Yes. I think LA is a good choice for the next game. That or New York would be great choices for both atmosphere and humor.

But, being from the South, I'd love to see one take place in Arkansas or Mississippi, but it would probably be a lot like a kind of Point Lookout redux, which, while hilarious, is a little too cliche.

I was in a playthrough with Boone and Ed-E as companions and it seemed like they were killing everything (I'm sure it was mostly Boone) so i started a new one where I'm just going to have ED-E and no other companions. I'm getting the feeling that they're overpowered in this game.

i actually like to play without companions for the most time. adds more challenge and without boone i can actually shoot at things now. every now and then ill use them but i like to lone wolf it.

I'm trying to lone wolf it this playthrough too but i also want to do as many quest as possible. I probably shouldn't be asking this here but can i do all the companion quest without really having them as companions with me constantly.

This is what was so weird, and made FO3 feel like a franchise reboot ~but wasn't. I played Fallout 1 and in the first game you emerge from the vault into an untamed remnant 50's retro world ~but its all the past. Those living in it now don't appear to be retro 50's minded. It felt a bit like the [later] movie 'Blast from the Past', when Calvin and Adam leave the Vault.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXClAFX8N2Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Z3N3KquVJY#t=01m20s

In Fallout 1, 80 years had past since the bombs. The world had shanty towns , inhabited ruins, and the Hub (somewhat like Barter Town in Mad Max).
In Fallout 2 80 years have past again and your PC lives in the a village that practically deifies their founder ~the PC from FO1. Towns and settlements exist all across the map. NCR sprung from Shady Sands and now has public utilities and a City Hall. Vault City exists (much as New Vegas), a gated community surrounded by slums. The Den in FO2 looks a lot like Freeside in FONV. Jacob's town is based on FO2's Broken Hills.
Fallout 3 takes us back to what appears like before FO1, and wants us to accept that mankind has lived in destroyed squalor for ten generations.

*(And FO3 adds supermutants and bottlecaps, and Enclave ~all of which were lost remnants themselves from the first two games ~and not appropriate for a game set farther in the future). Bottlecaps were given up by the time of FO2, they used currency, and made jokes about caps being worthless. DC has too much coinage to use sharp edged bottlecaps that don't stack as well as coins.

IMO Caps should have been left out of FO3 and NV. They are only in the games as an out of place tie-in/brand identifier.
"Remember Fallout?... Yeah my friend had it.. Its that PA rpg with supermutants and you used bottlecaps for money".

As for using LA or San Fran...the LA boneyard was in FO1 and San fran was in FO2. St. Lois was in FO: Tactics. FO3 was the odd man out for setting in the series. FO:NV is a natural sequel to FO2, environment wise.

FO3 was a lot of fun, but even on the most difficult setting, combat was always simply too easy and this part became boring after several playthroughs unless you installed some mods to correct the balance problems.

The problem with combat in FO3 is you can simply load up on weightless stimpaks and you are in a sort of "god" mode.

There was no purpose to the food and drink items, they were simply extra junk to weigh you down, especially when there were so many stimpaks everywhere.

On the higher levels, combat is a bit on the easy side in FNV as well, especially for a melee build with super slam perk, but I certainly died more often in FNV than in FO3. Another great improvement to FNV is the fact that there are some areas with really tough monsters even on the lower levels. This adds realism and makes for fun, challenging situations. (Plus revenge is that much sweeter when you are finally able to kill deathclaws and cazadores.)

Plus the oblivion DR system made it too easy to kill "tough" things with wimpy weapons. AKA the Power armor not giving any protection vs. BB's. While they have it much better with the DT system in Vegas it still isn't up to the originals standards.

Yes, I used companions for their perks and only traveled with companions when completing their quests. Other than that I made them wait in the area where I found them. (for example, Mojave outpost for Cass.) I heard some people experienced glitches where they couldn't find their companion when they told them to wait at the Lucky 38, so I would always travel to their original location and just tell them to wait. Eventually, after a certain number of days, you receive a popup message indicating that your companion has left and returned to their original home (which should be exactly where you left them), and you just go back there to add them again and get the perk.

There is one glitch that makes your companion suddenly appear when you descend the elevator in Vault 34. Maybe it only happens with Cass?

Sneak shot with modded sniper rifle + .308 JSP Hand Load + minimum 60 or 70% gun skill

Why is New Vegas easier than 3? Because there are stretches of the Mojave you can walk through without being attacked by anything. Mortal danger lurked around every corner in D.C., this feels like a theme park by comparison.

Eh, Mortal danger? more like more grinding for loot and Xp to make you even more powerful.

Skill makes the difference. It was nice to be presented with, though. Too bad you and most other NV fans don't actually seem to play videogames.

The mortal danger being the player, obviously.

What? I had to put in MMM increased increased spawns to actually get the "Mortal danger" level of enemies in spawns. So like Super mutant spawns where you see like 4-5 mutants you'd see like 15-30 mutants.

Yeah same here.

Nice mod BTW. Only I didn't think floaters, geckos and wanamingos were suitable for FO3. I dont know about the rest of the critters but I'm happy to see the return of the geckos and they fit beautifully in the Mojave, I reckon.

What in Fallout 3 did you consider hard? The dart gun made the most challenging enemies a joke.

Are you just counting the cheating enemies in the DLC?



LA was pretty rough in Fallout 1, run by gangs (and home of the Gun Runners), but that was 120 years ago.

San Fransisco is pretty civilized and populated by Chinese and a crazy religious cult kind of like Scientology.

hardcoe does do one important thing: make stimpaks heal you slowly over time. In FO3 you could use as many as you needed, while paused. And you really never ran out of the dang things as they were easy to find and buy. That's a major (and welcome) change.

I don't see anything in OPs post actually indicate FO3 being harder; I found FO3 much easier because there is loot every 100ft.

Agreed. In Fallout 3 danger came to you, in New Vegas you have to look for trouble.

Easier than Fallout 3? Yes. Enemies are few and far between. As such even difficulty increasing mods don't do much to alleviate it.

Edit: that is for the random exploring part, some quests include combat that's challenge depends on your level and equipment, from Bison Steve being difficult to Dead Wind Cavern being boring.

While in FO3 trouble are closer, most of the time it can be dispatch with ease with a HUNTING RIFLE. Broken Steel creature is an exception, but with tri-beam laser (very common once the overlord shows up), they are just as easy.

Point is none of them can do as much damage as high tier NV mobs, thus I fail to see FO3 to be difficult at all.

Wait, it is harder to snipe in FO3 because the bullets flies up.

lol, yeah and there is a perfectly good scientific explanation for it: the moon's gravitational pull.

Really? Fallout 3 easier than Fallout: New Vegas? I never died in Fallout 3... Not once...

Right....FO3 was harder where all you needed to do was rush to Rivet City to get A3-21's Plasma Rifle and thus win the game.

Edit: If you really wanted to cheese-it up, run through the OA sim at level 1 for T-51b that never needed repair or CSA.