EDIT: All fixed now, but I spose I'll leave this here for posterity's sake.

Hey guys, just got this game, really excited to dig in. I installed it to my 360 hard drive and got going, first 2 hours had no problems, but then I ran into a big one.

I walk into the saloon to see the scripted confrontation between Trudy and the Powder Ganger (can't remember his name), talk to Trudy about it and she tells me about Ringo, who's in the gas station. I fix her radio while I'm at it and head to the gas station to talk to Ringo. I ask him about the powder ganger, but then I can only ask him "Why are the Powder Ganger's after you?" and that's it. After that, I can only ask what he does around town, about his trading company, and to play caravan. There is no option to help him or inquire further about his situation and I never once got a quest marked down in my Pip-Boy. I simply cannot even start the quest for no discernable reason.

I searched all over the net, tried uninstalling and playing directly from the disc. I've reloaded saves from before I talk to Ringo and before I see the scripted confrontation, used all combination of dialog options with Trudy, the Powder Ganger (except taking over the town) and Ringo but no dice. Nothing opens up a new dialog option with Ringo. My reputation is good with Goodspring. I've tried it in the Vault Suit and Leather Armor. Nothing works.

Is there some hidden prerequisite? I had an encounter with a guy who tricked me into fighting some geckos before (and in doing so ventured beyond the "starting area" border), could that have somehow screwed everything up? I'm open to pretty much any advice or solutions, though I REALLY don't want to start over and have to do that character creation all over again...

Thanks in advance to anyone willing to help me out.

I think you need to talk more with Trudy first

What Mike said.

Nope, that definitely wasn't it. I went through her entire dialog tree, like I explained above.

Anyway, I did end up fixing it by reloading from before I did the gecko encounter. For whatever reason, that fixed the damn thing. An option to say "What if I help Ringo?" that was NOT available before opened up with Trudy, and from there everything was peachy. Weird.