I'll have to say I walked away impressed by this expansion (or you could say my expectations were lower from Dead Money :P). Instead of some kind of bleak, cramped casino area (seriously...how do you manage to make a Fallout game look even more depressing? :|), you've got a huge open canyon to explore, some kick ass weapons (you know me...a huge fan of the .45 8)) and 5 more levels under my belt.

Anyway, the game doesn't quite give a good first impression...when I started the first round, I couldn't figure out who was the enemy, so I basically shot everything in sight...well, I just so happened to accidentally knick someone who was supposed to be my companion and lead me through the quest (nope...at the time, I set off a chain of events that had me whacking everyone I saw, pick up a map, take the exit and fail the whole quest :|). I actually had to read the forums to make sure the thing wasn't bugged :lol:.

Still, Honest Hearts was a blast to play. It has the more primitive vibe going on (instead of people trying to rebuild cities to the best of their abilities, you're looking at tribal wars, and reclaiming turfs from the enemy). The best part is that after you beat the quest, you've got a box full of neat goodies, and able to travel back and forth between Vegas and Utah (that is, not having to resort to mods this time :P). All in all, the worst I can say about the game is that since there's so many canyons, the maps basically look like a maze...when you're ordered to pick up something specific, god knows which path you're supposed to take to get there, much less how to even find a path to get up to the higher places. I'm officially looking foward to more DLC for New Vegas, and actually not quite so dreadful over what I'll be blowing ten bucks on this time. Personally, I wouldn't mind another expansion that gave off the Point Lookout vibe (the creepy Hills Have Eyes kind of atmosphere, a massive place to explore that's full of variety, and enemies that just had me saying, WTF?). I was kind of glad the new expansion strayed away from the Vegas experience, because it gave off the impression that it can be as varied as the Fallout 3 ones were (say what you want about them, but exploring an alien ship, a VR war in China, getting chills by wandering in Louisianna, and raising anarchy in a grungy Pittsburg was just full of imagination here). At least Honest Hearts gives off that glimmer of hope that Bethesda pays attention to what we want and dread in our games, and the next expansion would offer the same kind of experience :D.