I have been having the most annoying issue where NPCs will not play their death sounds when they are in combat with the player character. If I sneak attack them the death sound plays, if they are just sitting there and I shoot them it plays. I have tried reinstalling, using no mods, resetting all sound codecs, using codec packages, different sound cards, etc. It looks like an NPC package issue where once the NPC goes into combat the death sounds are either configured wrong, or not scripted to play.

Has anyone else even run across this issue at all, or have any tips towards fixing it? I am all out of ideas over here.

So, for the lack of any more pressing business, I did some extra testing and research on this issue.

Unlike Fallout 3, not all NPCs will play a "death sound" in Fallout NV. I have confirmed this by doing a fresh install on an entirely different PC with no mods running, and also by watching YouTube footage of other people playing the PC version.

Hopefully I can bring this to the attention of Bethesda/Obsidian for a future fix. I think it really detracts from the immersion, and is unnecessary since the NPC deaths worked in Fallout 3 perfectly.