If there's one thing that I'm certain Bethesda does better than Obsidian, it's probably making npc's with a personality. I'm only like 10 hours into the game, but the only characters that I actually enjoyed talking to were Cass, No Bark, and Mr. Fantastic. Every other character seemed to lack a real personality. At least in Fallout 3 we had more memorable characters like 3 Dog, the president, Moriarty, that one chick that does the Wasteland Survival Guide, the ghouls, most of the companions, etc. In New Vegas, it seems like all of the characters existed solely for you to talk to and interact with. Don't get me wrong, I love NV, but I have to say that I find myself skipping most of the boring and predictable dialogue. Does anyone else feel the same way? If not, which characters did you feel had a good personality?

I thought many of the Caesar's Legion characters were memorable. What's-his-name who destroyed Nipton, Darth Va-- uh, Legate Lanius, that crazy guy who takes care of the hounds... I guess the fact that I can't remember most of their names reflects poorly on my assertion that they're memorable, but I liked them!

I don't feel the same way at all. For one, all of the companions have a distinct personality. Deputy Beagle had a good personality, too. All of the unique ghouls (and a certain human) at Repconn were very distinct as well. There are more, but I feel like listing them is wasting my time because it is obvious I don't agree.

Are you kidding?

Seriously, I thought the complete opposite. I used to skip through alot of the dialogue in F3 but am actually listening to it in NV. I really can't believe you think the companions were more interesting in F3, I dont even see how that's possible. I almost never even bothered with companions in F3.

F:NV memorable characters:
Raul
Veronica
Ultra Lux guy (starts with an M)
Benny
Jason (the ghoul leader at repconn)
The Nightkin leader at repconn(worships antler)
Tabbitha
Old Ben
Mr. House
Caesar
The King
Cass
ED-E

F3:
Moria
Father (just b/c the voice over is liam neeson lol)
Rad Roach King
Three Dog
Android guy
Reily
Fawkes
Euology Jones

Lord Ashur (doesn't count b/c its DLC, but he's my favorite fallout character of all)

Benny is cool, companions have way more character in them (maybe not Lily), Officer in charge of different camp have very different perspective, everyone of the remnant (maybe not Orion Moreno )is cool, all Ghouls with names are cool.......

Lack of Personality.

PS 3-Dog does knock Mr New Vegas out cold

Yes I do agree, just one sarcastic comment from Cerberus in Fallout 3 gave it a lot more personality than all the dialogue Victor and Yes Man had managed to do for them.

I feel NV focuses a bit too much on realism.
A world filled with supermutants, ghouls, mutated killer chameleons and talking robots just screams B-Movie to me.
And B Movies are great, except when they take themselves too seriously.
The mutants and ghouls in NV seems to have been shoved to the background, and the focus is on the humans. Which would have been fine if they weren't so darn normal. Normal people are boring.
The NCR in my opinion could have used a bit of Dr. Strangelove, while the Legion could have done with a touch of Monty Python.

There are some truly wacky, memorable characters in NV, don't get me wrong, but they seem to have been shoved to the sideline. And for some reason for me just seem to clash with the realism Obsidian added to the game.

Even some of the more iconic characters seem to suffer from this. The King feels more gimmicky than anything else. A bit more of an over the top personality wouldn't have hurt him I think.

All have different feeling to this and I can said I disagree with ya, greatly. AshJ list a handful but there a lot, lot more, but more in term in factions, location, and quest relation. That include the Boomers, 1st Recon, The whole Great Khans, The factions within New Vegas Casino, Fiends for christ sake, the Ghouls Cult, etc.


And this is not the same with Fallout 3 because that is how I would view FO3 in that sense.

I'm not understanding how being more over-the-top makes him less gimmicky.

Apart from a select few characters from F3, if Fallout 3 has alot of personality, Fallout New Vegas must be an entire factory of personality. :whistling:

Hrm...I feel exactly the opposite, Max. I felt like most of the major characters in FO3 were cliche, predictable, and outside of some notable exceptions, two dimensional. As far as over-the-top goes...I felt Fallout 3 went too far into the realm of all-out whimsy. Yes, Fallout has a goofy side, but in previous games the goofiness is usually tempered with some kind of realistic grounding. IMO characters like Ant-Agonizer and the Machinist are totally out-of-place in the Fallout universe. Then again, Fallout 3 wasn't my first Fallout game, so I already had my own notion of what it is before I played Fallout 3. I could see someone that was introduced to the series with Fallout 3 as having a totally different perspective.

Well, as I said, I've only played less than 10 hours so most every character on your lists i haven't encountered. I do like the factions a lot. However, some of the less important characters seem so dull and normal as one of the above posters said. Every character in Goodsprings, Primm, and Novac (barring No Bark) have literally nothing important to say. Hopefully it won't be like this when i get to Vegas...

I am sorry... but Tabitha is 100x better than 3-dog... (I hate screaming DJ's who are melodramatic.)

There is tons of personality in this game. Granted a lot of them you are only exposed to as parts of quests, but they all do have quite a bit of dialogue and are not afraid to express their opinions.

"Feed a man fish and he will come back for more.....Feed a man a bullet and he won't bother you anymore." or something like that....great stuff!

Here are some of the characters who I can immediately recall in FNV due to their unique personality and/or surrounding story:

The OSI scientist who abuses his staff and is an all-round [censored].
The Brahmin Herder scientist.
Keeley the no-nonsense Ghoul scientist.
Lily the Insane Nightkin Grandmother
An ex-Enclave scientist working with Mutants
Tabitha and Rhonda
Neil
Captain "Hardass" Moore
Talk your ear off Chief Hanlon
The King
Red Lucy of the Talon
Alice McLafferty
The Garret Brother of the Atomic Wrangler and his closet fetishes
Beatrix the Dominatrix Ghoul Cowgirl
Vulpes Inculta (Nipton Butcher)
Legate Lanius
Caesar
Boone
Jason Bright
Haversam
Harland the Ghoul Bodyguard
The traveling doctor who hangs around Novac
Victor
Jane
Mr. House
Benny
Swank (especially for his radio bit)
Mortimer from the Ultra-Luxe
Ted Gunderson
Mr. Fantastic
Raul
Jack & Diane
Jerry the Punk
Pappa Khan
Ten of Spades
Bitter-Root
Ranger Ghost
Sally the Owner of Vault 22

... There are a ton of characters who I can easily remember if not by their personality than their surrounding story which svcked in my interest. Most of the Fallout 3 characters were simply bland compared to the rich history and believability that surrounds FNV characters. Even the Raider gangs ooze personality compared to the generic Fallout 3 raider. Fallout 3 supermutants? Stupid brutes besides Fawkes. In Fallout New Vegas there are several Super Mutants who I remember by name and are genuinely interesting. Even the 2nd Generation mutants became interesting due to the surrounding context of Utopitha whereas Capital Mutants were a typical tale of "Science Gone Eviiiil"

I think back to Fallout 3 and I recall there being a lot of really boring characters. Generic scientists who work on the Water Purifier.. no real story behind them. Brotherhood of Boringly Similar Characters or characters whose only function was to provide something to the player. Seriously, besides Elder Lyons, his daughter, and that guy who worked on Optimus Prime, who in the FO3 Brotherhood really caught your attention as an actual Character? Even comparing the FO3/FNV Brotherhood gate guards the latter obliterates that Paladin who sat outside looking intimidating while being generically rude.

A lot of Fallout 3's characters felt more gimmicky one-trick ponies than anything. They all fell within a narrow spectrum that depended on their group. Neither did any of them feel connected to each other or the wider events taking place in the world. It's like almost everybody in the Capital Wasteland was a part of a sidequest instead of anything real. The majority of main story characters that you did interact with felt more like stepping stones along the plot than people. They were little more than Helpful Allies or Stubborn Villains; characters who would fulfill their function and then be forgotten.

I had a similar feeling when playing Oblivion as well so creating believable characters that fit into a wider game world, or main plot characters with some serious depth, may not be Bethesda's strong suit.

why not play the whole game through before claiming that there are no characters with personality?

Betsy. I rest my case.

LOL YEAH RIGHT the dialogue is way better

I prefer the characters in New Vegas by far. While it's true that some Fallout 3 characters had personality, their characterization was like receiving a hammer to the face. Completely lacking subtlety, completely over-the-top. That's not to say New Vegas doesn't have annoying characters (Fantastic certainly ranks high there if you ask me) but overall they're far more believable.

For example, I always hated the idea of the Kings before the game was released. Thought it was a terrible idea for a faction and fully expected to wanna wipe them out in the game. But the King completely won me over due to good writing. People in the game-world says he's charismatic and lo and behold, they manage to actually make him charismatic for real. If that character had been in Beth's hands...

Well I was pretty much surprised that the King was a somewhat kind, reasonable and a humble person after all. Immediately liked him.
gamesas would make him a generic power hungry, greedy megalomaniac, would-be-boss with a bondage and hair gel fetish.

cause I can't due to DLC error on saved games on XBOX360........