Fallout: New Vegas and the Perfect Opening Hour

Jamie tells us about Fallout: New Vegas’ perfect intro.

- Jamie Davies

There’s an art to crafting the perfect videogame opening, and as games get more complex, perfecting that art only gets trickier. Obviously, introductions aren’t important for all games. Nobody’s begging each new Tetris developer to frontload the latest title with an emotional, exposition-filled preamble or anything of that sort. With Tetris, players want to clear lines and they only want to clear lines; anything standing in their way is bound to go down like a staple-filled sponge cake. For a complex RPG like Fallout: New Vegas, however, set in a world of conflicting factions, political turmoil and moral ambiguity, a meaningful opening with a pitch perfect tone is nigh on essential. The question is, does it deliver that? Oh boy, does it ever; it delivers with a radioactive cherry on top. So, as we approach the 10th anniversary of Fallout: New Vegas’ release, let’s explore exactly what makes the game’s opening hour such a masterpiece.

Opening Flourish

One thing is clear from the opening seconds of the game’s introductory cutscene: war may never change but Las Vegas has. As we pull out from the inside of a lifeless casino, we see a rabble of drunken soldiers milling about the famous Vegas strip, followed by a squad of imposing, broad-shouldered robots and a couple of gamblers in shabby suits; not a usual Friday night on the strip, at least in our world.