t necessarily be faulted at its time of release for being a short romp through a new setting and offering completely different play mechanics in a quest for overpowered gear, but it can be faulted now for lacking value when compared with Fallout 3′s other DLC packs.

This armor can be yours for the not-so-low price of $10!

To put it bluntly, this DLC isn’t worth the 800 ($10) if gamers have already purchased Broken Steel, a piece of content costing the same amount as Anchorage. The post-level 20 experience gains (unlocked in Broken Steel) in Anchorage amount to only one-and-a-half levels. Even the weapons will be quickly replaced with those found in the other two add-ons.

Taken as a whole experience, Operation: Anchorage tries its best to be a sharp turn for the Fallout series while offering some back-story on a conflict first mentioned in Fallout 1. But instead of being a decent companion to Fallout 3, the DLC acts like a very easy shoot’em up with only super weapons as a pay-off–it’s not exactly a worthwhile privilege.

Recommended for:

• Fallout 3 fans pining for more content, but for some reason don’t want to purchase The Pitt or Broken Steel
• Players of Fallout 3 eager to add more gear to their characters’ stashes, slowly amassing everything available in the game
• Anyone interested in more of the world’s lore, as the battle for Anchorage is an integral point in the backstory of the franchise

Not Recommended for:

• Mostly everyone else. Completionists will want the DLC just to play the content, but what’s included isn’t exactly fun
• The fact that two more interesting content packs are available makes Anchorage the bastard child of the DLC offerings
• How the add-on injects FPS and action game elements into a title that didn’t need to have them, and worked fine with its unique take on shooting (V.A.T.S.) to begin with

Read our policy on reviews here.

Somehow, even after three DLC releases, Vault 77 still isn't in the game

This weekend we’ll be running a three-part Fallout 3 DLC review feature in honor of the newly released Broken Steel, the third and supposedly final exclusive pack for the Xbox 360 and PC.

All three reviews will be self-contained and cover a specific add-on, but we’ll also determine whether or not Broken Steel’s increased level cap of 30 impacts the relevance of the other two expansions’ content.

Look for our first two reviews to hit this Saturday and Sunday, with the final one dropping on Monday.

And yes, what Ron Perlman says about war never changing applies to our dates as well.

• Saturday, May 9th: Operation: Anchorage — Are the FPS-leanings and winterized weaponry worth the rather short playtime? Take a break from your hangover woes this Saturday to read our answer.

• Sunday, May 10th: The Pitt — A vicious ax that’s part chainsaw, all murder? Check. One pointless collect-a-thon for an achievement? Check. Some bang for your Microsoft space buck? Visit the site on Sunday to find out.

• Monday, May 11th: Broken Steel — Liberty Prime, everyone’s favorite Commie-hating robot, is back for an appearance, and Dogmeat can’t really die anymore. This is supposed to be the biggest and best Fallout 3 add-on yet, but that’s our job to decide come Monday.