I've been having a lot of fun exploring the southwestern wastelands the last few days, but there have been a fair number of noticeable bugs. Crashes to desktop are fairly common (for me, they seem to get much worse when I'm near some body of water), and there are a number of times where quests or conversation triggers don't quite work properly. I haven't experienced anything game-breaking yet, which has kept me pretty positive about the game. I think it's pretty typical Obsidian: great story, poor quality control.
I've attached a few screenshots below showing some of the lesser bugs I've come across in Fallout. None of these are a big deal, but I thought they were interesting as I made my way across the wasteland.
Fallout: New Vegas
Game » consists of 25 releases. Released Oct 19, 2010
The post-apocalyptic Fallout universe expands into Nevada in this new title in the franchise. As a courier once left for dead by a mysterious man in a striped suit, the player must now set out to find their assailant and uncover the secrets of the enigmatic ruler of New Vegas.
Fun With Fallout Bugs
I've been having a lot of fun exploring the southwestern wastelands the last few days, but there have been a fair number of noticeable bugs. Crashes to desktop are fairly common (for me, they seem to get much worse when I'm near some body of water), and there are a number of times where quests or conversation triggers don't quite work properly. I haven't experienced anything game-breaking yet, which has kept me pretty positive about the game. I think it's pretty typical Obsidian: great story, poor quality control.
I've attached a few screenshots below showing some of the lesser bugs I've come across in Fallout. None of these are a big deal, but I thought they were interesting as I made my way across the wasteland.
The more I see of New Vegas, the more I want to play it despite the bugs. Have you seen the head spinning bug?
I've heard rumors of some others, like a mailbox being assigned as a radscorpion, but I haven't seen any evidence. There was one really odd one with a corrupted save that looks pretty freaky, but I haven't seen that one duplicated anywhere.
I don't understand Obsidian shooting themselves in the foot all the time. They would be revolutionary if they managed to put out more reliable code. It's odd, but Bethsoft's reputation for bugs is so prominent now that when a new Elder Scrolls comes out, few seem bothered by the bugs anymore. Like it's part of the equation. With Obsidian they seem more geared to criticize. Putting those two companies together seems like a weird recipe to me, but I hope the incumbent patches make things smoother. I really want to see a Fallout game with this style and tone succeed.
@ahoodedfigure: I did see the head-spinning bug, right before I got the game. That part is at the very beginning of the game, so I was quickly able to see that didn't affect me. No idea how that happened. I have the same general reaction to Obsidian. I loved KOTOR 2, I really liked Alpha Protocol, and I like this game. But all of them have had bug issues. Bethesda is sort of similar, but I think they've largely avoided that label recently for some reason. Maybe Oblivion was less buggy than Morrowind. But when you make these massive, open world games, I imagine bug-squashing can be incredibly complicated and time-consuming. So the first users are essentially the last line of QA, for good or bad.
I've heard some people say Oblivion was maybe not as buggy as Morrowind, but then again, Morrowind wasn't as buggy as Daggerfall was (damn the void, DAMN THE VOID). Still there were a lot of quirky character behaviors that sort of evened things out in some people's eyes.
Upon reflection, I don't feel as burned by Bethesda as I do by Obsidian. Maybe because Daggerfall and Morrowind hit spots no one else did, so I was willing to put up with more. After Fallout 3, New Vegas has something quite similar to compare it to. If it had been first, I don't think it would have been anything but a triumph in many people's eyes.
All that said, the more I see of NV, the more I want it.
I played Oblivion on the Xbox 360, and can't recall running into many major bugs (only one I can remember involved completing a Daedric quest, so it wasn't a major plot point). But I didn't get far enough in Daggerfall to experience the bugs. At the time I think I was maybe 15 years old, and the initial difficulty level and steep learning curve (and massive, massive open world) made me quit pretty early on. I regret that now, especially because there's no going back to a game like that.
I still recommend New Vegas, but I finished it just the other day, and for now I'm done with it. I plan on doing one really evil playthrough (probably with the hardcore option turned on), but I think I'll let them fix bugs and produce DLC first before I go through it again.
Daggerfall I spent quite a bit of time with, on more than one occasion (the last time was when they released the DOS version for free). If you get a good rhythm it's fine, but the bugs, the weird, endless caves, and the many quests that don't quite work sort of sap my will. I still like its potential, though, and sorta wish rather than concentrating on making things bigger and sharper that they just refine things as they were, keeping stuff just as massive, but using modern processing to make things more complex, interrelated, and feel less like a MMO with only one player.
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