The Vault has some solid roundups for us. First up, a collection of developers quotes from the forums and Formspring. J.E. Sawyer on energy weapons:<blockquote>First, let me get this out of the way: I do not believe that it should be a design goal to make one skill better than another. While it's impossible to perfectly balance all skills, I don't think that Unarmed should be designed with the goal of being inferior to Guns, or that Energy Weapons should be designed with the goal of being inferior to Explosives. I believe the goal should be to make the weapon skills (specifically, in this case) distinct but comparable in overall utility. This means that I think Energy Weapons should not be inherently better than Guns and I don't think that someone who focuses in Unarmed should drop dead in every open fight because it would be realistic to do so.
The goal with Energy Weapons was ultimately to make them "outside the boundaries" of Guns. By that I mean that Laser Weapons would tend to be more accurate, faster firing, and lower DAM (usually, not not always) with higher DPS than its equivalent gun. Conversely, Plasma Weapons would tend to be slower firing and higher DAM. There are some cases where this isn't true, the most notable example being the Cowboy Repeater and Plasma Rifle, both of which are considered "tier 2" weapons for their classes. When balancing some of the Guns toward the end of the project, I did bump the Cowboy Repeater up relative to other Guns but did not bump up the Plasma Rifle, which is an oversight that I regret. The Plasma Rifle does have a much faster reload rate than the Cowboy Repeater, but it should also do a higher base damage. Ultimately I do think that I did tune some of the Energy Weapons too far out of "spec" compared to Guns, mostly at the low and mid-range. I did not intend to make Energy Weapons "bad" and I apologize if that is the perceived result. </blockquote>There's another tidbit roundup with some junk at the edges, review-esque pieces from Planet Fallout and Zero Punctuation. Here's a Filefront piece on homosexuality in New Vegas.<blockquote>Now, you may be asking what the big deal is, and why something so absolutely forgettable and easy to miss is fantastic and worthy of merit. That’s just the point though — Arcade Gannon’s sexuality isn’t a big deal, and that’s how videogames should play it. Not just videogames, in fact, but all media would do well to not make such a big deal out of homosexuality. Rarely is there a gay character whose identity doesn’t completely revolve around their sexuality. Maybe they have a gay crush on the main character, or are tastelessly camp, or have to struggle in a straight world full of homophobia. Often they tick all three of those boxes. In Fallout: New Vegas, gay characters just … are. Which is how most gay people exist in real life, too. If you’ve grown up watching too much television, you may think that gay people are all lisping, mincing crossdressers who constantly talk about how gay they are, and more often than not try to murder a heterosexual best friend who spurned their gay advances. Unfortunately for you, gay people generally aren’t like that in real life. They’re normal, and as boring as straight people are.</blockquote>
The goal with Energy Weapons was ultimately to make them "outside the boundaries" of Guns. By that I mean that Laser Weapons would tend to be more accurate, faster firing, and lower DAM (usually, not not always) with higher DPS than its equivalent gun. Conversely, Plasma Weapons would tend to be slower firing and higher DAM. There are some cases where this isn't true, the most notable example being the Cowboy Repeater and Plasma Rifle, both of which are considered "tier 2" weapons for their classes. When balancing some of the Guns toward the end of the project, I did bump the Cowboy Repeater up relative to other Guns but did not bump up the Plasma Rifle, which is an oversight that I regret. The Plasma Rifle does have a much faster reload rate than the Cowboy Repeater, but it should also do a higher base damage. Ultimately I do think that I did tune some of the Energy Weapons too far out of "spec" compared to Guns, mostly at the low and mid-range. I did not intend to make Energy Weapons "bad" and I apologize if that is the perceived result. </blockquote>There's another tidbit roundup with some junk at the edges, review-esque pieces from Planet Fallout and Zero Punctuation. Here's a Filefront piece on homosexuality in New Vegas.<blockquote>Now, you may be asking what the big deal is, and why something so absolutely forgettable and easy to miss is fantastic and worthy of merit. That’s just the point though — Arcade Gannon’s sexuality isn’t a big deal, and that’s how videogames should play it. Not just videogames, in fact, but all media would do well to not make such a big deal out of homosexuality. Rarely is there a gay character whose identity doesn’t completely revolve around their sexuality. Maybe they have a gay crush on the main character, or are tastelessly camp, or have to struggle in a straight world full of homophobia. Often they tick all three of those boxes. In Fallout: New Vegas, gay characters just … are. Which is how most gay people exist in real life, too. If you’ve grown up watching too much television, you may think that gay people are all lisping, mincing crossdressers who constantly talk about how gay they are, and more often than not try to murder a heterosexual best friend who spurned their gay advances. Unfortunately for you, gay people generally aren’t like that in real life. They’re normal, and as boring as straight people are.</blockquote>
It would also make speed-runs obscenely fast. 