THUMBS ON FIRE

Thumbs on Fire’s Random Awards of 2010: Most Abusive Developer Award

Obsidian, you and I need to sit down and have a talk. I love you, I mean I really do. You’ve got all these grand dreams and lofty goals of making some of the best western RPG’s in the bizz, and I really dig that.

I mean, a Mission Impossible-esque spy game with Mass Effectian dialogue options and a deep plot that has multiple endings? That sounds great! Oh, and you’re also going to put out a sequel of sorts to Fallout 3, one of my favourite games of the last couple years, only with even more factions and a better story? It’s like you have the keys to my heart, Obsidian.

It’s like you have the keys to my heart and you broke them.

             Man, remember in Alpha Protocol when I shot this guy ‘cause I thought he was a mole? That was awesome!

I mean what the hell happened this year? Alpha Protocol was so close to being amazing, but you guys just couldn’t get the combat right. Not to mention the stealth abilities kind of broke the game, and to call the AI retarded would almost be complementary. And the boss battles! The insanely difficult, only-way-to-win-was-to-glitch-the-system god-damn boss battles.

I had literally been waiting for Alpha Protocol since the moment it was unveiled, years back, and I tried so hard to like it when it came out. I really did. But I just couldn’t give it a pass.

             Man, remember in Alpha Protocol when I had to re-do that boss battle a dozen times ‘cause my character wasn’t spec’d out right? That fucking sucked!

And then, just when I felt like I was ready to forgive you, Obsidian, you release Fallout: New Vegas, a game that was so goddamn buggy I got the flu playing it (Note: That’s actually true, but I think it might have been unrelated). I can count a number of quests off the top of my head that just wouldn’t work, I can’t count off the top of my head the number of times I got stuck in a mountain or the landscape. Oh, and the six hours I lost when the game stopped recognizing my save file broke my heart, Obsidian. It really did.

             And New Vegas had so much going for it too…

I’m not giving you this award because I hate you Obsidian, it’s because I love you. Everything you guys make is always so goddamn close to being my favourite thing of the year, but you always manage to find a way to ruin it. Without fail. I sincerely hope that 2011 is the year you guys break out of this mold. Please, not just for my sake, but yours.

Oh, and I also haven’t forgotten what you guys did to the ending of Knights of the Old Republic 2; that shit still stings.

Review: Fallout New Vegas

If Fallout: New Vegas was a horse, they’d take it out back and shoot it.

After spending what can only be called an irresponsible of time with this game, playing every side quest I found, meeting every teammate, acquiring a godless amount of trinkets and guns, the overriding thing I’m walking away with is that Obsidian, the makers of New Vegas, stayed true to their developer history. That is, they continue to make games that could have been beautiful, but are instead too broken to fully endorse.

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Fallout: New Vegas Impressions

Alright, as of this moment I am officially waist-deep in New Vegas wasteland; I think I’m around my twentieth hour in, I’ve got my smooth-talking level 16 gentleman gallivanting his way through the desert, and I think I can officially make an initial impression on this behemoth of a game.

You should really play Fallout: New Vegas.

Though in retrospect I shouldn’t make that such an unqualified statement, as there are a number of issues this game should really fix. The foremost being that it’s kind of still broken. I’m well aware that this was developed by Obsidian, a fine bunch of fellows who have an unfortunate habit of releasing games in various states of disrepair, but after suffering a number of minor-to-major glitches, trawling through various forums to find out there are in fact much worse problems being suffered by others, and finally watching my roommate struggle in vain to play the PC version with little success, than I can also say that if you’re unprepared to suffer through some “technical colour” than you may want to wait a few weeks while Obsidian sends some patches through the pipeline.

             If the image of a cowboy shooting a unipedal robot does not get you interested in New Vegas than there’s nothing more I can do for you

Which is unfortunate, because when everything’s working this game absolutely rocks. The basic mechanics from Fallout 3 return in all their glory, with a couple new additions here and there such as an expanded crafting system and better companion interfaces. But the true belle of the ball here has got to be the story, as well as the related faction reputation system. Every quest, every kill, really every action you perform has an effect on your reputation with at least one of the myriad of gangs and factions working throughout the waste, many of which are at each others’ throats. You can try to help everyone, you can try to destroy everyone, you can try to control everyone; if you’ve ever read ‘A Game of Thrones’ than I suppose you can understand the potential political intrigue surrounding your character throughout.

I’ve still got a long way to go before I can safely say I’ve “finished” this game, and barring any sort of ruinous bug I think I’m going to have a pretty good time going through it.