Fallout: New Vegas - First Details Emerge

Are you Hardcore enough for these new features?

Written by Jon Seddon, 08 February 2010

This week a number of magazines will hit the newsstands with information about Obsidian's follow up to Bethesda's masterpiece. This information is already leaking out to the Internet. This is what we have heard so far:

Major Changes

*The game is set in Las Vegas obviously, hence the title, but from what was shown in the recent trailer and is now being discussed on the Internet, Vegas is far from a wasteland. It seems the city of sin was spared the nuclear destruction visited on the rest of United States.

*There will be 3 major factions vying for position in the Nevada desert: The Californian Republic, Caesar's Legionnaires and citizens of Las Vegas itself.

*As well as a system of karma the game will also measure your reputation with all 3 factions, probably giving you different story arcs if you favour one over the others.

360Zine Issue 48 For our latest Fallout New Vegas coverage, click here to download 360Zine Issue 48 for free.*Locations will obviously include the Vegas strip, but will also include McCarran airport, Fremont, Primm and the Hoover Dam. Either the game will fast travel you between some of these locations or else the map is going to be absolutely huge. If Fremont is the one in California, that's a distance of 500 miles by road. Area 51 is also mentioned, so expect more alien encounters.

*An example of where the reputation system will make itself felt is the inclusion of the Hoover dam, which can be used to supply electricity to the factions. Who will you be loyal to?

*You will play someone dug up from the desert rather than a vault dweller and will have a Pip Boy computer. Your skills and stats will be rolled with the use of a "vigour machine".

*Skills will affect your conversation options with an example being a high skill in explosives will give you extra options to discuss explosives.

*The game will feature a hardcore mode, which will make you reliant on drinking water, give ammo real weight and ensure that any healing items take time to recover your health.

As you can see there are a raft of new features in the game, but none of them seem to present any danger of breaking the game. For many people, just taking the original game and giving it a new location would be enough, but it seems like Obsidian want to genuinely make their mark on the game. Not many people know the Fallout universe like the guys at Obsidian and Bethesda's engine gives them a flying start. Exciting times ahead this Autumn.

Thanks to Duck and Cover for much of this info.

Fallout New Vegas coverage available in 360Zine Issue 48 - click here to download it for free!

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