Fallout 3 and fallout new Vegas came out shortly after each other, and both created waves when they did came out combing fps games to an RPG background. The old 1950’s futuristic clique never quite looked like this before with long maps that represent both the D.C. area to even the Mojave Desert with landmarks to vaguely resemble the true area. With old music scores by Ella Fitz Gerald and the ink spots were included in fallout 3. In new Vegas the music is more dean martin and frank Sinatra type of music. The creators of the interesting story driven game are Bethesda (known for making the game elder scrolls) and obsidian (which made the first to fallout games).

The story line in fallout 3 is that you were supposedly born in vault 101, and you live with your father and his lab assistant. Inside the vault you pick the way you look, and the way your character is built. Most people go either a super strong Rambo character or a hidden ninja sort of character. The thing I have to say is unique to fallouts game design is its witty humor by adding old Sci-Fi movies into the game for an example in the mission “those!” the whole point of it was ants were mutated by the atomic blast to be really big like in the movie them. The main quest of the story is that your father left the safety of the vault. Since your father left everything went to a mad house inside the vault causing many lives lost, so you were banished to leave the vault to survive, and to find your father. Your quest lead to some peculiar areas and interesting people to find what really happened to vault 101, and your father’s disappearance.

In new Vegas your story is totally different and sometimes a little bit hazier, and creates more questions than answers. You start off tied up in an unknown spot with a man in a checkered suit in front of you. He rambles on how your luck has took a turn for the worst and shoots you point blank in your head and buries you in a shallow grave. You then get dig up by a robot and rushed you to the nearest doctor you lose all your memories wake up near the doctor and pick up your build your only lead is the man in the checkered suit and you have to go either the super dangerous route or the not as dangerous indirect route. The game has three major factions instead of one like in fallout 3 the game story in this one is shorter the ending is less disappointing though in my opinion. The factions in new Vegas are the new Californian republic, Caesar legion, and brotherhood of steel. All are fighting for control over the Hoover dam to control the power in the Vegas strip.

The combat system in fallout is splendid you can pick first person view or third person view so it suits everyone who likes combat style games. They also have another goodie for combat v.a.t.s. it pauses the game so you can focus your shots to a particular part of the body so you can cripple a limb to defeat your adversary easier. Pay attention to your apparel condition and weapon condition a broken gun means a dead son. The game is not all about combat there is voice choices you can pick that controls the outcome of the game, who are your friends, or just plain get stuff. The higher you are in a skill set unlocks new voice options causing drastic changes to have high replay value. The other thing is a karma system which also controls what you say, and what you get. I must restate all the Sci-Fi references in these games from “mad max” to “them” it really does feel like an apocalyptic world you can control the game is superb for having so many side missions. The humor can cause some serious gut bursting laughter. The array of different builds and weapons are almost endless once again making replay value worth it.

In my personal opinion fallout 3 is better than new Vegas, but I highly recommend both of them they are worth the cash to buy. The games replay value is so high making it pay itself off in the end and doing all the side missions is nearly impossible to do the first time. Theres a lot of downloadable content to drive the story even further for more miscellaneous fun, and there is more to come. The story itself is so much fun on its own that it makes me laugh every time I play there’s never a dull moment. Also if you get the games on computer you can download an array of mods for more extravagant moments. My only pet peeves about this game are glitches, and graphics. These glitches like invisible walls falling through maps can be very annoying while others can make you laugh. For an example if a person head is moving his head like he’s in the exorcist that just makes the game funny and worthwhile to play but if you fall through a map that’s just annoying. Now the graphics its 2011 we shouldn’t have grass that looks like it belongs on the dream cast or the Nintendo 64 and the soil just looks like it’s just been plastered on with the same stone every five pixels . I also feel that new Vegas was rushed a little because of the parts of the map that just doesn’t connect very well creating sky between two areas. I also do not recommend this to kids under 12 due to lots of swearing, alcoholic/drug references, and the graphic nature of the game.

So in my conclusion I give fallout 3 a 9.8 out of ten and a must buy for anyone who likes sand box games, RPG’s or fps’s. Fallout 3 has a riveting story line for choose your own adventure type game. Now for new Vegas I give it a 8.5 I recommend it for purchase after the game of the year addition comes out due to all its dlc’s aren’t out yet, and wasting money is not cool. Fallout new Vegas has less of a story line to build off of but it’s a definitely worth the buy.