Fallout: New Vegas

[Gendal]

Planet XBox 360 says they didn’t have any, Ars Technica says they did.

Ars kinda goes off on it:

Both Bethesda and Obsidian are somewhat infamous for releasing games that, while ambitious, feature a number of technical issues, and New Vegas is no different. In fact, it’s a bit of a mess, though many of the problems are only superficial. Characters will say lines that were clearly meant for another part of the game, or they might walk into walls or through objects. Once, I witnessed a crucified slave hanging in mid-air, directly next to a cross.

But the technical problems you’ll really notice are the ones that affect how the game plays, not just how it looks and sounds. The biggest problem is that the game is prone to freezing. I experienced this at load screens where everything would simply go black, as well as during actual gameplay when the game would freeze up, forcing a restart. And though the game has an auto-save feature, it only saves when you enter buildings or certain rooms, so you can’t rely on it. You’ll need to save and save often, otherwise progress will be lost. And there’s nothing more frustrating than that.

Well, maybe there is. On three separate occasions, while walking over rocks, I found myself stuck inside them, unable to escape. Like the freezing, this forces you to restart the game, going back to the last save. In addition to these problems, New Vegas also has some incredibly long load times. Sometimes entering a new area will only require a few seconds of loading, while other times it can take upwards of a minute. You never quite know just how long it will take to get into the next room.

What these technical problems do is change the way you approach the game. When a load screen takes longer than usual, you can’t help but worry whether or not the game has frozen. And when the action freezes up for a brief second—which happens quite a bit—you get the same fear. When did I last save? How much will I have to replay? Likewise, the load times can make you question whether or not you really want to explore areas that aren’t 100 percent necessary.

The biggest problems seem to be stability and loading times, which it’s possible the PC could not suffer from. Or at least effectively mask - memory leaks tend to slow down a PC to a much lesser degree than the starved consoles.

[HRose]

The engine’s fine, oblivion and fallout3 were stable. It’s just buggy, because obsidian can’t QA for shit.

The engine is still the outsourced disaster they used since Morrowind and that powered DaoC and Warhammer too.

Looks decent (despite the animations) and runs like shit.

[MattKeil]

When a load screen takes longer than usual, you can’t help but worry whether or not the game has frozen. And when the action freezes up for a brief second—which happens quite a bit—you get the same fear. When did I last save? How much will I have to replay?

This is pure unadulterated truth.

[jeffd]

Well it’s midnight, when does steam unlock this fucker?

[jeffd]

Answer: NOW

[maxle]

Decrypting now. Try restarting steam.

ETA: Or not.

[Strollen]

I’ve tried reloading steam but it still shows preloading as the only option.

I wonder if living in Hawaii (3 hours behind the west coast matters.)

Never mind it is working.

[jeffd]

Decrypting! 48%

[jeffd]

War remains unchanged!

[Squee]

Well that’s a load off my mind.

[VegasRobb]

There’s a huge line at my local Gamestop. Seems like most folks are here to get Fallout but there seem to be a few Dj Hero 2 folks in the crowd (myself included).

The line is going out the door with more folks arriving every minute.

[Sarkus]

There’s a huge line at my local Gamestop. Seems like most folks are here to get Fallout but there seem to be a few Dj Hero 2 folks in the crowd (myself included).

The line is going out the door with more folks arriving every minute.

That might be one of the places having developers on hand.

My 24 hour Walmart had about five people waiting. Well, only three of us were waiting to get Fallout NV. One person wanted some XB360 game I’ve never heard of (and neither had the clerk) and one really upset older guy was apparently desperate to get Predtors on DVD RIGHT THIS MINUTE!

Still took almost half an hour for me to get rung up and out the door. But at least I go the free deck of cards! ;-)

[TurinTur]

I am finishing up reading the reviews / forums about the game, and i have already read three different stances about the technical problems:

1. Game is less buggy than Fallout 3 (2).
2. Game is as buggy as Fallout 3 (most of them).
3. Game is more buggy than Fallout 3 (3-4).

The game itself, it seems everyone is pretty happy with the quality. Big world, interesting plot & characters, better quests, crafting, more weapons, better voices, hardcore mode, better balance, etc etc.

[Chris_Nahr]

Sounds like I’ll be finishing up the Settlers 7 campaign while waiting for the first couple of patches on New Vegas.

[Hunty]

I’m almost certainly going to get this, but it’s the eternal question: 360 or PC? I suppose the bugginess and the likeliness of significant patching is a mark in the PC column.

[lordkosc]

PC = mods <3

[AndrewMyers]

How are “something getting corrupted” and “flaky hard drive” exclusive?

Well, yeah.

I’m gonna hold off on F:NV for now, and pick it up later after they’ve worked out some of the kinks (or I can get it cheap from the used bin). I loooooves me some Fallout as much as anyone here, but, having been burned by buggy Fallout releases before (car bug in Fallout2, anyone?), I don’t mind biding my time on this one. Plus Fable 3 hits next week.

So, thanks for the heads-up :)

[TurinTur]

I’m almost certainly going to get this, but it’s the eternal question: 360 or PC? I suppose the bugginess and the likeliness of significant patching is a mark in the PC column.

PC = mods <3

The pc version will be the best because a combination of these two things. Because it allows extensive modding, which includes the possibility of making a mod which is not a pure “mod” (new or changed content), but a patch that will fix bugs left by the publisher/dev.
At least, it was the case of Morrowind, Oblivion and Fallout 3, there was a mod called “unofficial patch” that fixed even more stuff than the last official patch.

[Delta]

Just a little off topic question while I wait for it to arrive:

In Fallout 3, do any side missions or places get locked off to me once I complete the main story?

[Cormac]

I know its probably too early for anyone to give me a clear answer, but I was wondering if I could just jump into this game without having played Fallout3. Or should I rather dig that one out and play it instead? (Somehow I never got around to it.)