Help me make a decision: Skyrim, Bioshock Infinite or Fallout: New Vegas?

[fixbsod]

All of them. I say this as someone who does own all of them and have beaten BS 1,2, Infinite as well as FO3 (can't recall if I beat NV tho I definitely get very close), does anyone actually beat Skyrim or just wander? What order you play them in is your choice but keep in mind that FO3, NV and Skyrim are all Bethesda games with FO3 and NV having basically the same engine and Skyrim using a much more advanced one. Also as noted you can jump in and play Bioshock pretty easily, whereas the Bethesda games should be something to savor slowly, wandering around, etc. So I'd say start with BS1 if you aren't looking for a lengthy huge game to get into and if you are I would start with FO3. I noticed that you did not specifically mention FO3, however if you haven't already played it I would pick it up and play before NV. People go back and forth on which to play first but FO3 came out first so there.

But again, the answer is all of the above.

 

[norseamd]

much more advanced one

 

[fixbsod]

much more recent one ? i mean we all know it's bethesda so no matter what buggy as hell ...

 

[mmntech]

much more recent one ? i mean we all know it's bethesda so no matter what buggy as hell ...

Creation Engine isn't too bad. It pretty stable when compared to their previous one, but it's not without its problems. You can find unofficial patches on Nexus Mods that fix a lot of issues. Skyrim has quite a few buggy quests and NPC interactions.

Fallout: New Vegas runs on the older Gamebryo engine. It produced some amazing visuals for the time but was notoriously unstable. Especially on multi-core setups. It's fine with two CPUs but any more and it starts to hiccough. There's also a performance penalty for using SLI or Crossfire. Which isn't a big issue today, but was a major problem when these games came out.

Both these games are best enjoyed with mods. If you get New Vegas, make sure to grab the NMC's texture packs off Nexus Mods. Don't use their installer though. Use FOMM. Nexus Mod Manager can be really buggy and sometimes doesn't install stuff properly.

 

[shortylickens]

I dont know of any other game engine that can run as many scripts and still be smooth.

And on unmodded New Vegas, I didnt have my first crash until 40 hours in. That was BEFORE I knew about the multicore fix.

Skyrim went a long time before crashing (80 hours) and that was WITH lots of mods installed.

 

[Sulaco]

Honestly, I think crashing is somewhat overrated in Bethesda games, specifically Skyrim.

Considering I'm currently running 64 active mods (according to NMM) and will only have a CTD every once in awhile, randomly, I can live with that.

But more importantly, it really doesn't bother me because you can save anywhere, all the time.
Save, quicksave, autosave, anywhere, anytime, for any reason.

On checkpoint save games, its a big deal, because your last checkpoint might be right before a huge, annoying battle. Or 20+ minutes ago.
But at most I'm usually looking at 20 seconds or less of game time in Skyrim to recover from any (infrequent) crashes.

It's a trade-off, sure, but I can deal with it.

 

[norseamd]

Key point on why the Skyrim engine is just downright terrible.

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=356110

 

[werepossum]

Honestly, I think crashing is somewhat overrated in Bethesda games, specifically Skyrim.

Considering I'm currently running 64 active mods (according to NMM) and will only have a CTD every once in awhile, randomly, I can live with that.

But more importantly, it really doesn't bother me because you can save anywhere, all the time.
Save, quicksave, autosave, anywhere, anytime, for any reason.

On checkpoint save games, its a big deal, because your last checkpoint might be right before a huge, annoying battle. Or 20+ minutes ago.
But at most I'm usually looking at 20 seconds or less of game time in Skyrim to recover from any (infrequent) crashes.

It's a trade-off, sure, but I can deal with it.

I have the same experience with the Fallout games, which are by far my favorite. But it takes a lot of work to get them stable, and a LOT of work to make them pretty. And a lot more work to make combat not suck.

Bioshock would be my choice to admire my new video card, although Crysus would be even better.

 

[norseamd]

http://forums.bethsoft.com/topic/13...ptimized-modders-do-better-job-than-bethesda/

 

[mmntech]

I dont know of any other game engine that can run as many scripts and still be smooth.

And on unmodded New Vegas, I didnt have my first crash until 40 hours in. That was BEFORE I knew about the multicore fix.

Skyrim went a long time before crashing (80 hours) and that was WITH lots of mods installed.

Fallout 3 was pretty rough when it first came out. Even the console versions had a lot of stability issues. I'm chocking that up to a lack of RAM. New Vegas wasn't as bad. One thing Obsidian knows how to do is polish a turd.

 

[AHamick]

I'm not sure if it's due to some of the mods I've added to NV but mine keeps crashing randomly and destroys my desire to play it.

 

[shortylickens]

I'm not sure if it's due to some of the mods I've added to NV but mine keeps crashing randomly and destroys my desire to play it.

unclick the mods. Find out if thats the problem.

 

[nightspydk]

I agree the games are quite stable.
It is after the release of daggerfall, probably the most bugged game ever, bethesda got a reputation hmm. It has just stuck since.

 

[Blue_Max]

BTW, watch for Steam sales! You can sometimes pick up Oblivion's games at a steep discount so you could get Skyrim AND FalloutNV for about $20.

Be warned... Fallout games can be a little gory from time to time.

...and don't pick the "bloody mess" perk.

 

[sxr7171]

I haven't played any games in the last couple years, but I bought a GTX760 recently and I want to play something new. The last game I bought was Arkham City. I have the bug again but I can't decide what to play. I loved HL and HL2, Portal, Portal2, Jedi Knight, Call of Duty 1/2/UO. I liked the world exploring and strong story lines. I'm not into gore or horror. I'll probably only buy one game this year. So if you had to pick ONE game from the last 2-3 years what would it be? Skyrim, Bioshock Infinite or Fallout: New Vegas? Others?

Thanks,


Chris

Did you like Fallout 3? Then New Vegas is what you need. Skyrim is amazing also but as said earlier not too much of a story. As you mentioned only one game this year I'd say New Vegas is the most likely to keep you interested followed by Skyrim. Skyrim is great but wow you'll need to get into online calculators etc. to optimize your spells, materials, armor, potions and crafting. So while it's very engaging it's less action driven and more strategy driven.

 

[sxr7171]

I have the same experience with the Fallout games, which are by far my favorite. But it takes a lot of work to get them stable, and a LOT of work to make them pretty. And a lot more work to make combat not suck.

Bioshock would be my choice to admire my new video card, although Crysus would be even better.

I wish there were mod systems where you just paid for a program to handle the modding for you. Maybe you don't get all the options but you get nice stable, standardized mod packages without hassles.

 

[werepossum]

I'm not sure if it's due to some of the mods I've added to NV but mine keeps crashing randomly and destroys my desire to play it.

Seems to vary greatly. Unmodded, my Fallout New Vegas crashed in less than a minute most times, and I don't think I ever got five minutes without a crash before an extensive trial and error of stability mods and unofficial patches. Others have Shorty's experience of hours before a crash. If you don't have that many mods loaded, you can uncheck them with Nexus Mod Manager and hopefully isolate the problem. I always mod methodically, running each version thoroughly before adding the next mod. Even so, at some point I find my game is borked. But if you want, you can copy the whole game folder after each verification, thus unborking simply by copying the working over the non-working. Installing in other than the "Program files" folders seems to have huge stability advantages as well.

I'm going to reload with Mod Organizer this time, it leaves your base game unchanged and builds a real time modded executable. I figure I can mod it for stability, then start adding content and graphics mods with Mod Organizer.

I wish there were mod systems where you just paid for a program to handle the modding for you. Maybe you don't get all the options but you get nice stable, standardized mod packages without hassles.

Yeah, I'd buy such a program if Bethesda licensed it. Probably not if Bethesda wrote it though.