Fallout: New Vegas Is Genius, And Here's Why 

Did you know, In the British version it’s called the “platinum crisp”

Even the caps that are in the game aren't just nuka-cola caps -- they're predominately sunset sarsaparilla caps which was more popular in Nevada before the war, making New Vegas feel like it has it's own distinct subculture and they're not just trading in generic wastelander money.

Rest in Peace Matthew Perry, thanks for shooting us in the head

I've put well over 500 hours into new vegas and I've never discovered the sewer people, so that just goes to show you that there's always more to explore in these games.

actually it's pronounced caesar

Thinking about it, Caesar ironically made two of the biggest mistakes Rome ever faced. He tried to expand farther than he could actually govern, and he didn’t set up a clear line of succession (even though he knew he was dying). It’s actually depressing that he read all that history and, instead of truly learning from it, he just repeated it, glaring flaws and all, on a smaller scale.

The water quest goes even deeper. When you investigate the cistern, there's even another party affected. Vault dwellers. And if you choose to save them, you actually find them later and they're very thankful.

“Using bluff to convince [Lanius] there’s a trap up ahead” The best part about this particular moment is all the things you’re pointing out are like “Do you really think the NCR was this incompetent?” and he agrees “Hmm, you’re right, it was too easy.”, when really, yes, the NCR was just that incompetent. It ties back to how little the NCR leadership cared about the whole Mojave campaign, that all their issues with lack of manpower and supplies were so bad, you can convince an enemy general they were strategic choices.

in the fallout universe bisexuals are known for their ability to deal 10% extra damage to everyone.

New Vegas has one of my favorite jokes "They asked me if I had a degree in Theoratical Physics. I told them I had a theoretical degree in Physics. Got the job"

Fallout: New Vegas taught me a few important things. One: I'm actually a woman Two: Eat the rich Three: Bisexuals have +10% to damage on everyone

Fun fact: I actually stumbled upon the violin before meeting Agatha and didn't know what it was for so I donated it to the Rivet City archive guy. I lost karma but had no idea why. Once I finally met Agatha, I learned what I had done and felt so bad.

What Bethesda never realized is Fallout is a world where people are rebuilding society after an apocalypse. Not just wallowing in the ruins.

Therrreeee was never a maaaaaan like my jah-nny

I think it's worth mentioning a lot of the people who say they don't "like politics" in their games also think "politics" is when a woman or minority is a major character

A prime example of just how good New Vegas actually is: You can clear Quarry Junction at extremely low level, basically as soon as you defeat the powder gangers, by using the landmines the gangers have all over their base. Turns out Deathclaws have legs too, and they get crippled quickly when they try sprinting over landmines. The game gives you have insane challenge right in your face, and a novel solution that requires engaging with the story and paying attention.

The thing that lives forever in my memory of New Vegas is my wife almost bricking our console by finding as many of the little plastic dinosaur toys as she could, bringing them to her hotel room, and dropping them one at a time. Once she finished, going into that room required almost half an hour of loading and everything in the room exploded in dinosaurs , often damaging her character with accelerated loose physics objects. What a good game.

Yeah, yeah "The Gary vault is so funny, haha!" My name is Gary. That vault was terrifying

I have never once played New Vegas without Hardcore mode. Best addition ever. Especially in the early game, food goes from being disappointing to, "Thank God I'm not gonna die!" and purified water becomes as valuable as it should be in the wasteland.

RIP Matthew Perry, really made Benny a good ass character

I love that the town Novac is called Novac because the 'No Vacancy' sign at the motel has broken lights in it so it just says 'Novac'

Game design example: they put a bunch of loading screens between you and the ncr embassy to encourage you to choose any other faction.

The fact you can make a feature film length video about New Vegas, and still completely leave out my favourite moment (the lottery) really shows just how incredible the game really is. Most games would be blessed to create just one moment of that calibre and this game has so much incredible stuff going on that it can easily be skipped over.

Jorge "Obscuro" Salgadob is the real reason that game was amazing. He was an epic level modder. He spent years making and polishing the most popular overhaul for Oblivion, OOO. He was noticed by Obsidian and they recruited him to work on New Vegas. I think the addition of him to the team helped, not only due to his high level of coding skill and understanding of game design, but as a kind of interlocuter/mascot for the modding community.

Broke: Cyberpunk is the hot discourse. Woke: Let's talk about a 10 year old Masterpiece.

"Gamers love politics. And those who said they dont actually like it even more, they just wish they were seeing different politics" this is your best video

I really wish you'd had a chance to cover the DLCs too. The Sierra Madre is easily one of the most difficult existential problems I've ever sat and thought about (once I was done getting wrecked by Ghost People). Living with unchecked desire and greed, and learning how to let things go before they consume you is something almost everybody has to go through in their lifetime in some way. Then exploring the tribal groups of Utah, and exploring the difficult moral choices of missionary work, whether or not you're actually helping anybody even if your holy book and your own seemingly more enlightened people say you are. Plus Old World Blues is just a legendary B-Movie put in game form. And then finally there's Lonesome Road, which ties back into the previous three by exploring the lingering ties to the past and present that have to be understood and let go of before we can really say we're moving towards a different future. New Vegas might be running on a clapped out engine under unfortunate constraints that even creativity couldn't quite get past, but the fact that actual honest to god storytellers wrung that much out of it that it's still being debated just means so much to me.

What I adore about Caesar going on about Hegalian dialects, and how fallout societies are basically recreations of a previous state of human development, is that Marx basically already broke down and criticized all of this. "Hegel remarks somewhere that all great world-historic facts and personages appear, so to speak, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce". CAESAR IS LITERALLY THIS FARCE JUST HOW NAPOLÉON III WAS A PITIABLE AND GROTESQUE PANTOMIME OF HIS CONQUEROR UNCLE! "Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all the dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living." The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte is literally a seminal work when it comes to analyzing the Fallout universe lmfao.

I genuinely love the fact that Mr. House doesn't have a super high intelligence. He has a super high LUCK stat.

"Fallout: New Vegas is objectively the best game of all time. And for that, it gets my highest score ever: 84/100." That nearly killed me holy shit.

1:17:48 Even funnier way to get in to the bunker, if you got the password and looted a set of brotherhood faction armor from the corpses, AND you've done Arcade Gannon's quest to get power armor training, you can wear the faction armor and they'll let you in. At which point you cam just stay undercover and try to arm the self-destruct, or start blasting.

RIP Matthew Perry. I cannot imagine Benny with any other voice than his.

I was trying really hard to get work done, man.

Nice.

This video inspired me to replay New Vegas. I'm 2 hours in, threw a random stick of dynamite at an ant, AND FUCKING MALCOM HOLMES RAN IN TO EAT THE EXPLOSION AND DIED

New Vegas is chemistry. It's hundreds of different chemicals in a dirty, radioactive vial battling it out for dominance of solution, and you, the protagonist, are the catalyst that will bring one of those reactants to power. Fallout 3 is water, and you get to choose whether or not it's consumable.

Can we just appreciate that a "villain" of New Vegas is someone who 1. Literally shot you and so you have personal reasons to hate 2. Has understandable reasons why he shoots you because it's actually in his own self interest, you have something incredibly valuable he wants not just because he's evil. 3. Can be, killed, freed, bargained with, but regardless of how high your speech or if you seduce him, he won't fundamentally change who he is, because he exemplifies the self interested, embodiment of a Vegas high roller who wants to own the whole town, and is willing to cheat, lie, and risk his own life to get it? (Edit) But ultimately his fierce individualism means their is no one to save his ass in the end, and drives home the point to the player that to navigate the Mojave successfully, you need allies, or at least play nice with factions until you have enough power to destroy them. 4. he's not even the "final boss ", and (edit) still can be explored more deeply than any character in fallout 3

I didn’t really think about how insane it is having the ability to kill literally anyone in the game and still have the story progress in a manageable way until you spelled it out

In the shoot the dog scene, the first dog is called Drei (german for three) and second Vier (german for four). This is reference to dog from Cowboy Bebop (dog was called Ein, german for one) and dog from Rwby Zwei (german for two). So this is a reference to a reference. But it can also referecne RWBY video that came later. So it was also a foreshadowing and could beinterpreted as reference to reference to a reference. Welcome to hbomberguy cinematic universe.

Watching this now makes me realize how many great things Baldur's Gate 3 does that are also major elements of New Vegas, and also part of what makes Outer Worlds great too.

My favourite part about Caesar is how he is the only member of the Legion who doesn’t speak in a formal dialect, he swears more than any other NPC in the game.

Roll playing bisexuality in the form of being better at killing everyone is very funny to me

Fallout New Vegas came to me a couple years late as a college student struggling with her terrible decision to major in graphic design. I was miserable. But I came home, diligently did hours of creative work I no longer loved, and then fired up the PS3 and took out my pent up frustration in New Vegas. The little creative expression I did of my own volition at this time was fanart of some kind. This game is a personal comfort game of mine, and helped me through what was probably a more traumatizing existential crisis than I remember it being. I love hearing someone whose creativity and opinions I respect preach its virtues, thanks Harris

fun fact about arcade gannon, he was based on one of the story guy's (josh sawyer) dnd character during the campaign that helped create Van Buren, the scrapped obsidian fo3. there's a lot of elements of van buren scattered across new vegas (joshua graham and the legion being the most obvios) and its just so interesting to me to think about how so many elements of one of the greatest games of all time (new vegas obv) came from some devs playing dnd

We won't go quietly. The legion can count on that.

“My favorite game ever, 84/100” That’s both a great joke and incredibly true.

in a post BG3 gaming industry I really hope more games look to fallout NV to learn about reactive story and quest structures

* you take a sip of your trusty vault 13 canteen *

Does anyone remember when IGN said that New Vegas felt more like Fallout 3 dlc then a new game? I do, I'll never forget.

I can't believe after all this time that I didn't notice Dinky the dinosaur holding a goddamn thermometer.

As someone who loves Cyberpunk 2077, so much of these design decisions are similarly seen there too. Things like an immersive world, surprising quests (many of the best quests and gigs sound basic at first, like helping a polititian deal with a home intruder), unique and interesting items, diverse and fun gameplay (after a few years) and a compelling, straight up cinematic main quest that makes you feel like you're in a movie and presents some really interesting moral or philosophical questions (can technology rival life itself). I think the biggest thing rpgs should focus on above all else is IMMERSION. Make players feel like they're in a real place, make the world live and breathe on its own. The best stories are cinematic, just like a movie, but you can actually interact and change the outcome. Rpgs where you get lost down a rabbithole for hours. You'll know you're playing a good RPG when its suddenly 3am and you'd much rather explore and discover more than go to sleep. Rpgs are by far, the best possible medium for any sort of world building. TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THIS BETHESDA PLEASE! JUST DO SOMETHING INTERESTING!

“He just thinks he’s got a right to rule the world because he knows what a ‘rubicon’ is.” Is actually a pretty concise summation of Caesar’s ‘modus operandi’, as he would say, before smirking.

"is a libertarian, so he wants to lower the age of consent--" JFHDHSJ YEAH

Not ONCE did Mr. Bomberman reference The Kings, a gang of Elvis impersonators that I placed in a hysterically high position of power by the end of the game, and I'm not mad... just disappointed.

I know it's not the main topic but I would LOVE a game based in vault 22 before everything happened. To slowly have your friends disappearing and not knowing why, having your character try to figure it out? I think it would make for a really fun game! Maybe not a full title, possibly just a dlc or even just a small spinoff game

46:31 my first ever exposure to the fallout franchise (2020) is FNV. And the fondest memory ive got of it is finishing the dead animal quest in novac and finding that this game had a group of INVISIBLE MUTANT WITH HEAVY WEAPONERIES.

"Fallout: New Vegas Is Genius, And Here's Why" >over 97 mins This video is my spiritual home

I remember my first playthrough of NV, I shot Vulpes' stupid head off his stupid shoulders because I assumed the Legion was a much smaller band, that he was the head, and that their razing of Nipton was basically their entire presence. It was super, super cool seeing the consequences of killing Vulpes, and the consequences of vastly underestimating the political struggle in the Mojave, play out over the rest of the game. Also it is SUPER hilarious blowing up all of House's robots only to go for the "fuck it, rule everything yourself" ending and seeing Yes Man hiding his sheer rage behind that scanline-tinted smile

“Fetch some eggs” is the best way to describe Lucy’s quest especially the reward afterwards

Hbomberguy: “and I will update this chart with every game, I will ever mention, in any of my videos for now on” *and we never saw that chart again*

They are called "Death Claws" for a reason, not "Moderately-Difficult Claws"

Being asked "Have you ever *seen* a deathclaw?" remains one of my favorite video game moments. New Vegas was my first Fallout game, and no, I had not ever seen a deathclaw. Decided to save the quarry for later and continue north on the road. Night fell. Deathclaws ambushed Cass and I, snarling and leaping at us from the darkness beyond the reach of my pip-boy light. Absolutely terrifying. There were no survivors.

This is one of my comfort videos, and I'm incredibly grateful that you posted it. Whenever I get overstimulated, but I can't sit in silence, this video is the perfect amount of controlled chaos. I've probably watched it 10 times since you've posted it. Thank you for your work.

R.I.P. Matthew Perry

The discussion with Caesar, the main villain of the game, about his motivations, is especially jarring when the equivalent discussion with the villain of Fallout 4 is just basically him saying "you wouldn't understand if I told you."

"You can even tell a child her teddy bear is dead" That's as close as we're gonna get to killing kids in Fallout without mods isn't it?

I keep coming back to rewatch this one, not because I love Fallout NV or anything but listening to someone speak so passionately and lovingly about something that has brought them tons of joy ... brings me joy.

Not only did this masterpiece convince me to give New Vegas another shot (I was dumb when it first came out), but it also put me on the scent of Agricola, a book that has legitimately changed my views on the world as it was and as it is. I cannot thank you enough for this.

Fun fact about Benny in the Legion Camp: When choosing how he dies, you can actually try to give him the tools to escape (a Stealth Boy and a bobby pin). Instead of waiting for you to leave and then make his exit, the asshat inmediatly activates the Stealth Boy and leaves you with the entire legion to hunt you down.

Hbomberguy: releases video talking about how fallout new vegas is incredible Fallout 3 fans: you again

Whenever I hear "X got cut for time", I get slightly depressed but then the video is so good I'm not sad anymore.

As a former Fallout 1 and Fallout 2 players I tend do favor the NCR in my Fallout New Vegas game sessions. Because in Fallout 2 the NCR was a real positive force (and also, I love the idea that Tandi, the teen you saved in the first game, was its founder). I am also pragmatic, and I think that a certain level of stability and unity is needed before people can really be free (I mean, at least there are no slaves in the NCR). But I love the moral ambiguity of Fallout New Vegas and I do acknowledge that a free Vegas also makes sense.

"Politics is objectively fun and all gamers love it all the time, and the people who say they hate seeing them in games actually love politics even more; they just wish they were seeing different politics." Yearbook material

The legend said, everytime someone mentions _Fallout: New Vegas_ Everyone goes to re-install _Fallout: New Vegas_ again to play it

I did not feel like a badass for taking the shortcut to Vegas; that took grueling hours of evasion and save-scumming. However, accessing the alternate story from back-treading the intended path made it rewarding.

I’m a recent hbomberguy convert and I’m so pleased to see how deep the vault of quality content runs

"you have to recruit the boomers who all pretend to remember woodstock even though none of them actually went" I chortled.

Even now, the "84 out of 100" line is simultaneously the funniest, saddest, and most infuriating thing ive heard in a long time.

I think my favorite part of new Vegas will always be the characters. I don’t know if I could reliably name more than maybe 5 from any Bethesda fallout game, but with new Vegas, I have trouble picking a favorite. I love that it feels like I could run into these characters in the real world, they have hopes and dreams and fears and live their own lives that you can see play out. I especially love that you don’t pick what they do from a list. You ADVISE Veronica on what to do, she makes her own decision based on how you’ve interacted with her, you HELP Arcade come to terms with the legacy of his father and how he is connected to the Enclave. Even the “bad guys” like Caesar, Lanius and even Mr. House feel real. I’ve spoken to people who cosplay Ancient Rome the same way Caesar does, I’ve seen people like Lanius who are so set on their own goals potential failure is the only thing that gives them pause. Mr. House, in all his kooky hyper-capitalist ways, has moments where I can see him as an actual person, despite the fact that he is both narratively and literally not alive.

Going back to this video and rewatching it after the fallout tv show it kinda elevates the tv show a bit when I think about the goofy dialogue moments, or various other things that came about in games and the show.

"You might call it a horrible way to die. I call it "good game design"." - from now on I will ask ppl to write this on my gravestone

"Fallout: New Vegas uses a radical new technique called 'game design' ... "

Admit it, we all made the mistake of underestimating Cazadors when we first met them in our playthrough

The first Fallout game I played was New Vegas and I never heard of Deathclaws before so went I went to the quarry and heard a noise behind me I turned around to see what I thought was the devil mid swipe I never screamed so loud in my life. I truly love this game and the Fallout series to this day

Oh how we are blessed by a magnificent notification

"Mr House, a Libertarian, wants to lower the age of consent" That's because the Fallout universe runs on the "half your age plus 7" rule, meaning he can't date anyone younger than 137.

Funny story: As a kid, I couldn't tell Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas apart very well based off their discs and titles (I know, I know, I'm dumb) But hilariously, when I wanted to play "Fallout" and popped in Fallout 3, I would start up a new game, get the opening cinematic, realize I had picked the "boring" one, and swap games. Every single time. Even as a kid who loved Fallout 3, once I had played New Vegas, it immediately became THE Fallout I remembered and wanted to replay.

The Dead Money and Old World Blues DLCs are my absolute favourite parts of New Vegas. The characters they introduce in them are so interesting.

hbomberguy "Eventually, players lose interest in picking through empty buildings full of locked safes in case there's something interesting in them." Todd Howard "So you're saying the loot should be randomized?"

This video is a work of art. This is one of my favourite games.

For me the coolest thing is not just the big differrences in the ending but the small one's. Choosing which major faction to support rocks of course as each vision of New Vegas has geniune merit behind them. But what I love most is the small stuff. My first run I chose to play as the wastelands bringer of democracy. I worked to fix the NCR from the inside doing all quests to support them. Whether it be support the troopers at camp golf, raiding legion camps or working with Cass to bring down the Van Graffs. But apart from that I chose to bring peace and cooperation wherever possible and in return when I fought at hoover dam I barely had to lift a finger. Why ? Cause thanks to my actions, I had not betterred the wasteland, but united it in a way never before seen. I had Enclave remnants, providing support for NCR Rangers and Brotherhood paladins while above a restored bomber let the wastleland feel the fury of the old world once more. It was exhilirating. To see my effort at trying to play the roll of mediator not only validated in the credits but also in the battle itself. I could see the effect I had on the wasteland and nothing has ever been as satisfying.

When i first played fallout 3 i didn't even know deathclaws were supposed to be all that scary and i just considered them another random monster that i could usually fight without all that much effort put in. When i met the blind deathclaw in new vegas for the first time i ran at it with the same attitude and even more confident because it was blind only to get my shit rocked. I think it says a lot about Bethesda that they took one of the most intimidating monsters in the franchise and just made it so forgettable

"10 % bonus damage to everyone." >Mom, dad I'm coming out I'm bisexual.

1:16:07 There's a fourth currency: pre-war money. It's not worth much but it has no weight and every merchant accepts it.

My sibling ended up tricking me into doing the Dead Money DLC first. Best thing I have ever done in this game. Dead money has such a good story. Plus I went back to Primm and made the powdergangers run away from me in fear while I swung a bunch of kitchen knives on a stick at them.

With how many casinos are around the map, I’d argue chips should be considered a currency as well. It’s only used in the areas in and surrounding new Vegas and has a guaranteed value only in the new Vegas area. I think it checks every “currency” box. If anything it’s the most trustworthy and consistent form of non caps currency in the game.

"The kind of people who name their discord server "athens" to make themselves feel a bit smarter" This is some advanced-level shade throwing at ole Carl

There’s one new vegas trap I just can’t forget. It was an NCR soldier, without limbs, telling you to both kill him and not get near. Being the good-natured wanderer I was on that run, I approached him.. Only to find a well hidden landmine right beside him.

I like the idea that gunshots from bisexuals are 10% more lethal across the board but only if they're flirty enough.

Honestly liked the Fallout 3 intro. The first time. Most bethesda games need an ability to skip their intros, but for a first playthrough I really liked it. Honestly for a second character it was still decent. After a few hundred hours, yes yes, I know, I know.