Let's Go Sunnin'....

With Nevada Skies - Weather Effects BETA, you had better grab a radiation suit and a pair of shades for the sunrise.

Nevada Skies adds 60 unique weather effects that cycle, new landscape textures and light conditions, rain and snow storms with thunder and lighting, sand and, my personal favorite, RADstorms, and an overall improvement to the New Vegas landscape.

For an example of what I'm talking about the general improvements to the Mojave landscape, here's a screenshot of the weather during a certain quest.

That being said, there's also times when fog or sandstorms will move in. The mod lowers NPC accuracy (which can be turned off in the menu system if you'd like) to adjust for this. This mechanic makes it a lot more fun to wander the Mojave or storm a Legion encampment during a heavy sandstorm.

Side-by-Side Comparison of the Night Sky
(Left with Nevada Skies Enabled, Right Without It.)

So go out there, download Nevada Skies, and enjoy your new weather! And like I said earlier, make sure you bring more than just a pair of shades if you fully want to enjoy this mod!

The Best Fallout: New Vegas Mods - Week 1

Okay folks, Mr. Vegas here filling in for Mr. Vegas who usually fills in for Mr. Vegas. Let's talk about something we're all anxiously waiting for: Fallout: New Vegas mods. While there's no comprehensive difficulty changer as of yet, there are a number of graphical and game-enhancing mods available right now. That's right, not even one week's passed since the release of Fallout: New Vegas and there are already 537 files hosted over at the New Vegas Nexus. So let's get down to the nitty-gritty and talk about what mods you should be playing Fallout: New Vegas with right now!

Oh, and by the way, don't have Fallout: New Vegas yet? Then you're definitely missing out, particularly if you loved or even just liked Fallout 3. You can grab a copy (cheaper than most places, to boot) on PC here, here on PS3, or on the 360 here. Keep in mind that only the PC and PS3 versions can have mods installed while 360 owners will get exclusive DLC later on.

So without any further ado, onward to our feature presentation! (And this time in descending order!)

1. d3d9 awesome perf fix - Right now, even if you ignore every other item on this list, you have to get this one. It fixes a ton of the performance issues most people have been having with Fallout: New Vegas.

Now, I'm not going to lie, I don't really know how this works. But with that being said, I will testify that it does work. Test it out for yourself, see if it works or not. I know that I gained 16+ FPS when I used it (keep in mind this was on Ultra with a rig built for gaming) and that's why I say there's more to gain than to lose in this case!

2. MTUI - This changes the default UI so that it looks better on resolutions set at 1024x768 and above. It scales up the fonts, makes the trader barter UIs a ton more friendly, and adds a bunch of other stuff. If you're like me, this is a definite must, especially if you don't feel like scrolling through all the items listed in Misc and Aid on your Pipboy 8 at a time.

3. URWL for New Vegas - Realistic Lighting and Color - This is what I consider the "Fellout" for Fallout: New Vegas. I don't know why it is that green seems to be all the rage in Bethesda's Fallouts, but maybe that's just because I don't care for it too much. Either way, thsi is worth playing with, even if it's to add a bit of color (or in this case, take away) to the environment.

4. CONELRAD 640-1240 - Civil Defense Radio - I know Mr. Vegas sometimes sounds like a broken record about the traders not being seen in Nipton and I know you're probably sick and tired of hearing Johnny Guitar, Johnny. So what can you do about it? Add a new radio station that fits the atmosphere of New Vegas!

"What's it add?" you might ask. Well, let's take a look:

2 hours, 20 minutes of Music across 55 tracks
22 minutes of PSAs & Civil Defense
Custom station host dialogue.

In other words, it gives some much-needed relief from the six songs that seem to be present in Fallout: New Vegas' radio stations by default so that Johnny won't be playing that guitar again and again and.. again.

5. FOOK for New Vegas - While it's not a must-have yet considering there's barely any content for it, you know ti will be soon. This is a port of FOOK for Fallout 3 to Fallout: New Vegas, by the same team, so you know it'll be good.

6. Better Binoculars - This isn't a must-have, but if you're like me and wish the binoculars had a bit of zoom, then you need this mod. (To be frank, I threw mine away after I got my first sniper rifle considering they both have the same default zoom.)

Now you can spot those Gecko's from much farther away as it should be!

The 5 Best Fallout 3 Graphics Mods

For a game that came out in October 2008, Fallout 3 still looks as beautiful as the day it was released (with a little help, of course.)

Below are my detailed picks for the five "must have" graphics mods, and as to this date, the 5 best Fallout 3 graphical mods.

5. Fallout 3 Re-Animated - I'll be frank, sometimes the default Fallout 3 animations just look whacky. This mod, developed by a professional animator as a project of his spare time, aims to correct that. In the 80 animations this Fallout 3 mod includes, every one of them makes the game look tremendously more natural.

The original "idle aiming" animation from Fallout 3 is on the left and the altered version is ont eh right. Needless to say, one looks much more natural.

4. Fellout - This mod removes the "green" light effect apparent in almost every part of the environment in Fallout 3. It lets the actual environment shine through clearly and seem much, much more realistic than before. It also allows for the environment to display more contrast, which gives a better overall graphics experience.

Pictured on the left is Megaton without Fellout installed and on the right with Fellout installed.

3. Enhanced Weather - Rain not "rainy" enough? Fog not "foggy" enough? This mod attempts to make the weather in Fallout 3 looks realistic. For example, your field of vision's outer reaches become foggy in a heavy rainstorm and likewise with a snowstorm.

Not only does it make these graphical changes, it also makes weather progressive. Instead of weather abruptly stopping, it first becomes cloudy and grey, with some thunder roaring before the rain cuts loose.

As would be the case in a real case of hard rain, your character's field of vision becomes limited when the storm finally hits.

2. EVE (Energy Visuals Enhanced) - EVE adds a whole new level to energy visuals. You know that energy pistol you picked up during Moira's quest int he supermarket? Now you have a reason to have fun using it. If I were to make a simplified (and potentially dangerous analogy), EVE upgrades Fallout 3's default energy visuals like the upgrade in visual effects that the 2009 Star Trek film provided for the 1966 Star Trek series without the horrendous change in story.

Not only do the lines produced by energy weapons look better, a "misty glow" is added to hit objects making for an even more entertaining sight.

1. NMCs_Texture_Pack_for_FO3 - NMC, the author of this mod, took a year to remake Fallout 3's textures by hand. This is why by most, inclusive of myself, this is considered one of the best texture mods to date. The textures included in this pack are 400% the size of the original Fallout 3 textures. The difference is not only in the resolution of the textures, but in the details.

For example, many "effect" textures, such as tree damage, paint flakes from bricks, and even junk piles have been completely redone so that they are in fact more detailed and more interesting to look at.

Many textures, trees included, take on an entire new life of their own with NMC's Texture Pack.

That's it; the five best Fallout 3 graphics mods. Some mods require FOSE and a Fallout 3 memory boosting program (such as FO3 Ram Boost) to be installed to work properly. While having your settings on maximum with all of these mods installed and simultaneously activated requires a top-of-the-line PC, there are also some low-hi-res options available in to mods like NMC's texture packs for medium-end PCs.

In closing, I have but one thing to say: Fallout 3, with mods, can be equatable to Crysis a few years back in terms of being top-of-the-line graphics. Installing just graphics mods can make the entire Fallout 3 playthrough experience revived in terms of fun for anyone who has played every possible class and back-story combination!