i really hate the start of new vegas, in the other games the reason you didnt know anything about the outside world was that you had lived your entire life in a isolated community and all you knew about the outside had been told and retold so many times and to so many people that the information that remained was nothing but a fairy tale, and the combat system, map and information all relies on your pip boy which was either standard issue given out to most residents or a piece of ancient technology passed down trough generations.
in new vegas you have amnesia and some dude just gives you, a complete stranger, this piece of advanced technology for no reason, and thats just the tip of the iceberg of poor writing in this game, i agree that fallout 3 had a ton of problems with its story, but new vegas makes it look like fallout 2.