Like with Fallout 3, the greatest delights aren't in the central storyline but on its periphery. A poet in an unlikely place mumbles aloud his difficulties in finding the right rhymes. During one quest, a robot with a specialized skill and a gut-busting name might offer a service that surely no game character has ever offered before. Some of the most fascinating occurrences are the wittier ones. You investigate the disappearance of a sharp-tongued wife in one town and bring star-crossed lovers together in another. Socialites in formal attire run a casino known for its creative menu choices, and if you play your cards right, you might get to make a menu alteration of your own.

A society of ghouls with pie-in-the-sky aspirations is creepy enough to make you squirm, yet blind devotion to their dreams still inspires empathy. Many of these quests are lengthy, and great dialogue and good voice acting will invite you to learn more about the characters, as well as keep you wondering about what will happen next. Nevertheless, the main tale provides a solid skeleton from which to hang a dumbfounding number of tasks and stand-alone parables. The large-scale combat scenarios are less epic, and the surprises are less dramatic than Fallout 3's mid-game reverie. This latest trip into the desolate American landscape possesses many of the same elements that made Fallout 3 such a successful role-playing game, but its story doesn't boast as many memorable moments. Now Playing: Fallout: New Vegas Video Review

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