DLC Review - Fallout: New Vegas - "Honest Hearts"

"Honest hearts produce honest actions."

To its credit, the second add-on for Fallout: New Vegas has a lot to say - it just doesn't give itself enough time to say it. Whereas Dead Money had much to throw at you about greed and deception and trust, Honest Hearts kinda just throws you the Spark Notes. That's not really a bad thing at all, considering what you end up getting, but it does mean you might be able to brush off the story a lot sooner than you'd hoped.

Even then, it still ranks very, very high on the list of Fallout DLC, possibly even above Point Lookout. Maybe.

It begins with a radio signal, as they always do, and an invitation to join the Happy Trails Caravan Company on a trek through Utah, and a place called Zion. Apparently, the company has fallen on hard times, and this will be their last run if they're unable to unload their goods. They're not taking any chances, so you're hired to go along for the ride as security.

But you'll quickly find that your efforts were all for naught and things go terribly, terribly... terribly wrong for the caravan, just before you're thrown into an unstable conflict between three warring tribes in Zion. Yeah, didn't see that coming either.

The rest of the story will have you picking sides and deciding the fates of the native tribes, all the while being prodded by the mysterious Burned Man, Joshua Graham. And while all that's going on, you'll become privy to even more details on how the DLC storyline is going to eventually end up playing out. This, I thought, was the most interesting part of the add-on.

Unlike those of Fallout 3, all of the add-ons for New Vegas are connected in some way, quietly building up a scenario in which you will eventually cross paths with another courier. Who this courier is and why he means trouble is still (kind of) a mystery, but I think that's an amazing thing to try and pull off with downloadable content: to essentially give you a whole other game with its own underlying narrative.

But that's neither here nor there. The truth of the matter is that you're mostly paying for access to Zion National Park, since the story, and all of the characters (excluding the Burning Man) are largely uninteresting. People who are aware of the Mormon tradition of sending missionaries to "uncivilized" countries will get where Honest Hearts is coming from, and it really doesn't try to do much more than that.

Unlike Dead Money, though, it's a much more cohesive experience. You might die, but nowhere near as much without that collar around your neck. You might get strapped for ammo, but you won't be scrounging for it in every box and dresser you find. So, long and short, it's a more relaxed add-on. The lack of compelling characters was a turn off, as was the laid back story, but it was, overall, a satisfying expansion. Zion will always be waiting for you when your quests come to an end, though what state its in when you leave will ultimately be up to you. For that reason alone, it's definitely worth the purchase.

Game Review: L.A. Noire

Copied from my Amazon.com review.

There are some things that you should know before you go into this game. Even though Team Bondi's L.A. NOIRE has the Rockstar brand on the cover, even though there is some revolutionary technology driving the narrative, and even though 1940s downtown L.A. has been recreated historically to 90% accuracy, this might not be the video game you thought you were buying. I know that it certainly took me by surprise. It's a game that's nothing like Rockstar's previous titles, such as the magnificent Red Dead Redemption or the GTA series. Where as those games placed you firmly on one side of the law and attempted to blur the lines, L.A. NOIRE tries the same take from an officer's perspective, albeit with a completely different approach.

Though the main storyline takes a backseat for most of the game, you'll follow Detective Cole Phelps as he makes his way up through the hierarchy of the Los Angeles Police Department. Starting as patrolman, you'll eventually find yourself working cases for the traffic, arson, homicide, and vice divisions, with each having its own subplot and cast of characters. Each of these subplots are then broken up further into "episodes," with their own isolated set of investigations, clues, victims, and suspects. When all is said and done, it feels like playing through a full season of LAW AND ORDER.

The approach to each of these episodes doesn't vary much. The beginning will introduce you to the crime, after which you follow the clues around 1940s L.A. until you have a decent pool of evidence going. To gather this evidence, you'll be asked to walk the crime scene and other places of relevance until your character notices something, at which point you'll enter an examination mode of sorts and take a closer look at whatever it was you've picked up. Sometimes the things you can examine will be junk, but anything that adds to your case will be logged away for further use.

In the natural course of compiling evidence, a list of suspects and witnesses will start to present itself. This is where interrogations come in, what you'll very likely end up spending 85% of the game doing. And it's also where the game's technology comes into play.

Thanks to real-time facial motion capture, the characters you come into contact with in L.A. NOIRE aren't like anything you've seen in any other video game. L.A. NOIRE relies on real, acted performances instead of just voice acting, providing a sense of realism and immersion that few games have managed to attain. When interviewing a suspicious witness, a flick of the eyes and a nervous gulp might give him away, while a firm, eye-to-eye stare might convince you the suspect is telling the truth. This also makes the drama and the character interactions just seem so much more real, like you were watching a very, very good crime series instead of just playing a video game.

But that is where my gripes with the game come into play. For the most part, L.A. NOIRE doesn't really play like your average video game and is more like a TV series with interactive moments. 1940s L.A. has been recreated with astounding attention to detail, but the game doesn't encourage exploration at all. The story is constantly in play, and while diverging away from your next waypoint is definitely allowed, it just feels... wrong. It doesn't feel like you should be driving around at random, exploring things, seeing the sights. That certainly might not be the case for some players, but I tried free roaming a grand total of one time and felt uncomfortable doing so. Like, as an adult, I should know better.

And those playable parts of the game are gradually, over the course of this 20 to 25 hour game, worn down by repetition. Confronting a suspect will usually always end in some kind of dramatic and destructive chase, either on foot or by car, regardless of the suspect's guilt. Interrogations lose some of their shine once you realize that even most of the innocent people will find any reason to lie to you. And since the game doesn't allow you to undo your choices or missteps during interrogations without reloading the game to an earlier autosave, some of the confrontations can get old really fast.

With that, the gameplay stops feeling like the focus of the game and more like a means to an end, because outside all of the driving, the car/foot chases, and interrogations, there is a stellar story going on in the foreground against a realistic setting. The writing is pitch perfect to the point where you'd almost expect the developers had lived through the time period. Events and rhetoric from the time are constantly making their way into the script. Hollywood is beginning is rise as the entertainment capital of the world, the stars on film are brighter than the ones in the sky, and capitalism is in full swing in post-war L.A. Advertisements are everywhere, there's a cigarette in everyone's hand, the beginnings of the Second Red Scare are making its way onto the radio.

Playing the game really did feel like stepping back in time, and that's why it gets four stars from me. It felt like an experience more than a game. In fact, sometimes I was so absorbed by the plot twist and the minute details of the setting and of the script, that when everything eventually stopped and I was back in control of Detective Phelps again, I had to wake up and remind myself, "Oh, yeah... I have to play this thing."

DLC Review - Fallout: New Vegas - "Dead Money"

"You can check out anytime you like..."

I left the Mojave Wasteland as the benevolent-ish dictator of the New Vegas Strip, having repelled both the New California Republic and Caesar's Legion from gaining control over the Hoover Dam. I took it upon myself to wander aimlessly for a time, snooping out sidequests and items that I may have missed during my ride toward revenge. When I was satisfied in my travels, and finally in possession of the armor displayed prominently on the box art, I returned to my home in Novac and logged out for what I knew would be an extended vacation from the wasteland.

Personally, I thought that was a damn fine way to wrap things up at the time. The chances were slim that I'd be returning anytime soon, since, for some reason, something about the DLC being released just didn't click with me. Maybe I was just opposed to all DLC in general when I was finished with Fallout: New Vegas. Just not sure.

But what I can say is that, after finally caving in and buying the first add-on, Dead Money, I am absolutely convinced that Obsidian Entertainment is the heir apparent to BioWare in terms of writing, story, and characterization. Maybe an odd conclusion to come to after a DLC pack, and maybe (definitely) a little random, but I just cannot deny the intense swirl of emotions that my travels through the Sierra Madre Casino evoked. As I assume they say in Vegas, "We have a winner."

Dead Money begins, as most Fallout DLC has, with a new radio station popping up on your Pip-Boy. When you track down the source of this new signal, you're led underground and into an abandoned base that was once owned by the Brotherhood of Steel. You'll notice a few clues as to where you'll be heading as you enter, but before you can process anything, you walk into semi-obvious trap and down you go. Eventually you wake up in the middle of a villa at the base of a hill where the infamous Sierra Madre Hotel & Casino sits, looming over you, as pristine as it was when it was originally constructed.

For as long as I've been traveling the Capital and Mojave Wastelands, it was unsettling to see something that wasn't destroyed.

And, again, before you can process what's going on, you're accosted by a man named Father Elijah, speaking to you through a hologram in the middle of the villa. He very indifferently lays the situation down on you: There is a bomb collar strapped onto your neck, and it's electronically linked to the collars of three other unfortunate souls out there in the villa. If one of you dies, you all die. This failsafe is in place so that the four of you will presumably work together to break into the vault of the Sierra Madre, which will then surrender its treasures unto you.

In any case, you don't really have a choice in the matter. Any move to resist Elijah's demands will result in your collar going boom, taking your three mystery companions along with you. From the start, you're made to understand just how expendable you are, and even though your circumstances are unfortunate, you're not the first to be enslaved in this way. Elijah can always find someone else.

Okay? So, let's break into a casino!

"Like this, but with ghosts and mutants."

What follows isn't merely a story of "the big heist," though it's certainly meant to resemble and celebrate one. The Sierra Madre has a dark history to it, and as you progress you'll find yourself stumbling onto bits and pieces of information that shed light on just what you and your unfortunate predecessors have gotten into. Many people, possibly even yourself, have been lured to the Sierra Madre with the promise of riches in mind. But nothing is as it seems, which seems to be the greater point of the story at hand.

History is what has made the Fallout series work so well for me. Walking into random houses will sometimes show you how their occupants once lived, how they died: little windows into how the survivors of the apocalypse have pressed on. Dead Money maintains that feeling the whole way through. Frantic scribblings on the walls, stockpiles of ammunition, journal entries, a skeleton in the corner with finger bones still clutching a pistol aimed at its own skull. You can experience the entire rise and fall of the Sierra Madre Casino third-handedly, amounting to one of the most haunting gaming experiences I've probably ever had.

The whole experience is elevated by the moot fact that you'll be stripped of all your weapons and armor upon waking up in the villa. This add-on makes one of the truer attempts at falling within the "survival horror" genre in some time. I found myself checking every drawer, every box, every nook and cranny looking for that much coveted stimpack or ammo clip.

Despite all of this, Dead Money isn't as perfect as I'd like to say it is. Sometimes that survival horror aspect works against it, turning a very immersive experience into a test of patience. Your collar will explode if it comes in close proximity to a speaker that gives off a certain sound. These speakers are sometimes well hidden. I can't tell you how many times I died trying to find those stupid things and cut off the signal. And there will also be times when it just seems impossible to find health and ammo, which ended with me either resorting to stealth or loading up an earlier save. This might be a gripe of extreme relativity, since I'm certain some players will welcome the challenge. But still - my head exploded many times.

Setting the difficulty aside, Dead Money will have you coming into contact with some great characters and a superb story. It ends on a high note, and sets up future add-ons. In fact, as I type this, the second add-on, Honest Hearts, has been released. Depending on how L.A. Noire treats me, I'll likely be diving into that one very soon, as well.

I'm sitting here, still in awe of the impression the Sierra Madre has left on me. It's not too often that a game developer sets out to tell a story that doesn't stop at the cutscenes. The Sierra Madre is a place of high extravagance frozen in time, where the ghosts of the dead still live on in artificiality, and nothing is ever what it seems.

Yeah, it was pretty good!