LadyCrimson

If you avoid the Powder Gangers near Goodsprings (and a couple other places) who attack no matter what & don't do anything to make them mad, there are little bands of non-attacking ones here and there. They stay blue and walk right by me. And if you rescue the ones associated with Nipton before making 'em mad, you're good to go. Until you later make them mad anyway of course, which I always seem to do.

It's a little bit longer time-wise, but it's just as easy to get to NV at lvl1 by taking the main path/avoiding all conflict/questing...has the added bonus of getting a ton of places on your pipboy as you dash through, too. But regardless which way you go, if you want to be even safer, imo there's a reason they put

Side question: Did anyone side with Mr House and like his motivations? When I first played, for a long time I thought he was supposed to be sort of the good guy...but it seemed all he was motivated by was keeping his precious city safe/the way he wanted. Like he didn't care about the rest of the world. That didn't appeal to me either. Did he have any more depth than that, that I missed/didn't notice?

The NCR are definitely not white hats & the Legion are not complete black hats. Nothing about the many social structure options of the world/history is ever that simple. Everyone has noble ideals....and the ideals don't usually sound bad on paper. I can almost always admire ideals for they are, after all, ideals. But it's the actual methods of trying to implement/enforce those ideals that decide me. I may love real Roman history and other similar societies - they are fascinating on many levels - but I wouldn't want to go back in time and live under it.

Sadly, since there are no flying spells or anti-gravity boots in NV, the only way to stack things high is via the editor. And it still take a long time. Oh well. Still fun to knock them down after.

There's that one early place that has tons of fusion batteries & conductors in it. After that I tended to just sell them off because I have no use for them. Side note: All of these little items you can pick up in the game, and not a single toothbrush near a sink. Between that & all the radiation, I'm surprised anyone in the game still has teeth.

All right I'll do it again. But this time I'm only giving the Very Short Version: Diablo1/Diablo2 (also like a lot of the clones, even if not huge all-time "faves") Tombraider1 Lords of the Realm2 Casear3 & to a much lesser extent, Casear4 Dungeon Keeper 1 Might & Magic7 (the rpg, not the strategy) Stronghold1/Crusader KOTOR2 Borderlands FO:NV ...I"ve played quite a few other story-RPG's & many many other games in all genres (and enjoyed most of them at the time), but most don't fall into my 'really big faves' pile because I rarely actually replayed them or in many cases, never quite finished them.

If you only want a perk, you can tell one to wait in a hotel room and leave them there forever. The perk remains. However, of course, this means you can't hire anyone else until you go back and 'fire' the original one. The only companion I found to be useless in Passive mode was the cyberdog (Rex?). The others would usually be more sedate...but I do think Passive mode is buggy, because sometimes they would go off (especially indoors) anyway. There are not a ton of different base types of weapons in this game. eg, a few variations of each for each bullet size, more or less, plus unique versions. The cowboy repeater is one of the best rifles until you get some .308 ones. Either from stores/enemies or a few in lockers/special spots. Also, Sniper Rifles will have a lot of sway if your gun skill isn't very high or you have lower str, so not a good early weapon. There really aren't that many types of energy weapons...and they tend to drop less often for most people. I guess you're having some reverse luck in that regard.

Finally got around to watching Predators. The first half was pretty groovy, but the 2nd half kind of lost me. They're so much more interesting when they're playing cat & mouse vs. showing their ugly faces and face to face fighting.

I killed Benny when I first met him ala Black Widow. Ring a ding ding baby. So the only reason I knew his story was through YesMan's dialogue.

BLOPS has a lot of cutscenes? Urgh. I don't like lots of cutscenes in more action-oriented games. Definitely pass then.

That's one of the things I kinda liked in NV....if someone shoots you in the head, you should be dead. Gunfights should be fairly quick and it shouldn't take 50 direct headshots to kill something. I'm so tired of games where everyone is magically bulletpoof or whatever. It's like in the movies where no one can seem to hit anything with their 500 guns unless required by the plot. But I do get the point that such instant-kills seem to come too easily in NV (can't speak for the other FO's). In games it's hard to balance even a modicum of pretend "reality" without making things feel too easy. (edit:or too hard) Really tough, actually.

Heh. I always figured they were games that if I'd picked them up when they first came out, I might (emphasis on might) have liked them fairly well. But as I am these days...yeah, maybe not so much. After Borderlands finally convinced me that I actually liked shooting/sniping guns (vs. magic etc) in the right game, I checked out some FO3 let's plays & considered trying that one....but decided to skip it and just go for NV instead since it was coming out. :D

I have mongolian beef, and I am happy.

I was not a part of any past convos, nor was it my intention to stir up/be part of any major debate. Merely briefly stating my personal preference. It's how I roll.

I find this an interesting statement, and I'd tend to agree. I used to really dislike almost all FPS because of the way they were designed in the 'old days' but as things seem to combine a little more all the time, I find there can be one here and there that I can enjoy. I'm not very into military settings, however, so I'll pass on trying this one.

I guess I'd have to play the first two fallouts to get a better idea of a lot of some of the references/differences. I've never been that into turn-based games...or rather, I have no particular preference for it. Don't care that much which one it is, as long as whichever is chosen is designed well to fit the game (VATS in NV, imo, was not a great thing...). Some of my fave strategy games were turn-based - a genre that I think suits turns very well - but I usually prefer real-time.

Could someone explain to me what, exactly "iron sights" is? All I noticed was that if I hit r-mouse I could aim down the sight of a gun for a more 'straight-on' view...giving every weapon a sort of sniper-viewpoint. Is that it? That didn't strike me as super powerful, especially since half the time the gunsight felt like it blocked my view of the enemy to be able to aim at it (unlike the 'scope' view), not to mention the enemies danced around so fast it was hard to keep them within the gunsight while in that mode.

That's why I said relative to all the rest of the story arcs....they're all kind of petty & hiding behind noble speeches. But then, that's kind of how I think of humanity as a whole so, y'know....been there, seen that. I mean, people (the media) romanticize Capone/gangsters. Don't see how Benny is any worse than that sort of type. But yes, I haven't read any extension of his story in another form. Just based on the in-game.

That's too bad about Skyline...oh well, I'll probably still catch it on cable. I watched the 1st episode of the new AMC series The Walking Dead. Seemed to have a fairly high production value/quality and it wasn't too bad....but it's slow and the lead actor didn't entirely connect for me in the role. That and I'm really not into zombies all that much. But it might pick up as the plot moves along.

I didn't get much of Caesar's story beyond a few forced encounters since I pretty much killed every Legion, named and unnamed, that I ran across. Relative to the general story power-hungry arcs, however, Benny didn't seem any worse. So he wanted to throw over House or whatever it was...I probably would too. House is kind of a creepy fellow when it comes down to it. The aspect of the Legion that I couldn't abide was their form of slavery. I won't tolerate it and I won't even roleplay acceptance of it. ;p

I was half-tempted to leave Benny alone too...he didn't seem such a bad fellow...but I really wanted his suit and he wouldn't give it to me, so...

Reached a point that happens a lot for me, in these types of games....where even tho there's still lots of 'paths' I haven't done/could explore in terms of story arcs, the role playing etc. kind of disappears & I mostly fool around via save games or quick test runs. Altering mechanics, testing them out, seeing what they affect or don't. Taking the phone apart, in other words. I can't help myself. At some point I'll tire of that, and playing the game 'properly' for another run or two will appeal. It's a cycle I go through. So from my point of view, FO:NV works on both of the levels that I really enjoy...it made me want to explore the world (what's around this corner?) for long enough to actually finish the game at least once...which is always a feat since overall I'm a terrible finisher of games....and it has the oddball tinkering & amusement aspects that keeps me mucking about long after the exploring/story arcs stop motivating me. I don't think I've bought a game in a long time that had this much replay incentive, whatever the reason.

I'm normally a "good" type, but I wonder what would happen if you were Vilified by every faction. Would it break the game or is there a plan for that...