From NMA:


http://twitter.com/Andrew_Reiner (Game Informer executive director):

Starting up a third playthrough of New Vegas.

Sorry gang, I can't comment on the game until Tuesday. All my playthroughs will make sense once you read the review.

@ZacharyLevi Killed you in Fallout: New Vegas. Thanks for the experience points!

I can say that I was able to play NV to completion without being stopped by bugs.

(about the review) @ShawnScot it'll be Tues or Wed.



http://twitter.com/DanielVavra (screenwriter on Mafia I & II):

Hated the story and quests of Fallout 3. Love the story and quests of New Vegas.



http://twitter.com/JimSterling (review editor for Destructoid):

First Jimpressions of New Vegas: As far as I am concerned, Alpha Protocol never happened now. Slate's clean.

Played New Vegas for two days and have only officially completed two quests. [censored] hell!

I in no way mean to imply that that's a BAD thing, either.

New Vegas has officially overwhelmed me. I have so many quests going on and don't know where to start. This is terrifying and awesome.



http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/showpost.php?p=2422063&postcount=1564:

How do you know I'm playing?

I'm not sure I could even begin to give a thumbs up or thumbs down yet. I can certainly say this is a huge game. I'm about 25 hours in and still pretty overwhelmed by the breadth of stuff to do. It's very Fallout 3.

I will say it's got some really disappointing tech and balance issues. The Xbox 360 version has locked up on me several times and I've heard the same from a colleague who's also playing. In addition, there seems to be some sort of memory leak. I was about ready to just throw in the towel, convinced that the geometry and effects in the actual New Vegas area were too much for the engine. But I cleared the memory cache (not sure if that actually does anything) and restarted my 360, and that made a world of difference. Now I'm making a point to quit out every few hours.

And although I love the hardcoe mode in theory, in practice it hasn't been the least bit challenging. Thanks in part to Fallout's lack of a real economy, the hardcoe mode just feels like an extra layer of futzing. It's more flavor than difficulty, I'd say.

I'll be doing a game diary series on Fidgit next week and a full review for Gameroni, Jason's site, when I'm done.

-Tom



To which Josh Sawyer http://forums.obsidian.net/index.php?s=&showtopic=56308&view=findpost&p=1074414:

BTW, yes, clearing your Xbox 360 memory cache really does do something!

We did find some legacy memory leak issues but I believe we fixed them.

However, memory fragmentation will inevitably occur in this engine, which is why clearing a 360's cache can *~ automagically ~* make Oblivion/F3/F:NV go from unstable to stable in some circumstances.

What I can't make heads or tails of is that this Tim character is having such a bad go of the 360 version, and yet the game informer guy had no problems. I somehow doubt Game Informer played it on anything other than the "lead platform", which as we all know is the 360. Odd, that.

So, instead of the PS3 having these problems now 360 has 'em?
Blah, I just hope they do mote patches than Bethesda did and fix the stuff that is broken.

so close, yet soooo far away.......

"From Our Friends At NMA"
Our?

Plural, I consider them a friendly site too.

You read the post, didn't you? You gained new information from it. Benefited, you could say. Don't be so sour, friend.

I liked Alpha Protocol. :angry:

Same. You had one group of reviewers being pedantic, and the rest jumping on the bandwagon because it was easier than going against the grain or forming their own opinions.

Me too.

Metaphor time:
I think it's like this, that one reviewer who is the cool kid in the class.
Start picking on the new fat kid who is alpha protocol.
By doing so, the other kids who are reviewers pick on him as well just so that they aren't "weird" themselves.
But none of them actually gave him a fair chance because the fat kid is really funny and has a great personality.
But none of them will notice it, because if they don't pick on him and try to befriend him then the other kids will start to pick on them as well.

True dat! :goodjob:
I predict that Alpha Protocol will be another "Vampire: The Masqurade - Bloodlines". That is, it fell under heavy criticism at release but may grow to be a cult classic some time down the road.

That's somewhat disheartening for the xbox 360 version. I've had no problems with Oblivion or Fallout 3. I'm now somewhat concerned.

I consider them friends. Sure they are often grumpy, but that never stopped me from liking people. For instance, I think Oscar the Grouch is awesome. NMA loves Fallout, we love Fallout. The majority of NMA is even excited about New Vegas, though some are doing their damn best not to show it! ^_^


I loved Alpha Protocol. I think it IS another Bloodlines. It has such depth and meaningful gameplay that once all the bugs are official or unofficially patched out, all people will remember who play it is how awesome it is.


Not saying you shouldn't be concerned, but other people playing New Vegas on the 360 are having no problems. The reports of problems on console for Oblivion/FO3 seem to be hit or miss. Some people play hundreds of hours on the console with no problems, others run into issues at every other step. It must have something to do with the Hardware or setup of the players' individual consoles. All you can do is be sure and clear the memory cache like Sawyer suggests. But if you played FO3 on your console and didn't run into problems, I wouldn't worry about being one of the unlucky people that may run into problems on the console.

Even the reviewer having issues on the 360 apparently isn't having them too badly, since everything seems to be going smoothly after clearing the cache as long as he takes a break every few hours.

Me too. Thought is one of the better RPGs of recent times. Somehow, Sterling liking something gives me an uneasy feeling.

Interesting reviews the 360 memory Cache worrys me but I'll figure out how to deal with it.

I don't want to have to stop playing every few hours but I can live with it I guess.

I still need to play Alpha Protocol.

So how does somebody clear a memory cache from the 360

Why? It is a common issue with games on the 360 :shrug:

The comments about hardcoe mode aren't very heartening. Pretty passive though. I intend to experience the game on hardcoe mode first-time around, still... find out for myself. I remember chatting about having a hardcoe mode on the FO3 forums when I first joined up, I really can't wait to see how it's been handled.

Go to the Xbox Dashboard, select the System Blade, and select Memory.
Highlight the HD symbol and press Y.
Press X, X, Left Bumper, Right Bumper, X, X.

Or go to system blade, select memory, highlight the HD tab, press Y then pci k the "Clear System Cache".

By stopping every few hours I mean just saving the game and turning off the console. Wait 10-15 seconds. Turn back on the console. Load your save. Keep playing. It's not like it isn't an annoying thing to have to do, but the 3 minutes it takes to do so every 3-4 hours shouldn't stop you from having marathon sessions.


Yeah, the reports of the economy of items making hardcoe Mode easy is what I feared would happen. Oh, well. There will be mods.

Seems simple enough I don't think I'll have problems but its always handy to have the info ready just in case :laugh:

Wait for it to go on sale and hopefully by then there might be a patch or two that get rid of some of the more annoying bugs - and remember to patch it of course. You'll most likely be able to find a cheap copy during a Christmas sale coming up in December - Steam is always handing out deals like that. :user:

hardcoe mode was never meant to make the game more difficult, it was always supposed to add a layer of realism, or "futzing" as Tom Chick calls it. I think he misunderstood the purpose of it. His other points I'll take seriously though, he was the only reviewer who gave Civilization 5 a realistic review and pointed out its many flaws, when other reviewers were jumping on the "perfect score!" bandwagon.