Needless to say you're assuming your headcanon to be factual. Which it isn't. NCR had to have a third party(Courier) inorder to convince Primm to be annexed into the NCR.
Benny should have been the final Boss
- Thread starter NevadaCourier2281
- Start date
NevadaCourier2281
First time out of the vault
No they failed to annex Primm because they had logistical issues. They lacked manpower and ammunition from Mojave Outpost. Mojave Outpost can't give them manpower and ammunition because Nipton Highway is blocked by fireants.
Later in the game, Crocker hires you. It's an ultimatum of "are you with us or against us?" Basically conscription.
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Jogre
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
People have already pointed out that Benny is a bit pathetic really, and so having him as a final boss would indulge in his delusions of himself, so I'm going to go a different route:
The Macguffin you're chasing in the first act of the game in a Fallout game is usually meant to be something just to get you out the door and on a path towards adventure. This is also what the Water Chip is and the G.E.C.K is.
Fallout 1 wouldn't be as fun if it was a game about finding a water chip, Fallout 2 wouldn't be as fun if it was about the player finding the G.E.C.K, and Fallout New Vegas would definitely not be as fun if they dumped the overarching struggle and just made it about finding a guy who shot you.
The Macguffin you're chasing in the first act of the game in a Fallout game is usually meant to be something just to get you out the door and on a path towards adventure. This is also what the Water Chip is and the G.E.C.K is.
Fallout 1 wouldn't be as fun if it was a game about finding a water chip, Fallout 2 wouldn't be as fun if it was about the player finding the G.E.C.K, and Fallout New Vegas would definitely not be as fun if they dumped the overarching struggle and just made it about finding a guy who shot you.
Yeah you're right about this. Even if they didn't have some weaker element to get you motivated initially, the way Benny is presented to us as it is in the game it would be a shitshow for him to be transformed into the entirety of the story.
They could have the character be a bit different, have Vegas work a bit different, change up the storyline and then have Benny be the antagonist all game. But that would make the game very different for the main story and some side quests.
Atomic Postman
Vault Archives Overseer
Except they didn't annex New Vegas. That only occurs in an NCR ending. Mr. House literally tells you this, and it's the entire reason for his base of power.
The NCR has millitary presence in the Mojave and conscription back home for their *citizens*. The USA had conscription for it's citizens in the Vietnam War, they did not forcibly conscript Vietnamese civilians into the US Army.
Norzan
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
You do know that for now that's a non-canon ending? None of the endings in New Vegas have been made the de facto ending of the game. And i doubt they will ever be and i hope they will never be, because discussing which ending is the best is one of the most fascinating things about the game.
About the NCR conscripting the Courier, that is also not canon because the game never says that happens. It can happen if you want to roleplay as a NCR Courier, but that's not something that happens to the Courier factually.
And if you want to bring up the Divide, you can actually deny you delivered the bomb, meaning your Courier cannot be the one that caused the disaster in the Divide if you choose to.
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laclongquan
Boned Hunter of Sister
Without courier help him mr House would have his hands full with vegas family revolt. He wouldnt be able to interfere with that Battle.
Well I could agree with @NevadaCourier2281 that New Vegas could have explored other themes than Van Buren.
Van Buren would have taken place in the year 2253 whereas New Vegas begins 2281. New Vegas could have built on the events planned for Van Buren without stealing themes and characters. Even though Van Buren never saw the light of day they could have regarded it as canon anyway and built New Vegas around Fallout 1, 2 and Van Buren as canon.
Van Buren would have taken place in the year 2253 whereas New Vegas begins 2281. New Vegas could have built on the events planned for Van Buren without stealing themes and characters. Even though Van Buren never saw the light of day they could have regarded it as canon anyway and built New Vegas around Fallout 1, 2 and Van Buren as canon.
I feel like there was something in Van Buren that's fairly contradictory to what happens in the New Vegas we got. But there's also design documents that make New Vegas what Fallout 4 would have been but obviously still not exactly the same as Van Buren never existed.
Can't precisely remember though, it's been awhile since I've read/listened to a reading of those design docs.
Can't precisely remember though, it's been awhile since I've read/listened to a reading of those design docs.
NevadaCourier2281
First time out of the vault
The only difference that I noticed in Van Buren was that the BoS would fight the NCR over Hoover Dam instead of Caesar's Legion. Caesar's Legion would fight The Daughters of Hecate, their female counterpart in Fallout 4.
Sidenote here: people criticize Caesar's Legion for being xenophobic and sexist, but people praise the mythological Amazons for being feminist and empowering. See the double standard hypocrisy here? The Amazons are just as sexist and xenophobic as Ancient Rome was yet they are treated positively? In most most militaires, recruiting lots of females is seen as a bad idea. Humanity sees sending women off to fight wars as equal to extinction, because they are afraid that humanity will not reproduce. Women give birth. Pregnant women in a war? Not a good idea. Which is why men are treated as expendable. Caesar's Legion probably looks at the NCR with humor, thinking they lack troops and have no one left to recruit but women and teenagers.
I got offtopic here. Anyway as for Fallout 1 & 2, they had personal villains. The mutants and their master wanted to slaughter your vault. The Enclave wanted to enslave the NCR, including your village. In Vegas, Benny kills you, then takes the platinum chip to reach his supremacy over Vegas. After you kill him, there are no more personal villains left. Every villain is optional depending on what path you take. This feels as if the stupid Hoover Dam conflict was optional all along. Since that was not part of your job. Your job being delivering the Platinum Chip to Mr. House. Since no ending is canon. This means you can just sit around and not be dragged into a conflict you have no reason to be in. This results in a standstill stalemate I guess.
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So the only reason you would do anything in an RPG is if the game explicitly tells you that someone personally harmed or will harm you or your home? You don't think about your character's motivations, character, background?
I mean... you know you can just not play, right? The game is about your character's decisions and actions and how they change the Mojave and beyond, if you don't wanna do that that's fine.
Atomic Postman
Vault Archives Overseer
New Vegas and Van Buren are very dissimilar in most important ways. There are reimagined plot threads and a handful of characters but the lion's share of content is different.
As someone who has spent a lot more time than he should have researching Van Buren, I can assure you New Vegas is not just VB.
NevadaCourier2281
First time out of the vault
Hoover Dam is V
Hoover Dam is Van Buren. So is Caesar's Legion and Arcade Gannnon.
So what you described is litterally Fallout 3. You are like most "roleplayers," who think that roleplay means "I can be whatever I want." No, that's called "play pretend." "Roleplay" means you actually play a certain role. For example "roleplaying," as a US soldier would make absolutely no sense in Fallout. Therefore you play the role of a Courier. You are a Courier, by default. You can't flipping "roleplay" as the Lone Wanderer. That would make no sense. And you can't say that you are not a Courier, because you are a Courier. You can't pretend to be anyone you want. You can't be a ghoul, a mutant, a deathclaw etc. So stop reusing the word "roleplay." "Roleplay," means you play as one role. One.
If you could "roleplay" as whoever you want then Fallout: New Vegas would not exist. That game would be called "lets pretend." There is no fun in what you say "roleplay." "Oh I am making my own fanfiction in Fallout! Today I slept, trained, hunted deathclaws, drank at the bar, talked to NCR troopers or Legion Troopers or Securitrons, and went to bed. The next day I took a shower, then ate breakfeast. On day 3 on my -insert name- diary I..." That's boring! Why would you roleplay your everyday life if you are living it right now! That"s GTA 4 stupidity of going bowling and watching TV. Hey I roleplay with my homies in GTA 4?
You are a character! Not an actor!
Hoover Dam is Van Buren. So is Caesar's Legion and Arcade Gannnon.
So what you described is litterally Fallout 3. You are like most "roleplayers," who think that roleplay means "I can be whatever I want." No, that's called "play pretend." "Roleplay" means you actually play a certain role. For example "roleplaying," as a US soldier would make absolutely no sense in Fallout. Therefore you play the role of a Courier. You are a Courier, by default. You can't flipping "roleplay" as the Lone Wanderer. That would make no sense. And you can't say that you are not a Courier, because you are a Courier. You can't pretend to be anyone you want. You can't be a ghoul, a mutant, a deathclaw etc. So stop reusing the word "roleplay." "Roleplay," means you play as one role. One.
If you could "roleplay" as whoever you want then Fallout: New Vegas would not exist. That game would be called "lets pretend." There is no fun in what you say "roleplay." "Oh I am making my own fanfiction in Fallout! Today I slept, trained, hunted deathclaws, drank at the bar, talked to NCR troopers or Legion Troopers or Securitrons, and went to bed. The next day I took a shower, then ate breakfeast. On day 3 on my -insert name- diary I..." That's boring! Why would you roleplay your everyday life if you are living it right now! That"s GTA 4 stupidity of going bowling and watching TV. Hey I roleplay with my homies in GTA 4?
You are a character! Not an actor!
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Norzan
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
You play the role of someone that canonically has only delivered one thing and that's the Platinum Chip. Most, if not all, of the backstory of the player character is not set in the stone because the entire point of the game is to come up with the background that can match the four paths the player character can go through (NCR, Legion, Mr. House and Independent). This basically following the same design philosophy for the player character in Fallout 1, where so much of their backstory is up to the player.
The fun of coming up with your backstory (one that makes sense anyway) is to basically pick the dialogue options and branching paths that would suit that character. Basically "what would this character say and do in this situation?". The game has to support different characters to allow this to happen, and the reason why roleplaying is so damn limiting in the Bethesda Fallouts is because those games add too much backstory to your own created character, stifling incredible amounts of creativity.
All of this goes back to Dungeons and Dragons, where coming up with your own character and then make choices based on that character's personality and background is one of the pillars of that whole game.
And yes, that means i can choose to NOT be a NCR citizen because the game allows me to. And no, this game and any game in this genre doesn't need any personal villain. But if i want to argue, Benny made it personal when he tried to kill you.
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NevadaCourier2281
First time out of the vault
I agree with the fact that Bethesda is too linear. Which is why people hated the Frontier (which felt a lot like Fallout 3)
Fact remains you roleplay as a wasteland dweller. You can't roleplay an American citizen for example. Nor can you roleplay as a jazz musician. You roleplay within the boundaries of the game's setting.
The thing that I don't like is when players judge a game by "roleplay." If you want to roleplay NCR training and pretending to fulfill an imaginery mission from a random NPC quest, then you should not be playing the game. The "pretend" aspect is what bugs me. The game itself is not imaginery. You could literally play Gmod and roleplay all you want with your imaginery quests and tasks.
You are not forced to be an NCR citizen yes. What I was saying earlier is that the game did not require you to be a Courier with a platinum chip to engage in the war. The war was not just the Hoover Dam battle. The war encompassed the whole Mojave. Which means you would either be recruited by either faction or witness the war and try to survive, like Fallout 2. This is where the whole Benny, Platinum Chip plot loses it's meaning. This is just a result of the game narratively being an original/Van Buren mess.
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Alphons
National Beholder
Again you're confusing two terms- you describe "larping", while others talk about "roleplaying". @Norzan pretty accurately describes it.
Both Platinum Chip and Benny were never supposed to be major plot points. You can finish the game without ever entering the Tops and confronting Benny/ retrieving the chip. They serve as a way to introduce the PC to some of the main factions and as an initial driving force for PC to explore. Retrieving the chip makes you a valuable asset to House while surviving the confrontation with a head of the Chairmen impresses Caesar.
Hardboiled Android
Vault Fossil
Hoover Dam would have been a location in Van Buren, but virtually the only thing in common between its Van Buren iteration and New Vegas is 1) it's held by NCR 2) the Chinese apparently tried to sabotage it pre-War. That's it.
Caesar's Legion appears, but again in wildly altered form and role.
Arcade Gannon is not from Van Buren, he was a player character made up by Josh Sawyer for a PnP game. He was never intended to appear in that game.
NevadaCourier2281
First time out of the vault
The NCR plotline is fully Van Buren. The Caesar plotline is fully Van Buren. The House and Yes Man plotline is mixed original and Van Buren.
Arcade does appear in Van Buren.
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Van_Buren_characters
Iprovidelittlepianos
Vault Senior Citizen
Considering that the war between the NCR and Caesar’s Legion was not to appear in Van Buren, I find it hard to believe that their respective plot lines are “fully Van Buren”. The Boomers and the Great Khans weren’t in Van Buren. The Kings weren’t in Van Buren. Caesar’s brain tumor wasn’t in Van Buren. All of these elements play a pretty big role in those plot lines.
correct me if I’m wrong of course
Alphons
National Beholder
I think citation is needed with such bold claim.
NCR's involvement in VB is almost non-existent- Presper and his men are ex-NCR and some NCR troops help protecting the Hoover's Dam settlement, which can be nuked at the end.
Legion doesn't even have that- you meet their slaver party in Denver and have the option to free the slaves their captured.
What exactly is "Van Buren" about House and Yes Man?