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I loved Fallout 3, and I was ecstatic when I heard about Fallout New Vegas. To be honest, after seeing the teaser trailer, E3 trailer, and various gameplay trailers I can safely say that I am looking forward to this game more than any other games coming out this fall. What made Fallout 3 great was the hard work that went into the perfect balance between both FPS and RPG elements, and since I am primarily a FPS gamer, I have to say Fallout 3 had to be the game I logged the most hours into overall in all of my games.

New features to Fallout New Vegas include a companion wheel, which allows you to take total command over what your AI buddies do, instead of having them be a senseless killing machine. Another new feature that I think is going to be really cool, is an addition of ammunition subtypes, so now you can be specific with what ammo you use for different things, for instance, if you are going up against something like your friendly neighborhood rad-roach, you can use the AP rounds or anti personnel rounds, or if you are going up against an armored mutant, swap to your AP or armor piercing ammunition. The company working on New Vegas has also said that they have modified the game engine to support the changes they have made to the game. More AI at once? Who knows? Another thing I loved about Fallout 3 was the diversity of weapons, from the mini-nuke launcher to the Chinese pistol and everything in between, and it looks like New Vegas is bringing even more to the table. From what I can see in the trailer new weapons include, C4, a 50 caliber sniper rifle, what seems to be a modified laser rifle, an automatic grenade launcher turret thing, a thumper, a M16 or M4, what seems to be a lever action shotgun, and the Colt model 1911. Another new addition is iron sights, which add to the FPS aspect.

Since Las Vegas is far from the bombed areas, the Vegas Strip is relatively untouched. But what lies outside the cities is much more interesting, long desert expanses, a return of the arid wastes, and training camps for soldiers.
There are also new enemies that come with the new environment. From what I can tell, we have some more interesting mutations of bulls or rams or "bams", along with new robot buddies to play with. But be weary, these guys don't look like the pushovers of Fallout 3's security robots, these new robots are what seem to be peace enforcing bots that are armed with stacks of missiles ready to annihilate anyone trying to crash the party. There are also two fighting sides that come into play. There is Caesar’s Legion, which appear to be bandits and pillagers, along with the New California Republic, which seem to be a more organized group of soldiers. Befriending either side can give you different benefits and missions.