Fallout: NV - Retrospective

Aubrielle has penned down a very positive retrospective of Fallout: New Vegas, the game that swept her away.

I’m not sure I’ve ever been swept away like Fallout: New Vegas swept me away. From the moment I left Doc Mitchell’s clinic and stepped into the glaring Mojave sun, I was a part of this living, breathing world. Its concerns were mine, and my concerns were steeped in the world. As I made my way down into the dusty settlement of Goodsprings, I wasn’t in my bland little apartment anymore, playing some video game. I was in a backwater caravan stop, deep in the Mojave, all alone. Goodsprings is dominated by a little bar that’s somewhere between biker roadhouse and wild west saloon. Its people eke a living out of the sun-baked desert, far from New Vegas and the watchful eye of its overlord. Out here on the frontier, people always keep one wary eye on the horizon, watching out for roving gangs. Step into the bar or general store and you’re greeted with an old dusty radio and the boxy sounds of country music from the 1950s. You might smirk now, but when you’re in the game, it’s perfect. If you smile, it’s from pure joy and that rare feeling of synergy – when something feels so appropriate, so perfectly placed, that the world instantly becomes so much more believable and real and right. Suddenly, music you would have never noticed before has become a part of this experience you’re having. You’re not playing a video game anymore. You’re experiencing something. Goodsprings has become part of your memories, your awareness. When you describe this later on, you’ll describe Goodsprings as a place you visited, and you won’t think of it as something from a video game.