Preview Fighting Deathclaws Is Serious Business

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Tags: Fallout: New Vegas; Obsidian Entertainment

<p>PCGamer had some <a href="http://www.pcgamer.com/2010/09/25/fallout-new-vegas-preview-hunting-deathclaws/" target="_blank">hands-on time</a> with Obsidian's upcoming Fallout: New Vegas.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Chomp warned me the road ahead was very dangerous. A plan forms. I love sledgehammers, and he has one. I ran on ahead and a Deathclaw, a powerful bi-pedal lizard, appeared. As soon as it was aggroed, I fled back to the prospectors. Chomp, high on adrenaline and Stimpaks, manned up again, running at the scything, ugly beast. There&rsquo;s a reason it&rsquo;s called a Deathclaw. It clawed Chomp to death. Weight of numbers brought it down, eventually, but I got in the winning blow with the dead man&rsquo;s sledgehammer. Life in the Wasteland is hard enough for his team to not begrudge me the prize. I should feel bad, but it&rsquo;s a really nice sledgehammer.</p>
<p>I never played Fallout 3 as a survivalist. It was too silly. The apocalypse became a playground as I ran around in pyjamas, wearing wig and splatting orcs with a steampunk hammer. New Vegas gave me a sledgehammer in the first hour. I really can&rsquo;t wait for the next 34.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Spotted at: <a href="http://www.gamebanshee.com/news/99891-fallout-new-vegas-preview.html">GB</a></p>

 

[Derper]

I pumped 35 hours into Fallout 3 and didn’t get anywhere near to completing the main quest.

It’s how I played the first game: heading off to interesting places and hoping the journey would be as unpleasant as possible.

Sadly the rollercoaster was broken and I died leaping off it.

I never played Fallout 3 as a survivalist. It was too silly. The apocalypse became a playground as I ran around in pyjamas, wearing wig and splatting orcs with a steampunk hammer. New Vegas gave me a sledgehammer in the first hour. I really can’t wait for the next 34.

 

[Hoodoo]

sounds just as retarded as bethesda version

 

[Nex]

there are orcs in the new fallouts? wtf?

 

[Zdzisiu]

<p>
aggroed

I fucking hate this mmorpg-speak.

 

[MisterStone]

 

[Squirly]

Maybe he was being all tongue-in-cheek about it?

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

<p>
aggroed

I fucking hate this mmorpg-speak.

 

[Rogue]

 

[Hoaxmetal]

Looking good.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

There’s a reason it’s called a Deathclaw. It clawed Chomp to death.

Now we know why he's a video game journalist instead of a regular journalist.

Anyway, didn't really see anything wrong with the gameplay. Sees monster, attracts monster somewhere, some person fights the monster, person dies, other people gang up on the monster, killing it. What's the problem?

Wished he bothered getting hit with VATS on so we knew if you still take reduced damage, though.

 

[DragoFireheart]

<p>
aggroed

I fucking hate this mmorpg-speak.

 

[nFn]

Looking good.

 

[Melcar]

Rage.

 

[Genma:TheDestroyer]

But on the other hand you have info like this from a French magazine (summarized by someone on NMA)


It's a five page-long hands-on and is focused on the Repcon quest.

The later is given by Boone : you have to clear the Repcon Site from all these ghouls. The quest seems relatively bad written at first sight : just come and obliterate all the ghouls.

Once arrived in Repcon, the player is surprisingly welcomed by a human, the scientists of a ghoul hubologist-like cult. Their goal is to find "another plan of existence" while flying in space. First odd thing : the scientist deeply believes that he's a ghoul.

He asked you to get rid of "invisible monsters" living in the basements. These are a group of NightKins. The journalist's character was pretty weak in combat (Strengh 3, low Gun skill). Moreover, he played on harcore mode, and the combats were rather tough. He was killed quickly by the leader of the Mutants. Then, he tried another way to deal with them : he sneaked and managed to reach their leader... who was friendly ! You could talk to him. The NightKin leader was quite insane : he talked to a buffalo skull which he workshipped as a god. Thanks to his high speech skill, the journalist managed to find a compromise : these Stealth-Boy addicted Nightkin believe the a pre-war shipment of their precious drug was to be find in the higher levels of the site.

The only problem is that the shipment is guarded by a ghoul sniper... who was friendly as well ! He would give info to the player if the later accepted to find a lady ghoul (he wanted to have sex with her... urgh !) who was trapped in the basement when the NightKin came. With little investigation, it came out that the poor lady ghoul was lying dead in a basement's room, attached by the NightKin.

Thus, the ghoul sniper revealed that the Stealth Boy shipment never arrived in Repcon. When the NightKin leader knew about it, he got mad, but the high speech skill of the player managed to avoid the confrotnation. Finaly, the NightKin left the base. The cultist's human scientist congratulate the player about the news, but another issue appeared : the ghouls wanted the player to convice the human scientist that as a human, he could not survive in space.

Whan the player told the scientist that he was a human, the latter did not believe him. The lie was so anchored in his insane brain that the player had to give him an evidence. Which was in that case, his non-resistance to deadly radiations (the site is filed of those). The truth was unavoidable, and the scientist got even more crazy : in order to revenge, he wanted to fail the take-off and kill all the ghouls. Through a long an intense conversation, the player managed to calm down the scientist and save the ghouls.

Other tidbits : the journalist managed to solve the Primm Quest by disguising as one of the convicts.


Journalist's impressions

One important note : he's an absolute fan of the first two episodes, but hated the third one (gave it an overall mark of 4/10 if my memories are correct). Then, his point of view differs from the regular video game press, what is rather interesting.

While he played the four hour-long demo, he first believed and feared that New Vegas would be another copy of Fallout 3. Nevertheless, the more he played the game, the better it get. According to him, the game is very deep : the quests are well-written (better than FO1&2's !), the characters and dialogues are pretty good, and so is the music. The Repcon Quest was deep and complicated and could be solved in numerous ways. For instance, you could manage to set every group (cultists/Nightkin/ghoul sniper) against each other and end up in a general fight.

His conclusions are rather excellent : he's extremelly enthousiastic and impressed by the game.

 

[treave]

The journalist's character was pretty weak in combat (Strengh 3, low Gun skill). Moreover, he played on harcore mode, and the combats were rather tough.

Interesting. Didn't other previews of New Vegas provide the journos with twinked out characters loaded full of guns to make combat easy?

 

[Gay-Lussac]

Looking good.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

Interesting. Didn't other previews of New Vegas provide the journos with twinked out characters loaded full of guns to make combat easy?

Isn't it always like that? So the ADD journalist can do lots of things and not risk dying and bash the game for being "boring" out of butthurt.

...Great, now I'm thinking of that faggot who felt "frustrated", shot a guy in the face and got kicked out of the casino, and felt "confused" because it was too "complex".

 

[treave]

Interesting. Didn't other previews of New Vegas provide the journos with twinked out characters loaded full of guns to make combat easy?

Isn't it always like that? So the ADD journalist can do lots of things and not risk dying and bash the game for being "boring" out of butthurt.

...Great, now I'm thinking of that faggot who felt "frustrated", shot a guy in the face and got kicked out of the casino, and felt "confused" because it was too "complex".

Yeah, but this French journalist reportedly got to play a character geared towards showcasing the possible diplomatic options. I was just wondering why all the other journos focused plenty on thrilling punching someone to death with a boxing glove is, and why Obsidian didn't stick them with low combat skill character builds and showcase their C&C!!! more.

Or maybe they did and I just haven't been paying New Vegas articles enough attention.

 

[Jaesun]

Interesting. Didn't other previews of New Vegas provide the journos with twinked out characters loaded full of guns to make combat easy?

Isn't it always like that? So the ADD journalist can do lots of things and not risk dying and bash the game for being "boring" out of butthurt.

...Great, now I'm thinking of that faggot who felt "frustrated", shot a guy in the face and got kicked out of the casino, and felt "confused" because it was too "complex".

He was the guy who "Broke the game" and failed to understand basic RPG mechanics.

 

[hal900x]

Maybe it's assumed U.S. journos (and their audiences) tend to be twitch-addled ADD sufferers, incapable of following any thread lasting longer than 2 minutes, whereas Euros are all refined and sophisticated and stuff, and thus can handle all that C&C.

 

[Volrath]

Maybe it's assumed U.S. journos (and their audiences) tend to be twitch-addled ADD sufferers, incapable of following any thread lasting longer than 2 minutes, whereas Euros are all refined and sophisticated and stuff, and thus can handle all that C&C.

Obviously

 

[JarlFrank]

 

[Lomm Cuz]

But I really wasn't aware that frenchmen actually can play real games (you know, made for male audiences).

Edit: JarlFrank, you should post some new shit in your blog... I hasn't iGoogled it for nothing!

 

[Crispy]

But on the other hand you have info like this from a French magazine (summarized by someone on NMA)


snip

I'm not so sure about the buffalo skull bit and the use of the Stealth-Boys as a rather weak plot device, but most of this is very encouraging. Combined with hard core mode we may actually be required to fire up minor portions of our intellect this time around.