REVIEW — Fallout 3 Anchorage Addon: Don’t Bother!

I played through practically the entire Anchorage addon for Fallout 3 in under three hours. It’s not worth ten bucks — seriously. Wait until the GOTY edition comes out and get it when it’s included in the bundle. Don’t waste ten bucks worth of MS Points on this silly thing.

PROS:
* Rather awesome plasma sniper rifle with 72dmg afterward (uses one entire MF Cell per shot)
* Rather awesome winterized armor afterward.
* Rather awesome special sword afterward.
* Graphics that are different than the same boring desert wasteland all over again.
* Tons of ammo and health regeneration everywhere.
* Tall cliffs, large caverns, fighting against a tank, a few big explosions, some cloaked enemies.
* One of your squadmates seems almost completely immortal, as if he had one of those crown icons from Oblivion, so he can come in handly.

CONS:
* Not free-roaming. You can only go in very limited areas. Very BIG con! The added size is about as big in areas as perhaps two of the harder Oblivion gates from ES4:Oblivion. You’re not allowed to wander about, you’re pretty much set within either terribly steep cliffs with nowhere to go but the path, or between trench-like cliffs taller than your head that you can’t climb over.
* You don’t get to bring your gear, and start with practically nothing.
* A very confusing moment when teammates start shooting each other/you, seemingly unprovoked.
* Really corny, unrealistic, absurdly simple miniboss at the end.
* Stylistically terrible copypasted use of the Nirnroot sound from Oblivion to locate ammo/health/weaps.
* Can’t open boxes, garbage cans, toolboxes, or anything else.
* Can’t pick items off bodies, they disappear after death.
* Harder enemies hinding in the distance easily outsmarted by novice-level VATS usage.
* Supposed immense treasure trove at the end is a very small, single room and a few shelves of regular junk, most of which you probably already had.
* Forced “fast travel” moments when, as you’re done with a particular task, you’re just blurred out and back into wherever you’re supposed to be instead of letting you walk around and pick up the pieces.
* No need for money, repairing weapons (since you can’t collect them from fallen enemies), lockpicks.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of Fallout 3 so far, despite my initial frustration with many of the non-intuitive aspects of the game — but the Anchorage add-on flat out removes a lot of what makes Fallout 3 great (just while you’re in the simulation) and doesn’t add but perhaps a few nice weapons and maybe five hours tops, to a game I could easily spend 80-100 hours playing without even completing the main quest. Bad Bethesda! Bad!