It’s Quakecon 2010 and those kind folks at Bethesda and Obsidian have been nice enough to let journos have a go on their upcoming title Fallout: New Vegas. It’s a game that’s been exciting a lot of gamers worldwide after the massive success of Bethesda-developed Fallout 3.
Obsidian have taken the helm this time round and utilized the engine from the last game, making a few tweaks along the way. We’ve got an hour to have a play today, which should give us a fairer impression than the short clips and quick goes we’ve been offered in the past.
Bethesda tell us the build is far enough along to enable play from the very beginning but it’s not where we’re let out in this playthrough. Instead, we land in Freeside, a town connected to the New Vegas strip but nowhere near as closely policed. All the makings of a seedy underworld are present and correct: one example being a back-street casino by the name of Atomic Wrangler that’s a few steps down from some of the more glamorous establishments found on the strip
The strip joints aren’t exactly clean-cut either, as the prostitution-filled, sex-centric Gomorrah so blatantly demonstrates. Another indicator of the town’s rife criminal activity is the presence of a misfit mob made up of Elvis impersonators known as the Kings.
We bump into a local named Old Ben near the exit of the strip who’s not having a particularly good time, mainly due to the fact he’s under attack from some ne’er do wells. We assist him in his fight, polishing off the enemies with devastating effects courtesy of an Anti-Material Rifle.
A quick chat to Old Ben and he tips us off on information that I’d presume to be fairly obvious: telling us not to try to sneak past the massive robots at the strip entrance (where you’re meant to pay a fee for admittance). Immediately after speaking to said local we see someone run past the robots in an attempt to break in gunned down without even the faintest glimmer of mercy.
Following suit, as you do in this sort of situation, we progress towards the doors only to be apprehended by the greeter, who we, unlike the last man in this vicinity, are happy to talk to in order to prevent certain death. We don’t have the money or a passport to gain entry though, so are turned away, subsequently setting off in search of dollar.
Francine and James Garret are the nearby owners of the aforementioned Atomic Wrangler casino and have a quest that could help earn a bit of that much-needed dough. They’re after offering a service beyond card games and request that we go find them some, er, willing participants to help out. Apparently a couple of their clients have some quite niche interests, so off we pop to go find a cowboy ghoul, a suave, role-play capable man and a sexbot.
Unfortunately our lockpick skill’s not good enough to get through the door that leads to the sexbot but the helpful Old Ben’s a pretty smooth talker so, after a little convincing (just speech, no violence, really), he begrudgingly obliges.
Next, we make towards the Old Mormon Fort, a slapdash medical centre full of well-meaning folk tending to the ill. We find a lady ghoul with a penchant for pain and anguish who’s adequately cowboyed up, it only takes the offer of a few discounted drinks to get her on board and what’s more, it sounds like she’s pretty game anyway.
When we speak to Francine Garret, we’re tasked with locating a bunch of non-paying clients to pick up their tabs with the promise of 50 per cent of said collected dollar.
We easily locate our first debtor in the shape of a smooth-talking man named Santiago: he attempts to worm his way out of paying but we’ve got a maxed out speech skill so it isn’t hard to convince him it’s a bad idea. Next we speak to someone named Lady Jane who ran off from a caravan due to an attack. She informs us the money’s in said Caravan if we want it, it’s just amidst a bunch of rather nasty creatures.
Last and probably least is a battered looking ghoul who’s asking for money himself, the cheeky blighter! We manage to force him to give us some of the money he owes as he explains that’s everything he owns bar the clothes on his back. So of course, we take the clothes off his back. Poor thing.
With that quest complete we have a wander round the rest of Freeside and bump into the Kings, a bizarre but powerful local mafia with a mandatory (haircut included) Elvis uniform. It seems a Freeside bodyguard named Orris has been behaving rather suspiciously of late and seems to be raking in a bit too much dough. We’re told to hire Orris and watch him work to see if he gets up to any funny business. We oblige and upon meeting the suspect supervisor are rushed through the streets in tow.
Just a little while through Freeside and lo and behold there’s a gang seemingly attempting to get their mug on. Our apparently adept bodyguard has already requested we hang back a little and take a route down a seedy back alley. Pushing further ahead he fires three shots, bringing the would-be muggers down. Fantastic, yes? Only we’re suspicious of Orris remember: is everything as it seems? Time to go get our thinking caps on.
At this point we’re able to question why there were only three shots fired when there are four bodies are lying on the floor. We’re able to ask the question as our Intelligence is at 6 or higher. If you don’t have the stats then you’re able to ask Orris why he ran ahead or request to keep moving. We opt to go all Columbo on his ass and question the validity of his killings with some shot-count based reasoning. He gives us some twaddle about killing two of them with a single shot. We don’t believe him so accuse the suspect wheeler dealer of rigging the whole thing to ensure he gets repeat business.
A high enough barter skill presents the option of bribing Orris for his caps to “stop” us spreading the word. He takes heed of our warning and promptly pays up, warning us that it doesn’t end there and before promptly scooting off. An examination of the “corpses” on the floor is possible providing that your medicine level is above 50. Fortunately, our training is up to the required standard, and upon inspecting them find the muggers are indeed pretending to be dead.
Fallout’s level of freedom rears its optionally ugly head and we become judge, jury and executioner, killing the muggers before slaughtering Orris and returning to the King. We tell him Orris isn’t a problem anymore but it’s clear things didn’t necessarily have to go that way but hey, the King, despite commenting on our lack of subtlety, is happy.
The King would like us to perform another job now but alas, we want to experiment and have a bit of fun. The tiny slice of time-cake we’ve been handed has nearly been devoured now anyway, so we opt for a little less conversation, a little more action and try to take out the Kings. Sadly we were wrong to be so cocky and kick the proverbial bucket pretty much instantly at the hands of his private army of impersonators.
Unfortunately, this marked the end of our time and we never had chance to actually manage a visit to the strip itself. A massive shame as it wasn’t even ruined in the blasts. But never mind, we’ll just have to wait until release.
