Fallout: New Vegas: Ain't that a cuck in the bed?

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Fallout: New Vegas: Ain't that a cuck in the bed?

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

VocalizePlayerDeath posted:

I have tried to do a NCR playthrough three times but I have never been able to follow through.

I cant stand the NCR they are a bunch of incompetent American military reenacters. Loosely led by a bunch of fat cat pencil pushers a few states back in the pockets of the big Brahmin ranchers and gun manufacturers.

The Legion is the best thing to happen to the Mojave.

The legion enslaves people and treat literally all women as chattel.

They somehow manage to be worse than actual Rome, and are barely held in check by a dying egomaniac as they rape and murder their way across the continent.

There really is no good reason to support the legion unless you like sociopaths or something.

# ¿ May 9, 2012 18:53

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 13:07

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

CommissarMega posted:

Fair enough- but you have to admit, that without the Courier, the Legion would have won the same way the Cong did; demoralizing the troops and the civvies to the point where the war would have been untenable.

And like I said, from a cold, ruthless, inhuman perspective, what the Legion did was desirable. For some people, that sheer ruthlessness is a selling point. The NCR is going about the war all the wrong way- this isn't so much a matter of killing bodies as it is a war of ideas, a war fought in the hearts and minds of people. The NCR can protect all the towns they want, but a single Nipton will have them ousted right quick.

Hell, you might make the argument that Nipton was actually a way to minimize casualties- a straight up fight might end up with many more civillian deaths, whether from outright fighting or uncowed resistance. Put the fear of Caesar into them, however, and you'll take over other towns without a single shot fired or drop of blood spilled. All you need is one big atrocity, something to make people think that they might be next if they don't cooperate.

... And then the vast majority of them are brutally enslaved, the women treated especially harshly while every social construct and convention they have, including the basic building block of the family is thrown out in favor of worshiping Ceasar.

I'd argue the atrocities the Legion commits on populaces it controls might be worse than the rather horrific slaughter they perpetuate. I mean getting crucified lasts for a few hours/days of agony. Living as a slave and being constantly raped can last decades until they decide you've outlived your usefulness/looks and torture or kill you for sport.

Basically, no, the Legion is never going to be the choice that decreases bloodshed/atrocities.

# ¿ May 10, 2012 07:05

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

Wolfsheim posted:

I think this is one of those things that is murky at best and would've benefited from seeing more Legion territory. Not everyone is brutally enslaved to become a rape factory/brainwashed grunt. Dale Barton isn't a member of the Legion or anything, he just has a mutually beneficial trade relationship with them. In several of the Legion endings (with Caesar alive) its mentioned that some are enslaved and others peacefully lorded over, and Primm even stays open for regular business. Cass says they enslave all women, but would they steal away, say, Dale Barton's wife or whatever, or a prominent female trader? We don't really know, and Cass is wrong about a lot of things.

The question that's never answered is who is enslaved and who isn't, and at first I kinda assumed it was any town/group that defies the Legion, but some of the slaves seemed to be from regular towns overrun by the Legion. They also supposedly kill all the men and leave the boys when assimilating a tribe, but with the Great Khans they only kill off the old and infirm, and also the female members become officers' wives? But since when are Legionnaires married? And then there's that one slave boy who's such a sickly little wimp they let him slave it up with his mom and sister.

So yeah, more insight into their modus operandi would shed some light on it, but for now its just a lot of guesswork.

Its the issue of multiple writers rearing its head I'm guessing, and you're right that the Legion does not universally practice those atrocities in game.x

However, it does practice them on a large scale even on towns that didn't really resist as you noted. And the poo poo that Legionaires will say to even the female Courier walking around Ceasar's camp gives some credence to Cass' report, there is a deep and cultural disrespect of women on pretty much every level there.

Regardless, I'd argue the fact that the Legion practices that kind of slavery at all is so incredibly hosed up as to negate any of their positive points.

Edit: Note I'm not defending or supporting the NCR here, just calling out the Legion for being so ridiculously evil and nearly indefensible.

Zore fucked around with this message at 07:50 on May 10, 2012

# ¿ May 10, 2012 07:47

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

Cream-of-Plenty posted:

I'm not trying to be obtuse, but why is it clear that they'll rape them and not that they simply stole them for slaves?

EDIT: What I mean to say is that this is a faction that doesn't like to mince its words in a game that doesn't like to beat around the bush. It seems odd that they would leave a message basically going, "Heh-heh, wink wink, you know what we mean" and then go back to burning down an entire town and nailing people to crosses.

Writers tend to be more circumspect about sex and sexual abuse than maimingand torturing. There's a reason we saw a town being crucified and never had a single person graphically raped on screen, or see anyone left after an obvious rape. Its far more shocking and taboo to put into a video game that's trying to avoid an AO rating.

Non-sexual violence is way more accepted and mainstream in America.

Edit: plus, in the scene you're talking about the point is that horror is always worse when you don't know exactly what happened. They're just 'hiding the monster' to instill greater fear into their enemies. Ominously trailing off conjures all sorts of horrible ideas that "WE TOOK THEM TO RAPE AND MAKE BABIES" doesn't.

Zore fucked around with this message at 06:55 on May 11, 2012

# ¿ May 11, 2012 06:52

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

OldMemes posted:

House might be a bit of a dick, but his plan to rebulid the manufacturing industry would bring alot of money, jobs and other resources into Freeside, and he even says he has no interest in meddling with people's personal freedoms and choices, so I don't get why the Followers seem to dislike him so much? Surely they have similar goals, even if House is more ruthless in his methods? An independant Vegas seems nice, but there's no long term grow, and House isn't looking to control people anyway.

Unless he's Ronald Regan of the future and I just missed the point, or something?

I could never get into Caravan.

House isn't directly looking to control people, no, but he's an incredibly brutal and ruthless capitalist who really doesn't have a problem crushing people who stand in his way. He's probably going to lead the New Vegas area into something akin to the Gilded Age with himself sitting at the top as the de facto ruler of everything people need to live. He wants to accumulate a lot of power, and the Followers tend to be incredibly wary of people who are setting themselves up as autocrats.

# ¿ May 23, 2012 02:53

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

Kashew posted:

I don't know how to dismember.

Hit them with a melee weapon or shoot them until they explode violently after you deplete their health while they are lying ragdoll on the ground. You take off even an arm and they never get back up.

Haven't you ever tried just hitting some of the dead bodies before?

# ¿ May 26, 2012 06:24

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 13:07

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

Yeah, one of my big problems with New Vegas was that I was never able to really find anywhere that was actually fun to explore. The areas all felt really tiny and short, or so actively hostile and obnoxious they required obscene amounts of preparation for virtually no reward (vault filled with the irradiated water I'm looking at you). New Vegas just sort of felt perpetually like I was about to go somewhere cool and then it immediately ended.

Of course after playing Dead Money I'm really loving glad they didn't design larger areas or dungeons into the base game because I'm pretty sure whoever did that actively hated the players.

And while the writing was good the characters always felt so... disengaged and un-interactive which was bitterly disappointing after some of Obsidian's other games like KotOR II which I really loved.

Still a good game, and I dumped a lot of hours into it, but it really felt pretty hit and miss.

# ¿ Jun 9, 2012 06:18

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Fallout: New Vegas: Ain't that a cuck in the bed?