Obsidian Boss Promises Old-School "Vibe" in Fallout: New Vegas

Andy Chalk

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Obsidian Boss Promises Old-School "Vibe" in Fallout: New Vegas


Obsidian chief Feargus Urquhart says the studio is definitely putting its stamp on the upcoming Fallout: New Vegas [http://fallout.bethsoft.com/eng/home/teaser.php] but warns that gamers expecting some sort of Van Buren rebirth are in for a disappointment.

Urquahart, of course, was the man at the head of Black Isle Studios when it created the famed Obsidian Entertainment [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallout_2], but the time for Van Buren, he told The Escapist, has passed.

"A lot of it is that it's not the Black Isle team, it's people from the Black Isle team working on it. It's a different set, it's a different group of designers. I've learned a lot, Josh [Sawyer, Lead Designer] has learned a lot about making games since then," he said. "Back then, we were trying to steer away from something like Vegas. We just had Reno in Fallout 2. It's something that would have been a difference if the other game had come to fruition."

But he promised that the Obsidian "vibe" will still come through when gamers get to New Vegas. "Every studio has a different approach to things, a different vibe. When it comes to us, Fallout [http://fallout.bethsoft.com] is always a little campy," he said. "We probably play that up a bit more - like with Dinky. Like you were saying, it's the Vegas thing. People are going to take that away. They're just going to have a different vibe playing it."

"If you take someone who played New Vegas, and didn't play Fallout 3, and someone who played Fallout 3 and didn't play New Vegas, and they talked about the general feeling of playing it, they would say very different [things]," he continued. "'Oh, it's kind of a wasteland - it was very desaturated,' and then the New Vegas player would say 'Oh, no it was blue skies, and there's a dinosaur,' and things like that."

Urquhart touched on a number of other topics as well, including the challenges in moving from an isometric to a 3-D game design, the potential for conflict between Obsidian and Feargus Urquhart Comes Home [http://www.bethsoft.com].



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Flying-Emu

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As long as they don't scrap that Hardcore mode (where you have to eat and drink to survive), I'm still on board.
 

Brotherofwill

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Amen to the old Fallout 2 vibe. Someone has to slap Bethesda's hands away from editing that game, I want blue-sky, dinosaur goodness.
 

Ironic Pirate

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Hmm, sounds interesting...

I just hope enemies are less durable. And better animations would be cool too.
 

Icehearted

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Wait, so we'll be able to target eyes and groins again? Because a haymaker to the meat orbs (either pair) was kinda fun to dish out.

Seriously though, I think Fallout 3 was great fun, but I wish it had been more of a spin-off than a sequel, so we could hope for an old-school sequel as well. Best of both worlds and all.
 

Jonci

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Obsidian just better not fuck up what Bethesda made great. I don't want some old guys trying to perserve their glory days and screw up a good formula. Fallout 3 is one of the best games I've ever played and I want a sequel that will shine just as brightly. I already don't like the low-key character creation that was written about earlier.
 

Ironic Pirate

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Xzi said:
Ironic Pirate said:
Hmm, sounds interesting...

I just hope enemies are less durable. And better animations would be cool too.
LESS durable? Fallout 3 was one of the easiest games I've ever played, even with the difficulty slider all the way up. New Vegas better be at least five times harder.
You would be less durable too, silly. It made non-vats combat annoying at best.

It's never fun to shoot someone several times and then have them suddenly fall over. I want everyone to die in one or two shots, makes it more tense.
 

silver wolf009

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New vegas looks good, and if you have the atmosphere of fallout 2 with the gameplay of fallout 3 then its hard to fail.
 

Starke

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Ironic Pirate said:
Xzi said:
Ironic Pirate said:
Hmm, sounds interesting...

I just hope enemies are less durable. And better animations would be cool too.
LESS durable? Fallout 3 was one of the easiest games I've ever played, even with the difficulty slider all the way up. New Vegas better be at least five times harder.
You would be less durable too, silly. It made non-vats combat annoying at best.

It's never fun to shoot someone several times and then have them suddenly fall over. I want everyone to die in one or two shots, makes it more tense.
A quick way to achieve that is to rig up a mod that sets the damage multiplier for skill and condition to 1 each, instead of .5. It makes the combat a lot more interesting.

Though the swampfolk were just bullshit. :(
 

Jared

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Flying-Emu said:
As long as they don't scrap that Hardcore mode (where you have to eat and drink to survive), I'm still on board.
Thats something I am really excited for too...Its going to add a certain amount of tense-ness which we havnt had before
 

Onyx Oblivion

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As long as it doesn't shove Small Guns, Repair, and Lockpick down your throat, I'll pick it up.
 

obisean

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Jonci said:
Obsidian just better not fuck up what Bethesda made great. I don't want some old guys trying to perserve their glory days and screw up a good formula. Fallout 3 is one of the best games I've ever played and I want a sequel that will shine just as brightly. I already don't like the low-key character creation that was written about earlier.
If you ask some people, Bethesda fucked up what Obsidian (then Black Isle) made great.
 

Flying-Emu

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Jaredin said:
Flying-Emu said:
As long as they don't scrap that Hardcore mode (where you have to eat and drink to survive), I'm still on board.
Thats something I am really excited for too...Its going to add a certain amount of tense-ness which we havnt had before
Plus, that's how Fallout should have been in the first place. It felt weird how every NPC was constantly worried about water and food, but you were more concerned with finding another clip of 10mm JHP rounds.
Jonci said:
Obsidian just better not fuck up what Bethesda made great. I don't want some old guys trying to perserve their glory days and screw up a good formula. Fallout 3 is one of the best games I've ever played and I want a sequel that will shine just as brightly. I already don't like the low-key character creation that was written about earlier.
Bethesda ruined what was arguably the greatest RPG series ever made.
 

AceDiamond

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Flying-Emu said:
Bethesda ruined what was arguably the greatest RPG series ever made.
Yeah because Fallout wasn't already being run into the ground with things like Fallout Tactics, Fallout: BoS, and the like. And let's not forget of course the fact that Van Buren was dead and buried for years before Bethesda got their hands on the license. Bethesda saved Fallout whether people like to admit it or not. If not for them there wouldn't even be a New Vegas much less a chance for the original Fallout guys to come back to the series. Was Fallout 3 great? It was in some places and not in others. Did it ruin the series? Hardly.
 

Flying-Emu

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AceDiamond said:
Flying-Emu said:
Bethesda ruined what was arguably the greatest RPG series ever made.
Yeah because Fallout wasn't already being run into the ground with things like Fallout Tactics, Fallout: BoS, and the like. And let's not forget of course the fact that Van Buren was dead and buried for years before Bethesda got their hands on the license. Bethesda saved Fallout whether people like to admit it or not. If not for them there wouldn't even be a New Vegas much less a chance for the original Fallout guys to come back to the series. Was Fallout 3 great? It was in some places and not in others. Did it ruin the series? Hardly.
Tactics was great. But that's an opinion.

Bethesda picked up the license and that automatically means they saved the game? Did Sega and Secret Level save Golden Axe with Beast Rider? Hell no. Just because you bring an old game to the forefront doesn't mean anything. While I'll admit that the chance for New Vegas to come about without Fallout 3 was indeed slim, it's simply disgusting to pick up an old license to a popular game, essentially reskin one of your own company's popular games (the Elder Scroll series), add in something to appease the old-school fans, and release it. I am of the firm belief that, if you're going to continue an old license under the same name (and make it a direct sequel), you should at least stick within a similar genre.

Fallout 3 did not have the vibe of the Fallout series; it lacked that special something that made Fallout good. Don't bother trying to say it was nostalgia, either; I played Fallout 1 and 2 for the first time in 2004, and it was beautiful. I'm not saying that Fallout 3 was a bad game, by any means. It was a well-crafted game that had some high and low points, as you said. But as a Fallout game? It's more of a side dish than a main course, if you catch my drift.
 

Mrsoupcup

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theSovietConnection said:
If I wasn't sure on New Vegas before, the dinosaur definitely now has my attention.
Thats Dinky The Dinosaur. (No, really but I'm not complaining) Well D.C. had a vibe of the new. (In a sense) Like crawling through ruin and historical landmarks. While in Nevada they have things like The Worlds largest Thermometer as landmarks. Apparently Vegas takes place 70 years after Fallout 3, so that pretty much ruins my hopes of seeing Marcus again. (My guess is this game is going to be less serious than Fallout 3 and have some humor)