Story
The game places the player in the role of a courier. While delivering a package with a platinum poker chip and NCR war documents to a town called Primm, the player is ambushed by a man named Benny Gecko (who steals the package and shoots him/her in the head and left in a shallow grave. The Courier is rescued by a robot named Victor who brings him or her to Doctor Mitchell. Thereafter the player enters into character creation (defining skills and attributes, name, gender, age and appearance) before investigating the assassination attempt, recovering the stolen package, and exploring the world.
Gameplay
The player determines the race, the gender, and the general appearance of their character and determines the first three Skills they wish to focus on. Skills and Perks are similar to those in previous games: Skills can be gradually assigned and give players increasing degrees of ability; for instance, increasing the lock pick skill grants the player the ability to open harder to unlock doors. With each level, the player can allocate more points to their skills and a new Perk, some requiring specific stat levels or karma levels, each offering advantages of varying quality and form.
Another important statistic tracked in the game is karma. Each character has an aggregate amount of karma which can be affected by the decisions and actions made in the game. Positive karma actions include freeing captives and helping others. Negative karma actions include killing good characters and stealing. Beyond acting as flavor for the game's events, karma can have tangible effects to the player, primarily affecting the game's ending. Other effects include altered dialogue with (NPCs), or unique reactions from other characters. Actions vary in levels of karma; pickpocketing produces less negative karma than the killing of a good character. The player's relationships with the game's factions are distinct, so any two groups or settlements may view the player in contrasting ways, depending on the player's conduct.
Health is separated into two types: general and limb. General health is the primary damage bar, and the player will die if it is depleted. Limb health is specific to each portion of the body, namely the arms, legs, head, and torso. Non-human enemies will sometimes have additional appendages. When a limb's health bar is depleted, that limb is rendered "crippled" and induces a negative status effect, such as blurred vision from a crippled head or reduced movement speed from a crippled leg. Health is diminished when damage is taken from being attacked, falling from great distances, and/or accidental self injury. General health can be replenished by sleeping, using medical equipment (stimpaks), eating food, or drinking water. Limbs can be healed directly by injecting them with stimpaks, by sleeping, or by being healed by a doctor.
There are also secondary health factors which can affect performance. Chief among these is radiation poisoning: most food is irradiated to a small degree, and parts of the world have varying levels of background radiation. As the player is exposed to radiation, it builds up, causing negative effects and eventually death if left untreated. Radiation sickness must be healed by special medicine or doctors. The player can also become addicted to drugs and alcohol, and then go through withdrawal symptoms if denied those substances. Both afflictions can blur the player's vision for a few seconds and have a negative effect on SPECIAL attributes until the problem is corrected.
Another game mechanic is item degradation. The more weapons and armor are used or damaged in combat, the less effective they become. Firearms do less damage and may jam during reloading, and apparel becomes gradually less protective. This will eventually result in the item breaking altogether. Items can be repaired for a price from special vendors, or if the player has two of the same item (or a comparable item), one can be cannibalized to repair the other.
Players also have the option to create their own weaponry using various scavenged items found in the wasteland. These items can only be created at workbenches, and only if the player possesses the necessary schematics or the necessary Perk. These weapons usually possess significant advantages over other weapons of their type. Each schematic has three copies to be found. Each copy, up to a maximum of three, improves the condition (or number) of items produced at the workbench. A higher repair skill will also result in a better starting condition for the related weapon. Weapon schematics can be found lying in certain locations, bought from vendors, or received as quest rewards.
The Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System, or V.A.T.S., plays an important part in combat. While using V.A.T.S., real-time combat is paused, and action is played out from varying camera angles in a computer graphics version of "bullet time", creating a combat system that the Bethesda developers have described as a hybrid between turn-based and real-time combat. Various actions cost action points, limiting the actions of each combatant during a turn, and the player can target specific body areas for attacks to inflict specific injuries; head shots can be used for quick kills or blinding, legs can be targeted to slow enemies' movements, opponents can be disarmed by shooting at their weapons, and players can drive certain enemies into a berserker rage by shooting out things like antennae on various overgrown insects and combat inhibitors on armored robots. However, the use of V.A.T.S. also eliminates most of the first-person shooter elements of the game; aiming is taken over by the computer, and the player is unable to move as a means of avoiding attacks.
The Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System, or V.A.T.S. will have the ability to use new special attacks. Usage of certain melee weapons will trigger unique animations. For example, using a 9 iron would show up as "Fore!", and sends the enemy reeling for a period of time. Also, the developer added the ability to use the iron sights on almost all guns, excluding larger weapons that are shot from the hip, with better over-the-shoulder view for third-person combat. New weapons, some Fallout 3 weapons, and a weapon modification system are introduced in Fallout: New Vegas. The modification system allows for weapon modifications, such as mounting scopes, modifying rate of fire, and changing size of magazine. Crafting will also play a role in weaponry, with the player being able to craft ammunition, such as hand-loaded rounds. In addition, a plant-harvesting system similar to The Elder Scrolls series will be in place for the player to use such plants in bullets, chems, for healing, stats, and for other handy uses.
One of the more noticable features of New Vegas is the inclusion of real-world guns, such as the M4A1 Carbine replacing the G3-styled assault rifle of Fallout 3. The use of real-world weapons was also included in Fallout: Tactics. In Fallout Canon, the states of Arizona and Nevada more commonly used 9mm compared to the more powerful 10mm rounds used on the East and West Coast. New weapons, such as the M1 Garand rifle have been included, as well. On the other hand, other weapons such as laser weapons and large guns like miniguns have remained relatively unchanged.
The quantity of factions prompted developers to reintroduce the reputation system that was absent in Fallout 3. The degree of faction loyalty influences the player's reputation. Reputation affects the behavior of faction non-player characters (NPCs) toward the player, and reflects the impacts of selected choices in the world. Karma is also a factor, but is independent of faction reputation (the player can rob a faction member, lowering his karma, but leaving his reputation unchanged assuming he isn't caught). Availability of dialogue options with NPCs are based upon skills, reputation and karma. Skills have a bigger effect on conversation choices. Whether a dialogue option will succeed or fail is shown up front, and entirely dependent on skill level, rather than chance as seen in Fallout 3. Companion behavior and tasks are controlled using the new "companion wheel." Fallout 3 presented companion commands in a conversational dialogue menu. The new Companion Wheel offers command execution by selecting commands that are presented in a radial and graphical menu. Josh Sawyer states the Companion Wheel offers ease of companion interaction. Such examples of companion commands include setting and changing its combat tactics, its default behavior towards foes and usage frequency of available resources. The player also receives a special perk dependent upon the companion recruited, and can have one humanoid and one non-humanoid at a time.
In New Vegas, the player can visit casinos to participate in mini-games, including blackjack, slots, and roulette. You can either win or lose money at these mini games. Designer Chris Avellone said the mini-games were done by a programmer experienced in programming non-table gaming machines. A card game called Caravan is also playable in the game.
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