Obsidian's New Fallout Game Is Not Officially New Vegas 2, and Calling It That Could Sell It Short

Obsidian is making another Fallout game. Bethesda has confirmed the two studios are working together, and the director of Fallout New Vegas is reportedly leading the project. If you have spent the last 16 years asking for New Vegas 2, like I have, that sounds like the announcement you have been waiting for. But I want to pump the brakes for one second.

For me, the most interesting question here is not whether they are going back to the Strip. It is whether the people who gave us New Vegas can still make a Fallout game where your decisions can actually scare you. There is a reason I am asking that. This project is happening in the middle of Xbox layoffs, with canceled games and a massive reshuffling of its studios. Look at what is happening with Halo; that is just one example. So yes, I am excited, but I am also keeping a very close eye on this.

Here is what we actually know about Obsidian's new Fallout project

Bethesda says Obsidian is working with it on a new Fallout project. Reporting says Josh Sawyer, who directed New Vegas, is leading this game. Then, just days ago, word came that Obsidian would be brought closer to Bethesda as part of the Xbox studio reorganization.

That is a lot more substantial than somebody finding a number two hidden in a teaser image. There is a new Fallout project, and the studio behind New Vegas is actively involved. It is possible this game could get here before Fallout 5.

Nobody has announced Fallout New Vegas 2

Here is what we do not know: the title, the setting, the size of the game, the release window, and whether it has anything to do with the story of New Vegas at all. Nobody has announced Fallout New Vegas 2. I know that is going to disappoint a lot of people, but honestly, I think calling it that right now may sell the opportunity short, because what made New Vegas special was never just Vegas.

I love the Mojave. I love the Strip, the NCR, Caesar's Legion, Mr. House, all of it. I love walking into a conversation where every person sounds absolutely convinced they are the only adult left in the wasteland. But the thing that kept me coming back was that the game let me decide who deserved to win, and then it made me live with the fact that my choice hurt somebody else. Not probably. It definitely did.

You could spend hours helping a faction learn what it really stood for and suddenly wonder whether you had been doing the wrong thing the entire time. You were not just collecting quest rewards until a final cutscene told you what kind of person you were. The quests kept asking you to show them what kind of person you were.

What I want from Obsidian's next Fallout is consequences that stick

Give me a place with competing ideas about how people should rebuild. Give me factions I actually want to join and am not forced to join, then show me the cost of joining. If I betray somebody, let that relationship stay broken. If I put the wrong people in charge, let me see the fallout, no pun intended, and the consequences in the world. "Don't hand me four dialogue options that all lead to the same hallway."

And please, please let me talk my way out of a disaster or talk my way into one. Half the fun of New Vegas was building a character whose intelligence, charm, or absolute lack of either could change a situation. I think a Fallout RPG should let the guy with a rifle, the scientist and the smooth talking idiot experience different versions of the same problem.

A literal Mojave sequel has an ending problem

The obvious pitch is to return to the Mojave. I get it. I would click on that trailer immediately, and I would preorder that game immediately. But a literal sequel creates a big problem if you ask me: whose ending are we continuing? New Vegas gave players radically different ways to decide the region's future. The moment a sequel declares one of those endings canon, a lot of players are going to feel like their Courier's story got erased, because it would be.

You could work around it, I guess. Set it far enough in the future that history has become very messy, and let different characters tell different stories about what happened at Hoover Dam. That would actually be kind of cool. But I do not think Obsidian really needs Nevada to make this work this time. Put us somewhere new and give that place the same level of care. Make its politics, settlements and weird local grudges interesting enough that five years later we are asking for a sequel to that one.

This is not Fallout 5, and a tighter game would suit me fine

There is also the question of what this project actually is. A lot of people are imagining a gigantic, fully open world RPG on the scale of the next mainline Fallout. This is not Fallout 5. Maybe it will be huge, but Bethesda has only called it a new Fallout project, which is kind of iffy. We have not seen gameplay or even a formal reveal.

I would rather have a tighter game packed with meaningful quests than a massive map full of locations I forget 10 minutes after leaving them. If this is going to be the bridge to Fallout 5, I would like it to be a tighter, maybe smaller game. I think of it in the vein of the God of War game that bridges the lore into God of War 6. I know some people do not like it or are not excited about it, but I am truly excited about it, and I think that is exactly what could be done here.

Obsidian does not have to make a substitute for Bethesda's own games

The comparison to Bethesda is interesting, too. Bethesda is building Fallout 5 and The Elder Scrolls 6, with The Elder Scrolls 6 being its main development focus right now. Obsidian does not have to make a substitute for Fallout 5. It can make a Fallout game with its own priorities.

Bethesda is incredible at making you see a ruined building on the horizon and decide your entire afternoon is going to belong to that building. Obsidian's opportunity is to make the people inside it so complicated that you are still thinking about your choices after you leave. You are in the shower the next day thinking about your choices.

Layoffs and a canceled Avowed sequel make this hard to celebrate

There is a part of this story that makes it harder to sit here and celebrate. According to reporting on the Xbox changes, Obsidian canceled multiple projects, including a planned Avowed sequel, as it shifted toward Fallout. The studio has also been hit hard by layoffs. Those are not small details to bury under excitement about a Ranger helmet. Experienced developers make these games. You cannot cut people, change the plan, put a famous franchise on the calendar and assume the magic is going to take care of itself. It does not work that way.

I am glad Obsidian gets another shot at Fallout. I am. I hate that the route there involved people losing their jobs and other projects getting canceled. I think it is fair to ask whether Xbox is giving the team the time and freedom to build something special, or whether it looked at the popularity of the Fallout TV show and decided it needed another project as quickly as possible. Those are two very different games. One would be made by people with the room to argue over a quest for weeks, rewrite a faction so its motivations make sense, and let you do something they did not initially expect. The other would have a familiar logo, a few recognizable factions, and somebody in a meeting asking whether a moment can look more like New Vegas. You could absolutely bring back a Ranger helmet, but "the helmet isn't the reason people still argue about New Vegas 16 years later."

Josh Sawyer being attached matters, but it is not a guarantee

Josh Sawyer being attached is important to me, but it is also not a guarantee. Games this size are made by big teams. I want to see who is writing it, how the quests work, how much freedom the player has, and whether Bethesda and Xbox let Obsidian actually take creative swings. "A director's name, that's a good start, but the game has to earn the rest."

So is this New Vegas 2? Officially, it is not, and I would be careful with anybody telling you otherwise. It could revisit the Mojave. It could take place somewhere completely different. It could even end up being a smaller Fallout experience than a lot of people think, which I am actually okay with. We just have not been told.

This deserves excitement, and more than nostalgia

Still, this is the closest thing to New Vegas 2 we have seen in years: Obsidian making Fallout again, reportedly with Sawyer in charge, while Bethesda works on the next mainline game. That is something we can get excited about, and it is also worth demanding more than nostalgia from.

I do not need the same casino. I do not need a familiar faction walking into frame so I can point at the screen. Give me a wasteland where I can believe three different people, choose one, and spend the next 20 hours wondering whether I made a good choice or a terrible mistake. That is the Fallout game I want and am waiting for.

Would you rather go back to New Vegas or have Obsidian build a completely new corner of the wasteland, and if they do return to the Mojave, whose ending should they follow?