Honest Hearts is the second of the four planned downloadable contents for Obsidians Fallout New Vegas. The premise is simple. The player signs on with a caravan crew to journey to New Canaan, which was mentioned in the core game as being a settlement of Mormons in Utah. En route through Zion National Park, your caravan gets jumped by tribals, setting off a chain of events that lead to the final conflict between warring tribes in the valley, as well as the conflict of ideals between a Mormon Missionary and the infamous Burned Man, aka Joshua Graham, of Ceasars Legion fame.
We never get to see New Canaan, as we learn that the tribe that attacked you wiped it out. It's a fact that made me think that the DLC started too late into the story, and indeed feels like you're arriving onto the scene right before the big climax.
The main storyline clumps a bunch of quests on you, most of which are satisfied with a single action, and a lot of them are merely fetch quests, or going to a location and eliminated a set enemy. It all seems like prep work that would have made a lot more sense if we had arrived earlier in this storyline.
The big moral decision is whether you choose to have a tribe that has been mostly docile and peaceful go to war to defend their land against the evil White Legs tribe (whom we only get to interact with through violent means), or helping them evacuate out of Zion to safety. You're probably not going to be losing sleep over this one like certain other moral dilemmas, but it's nice that it's there to make us feel involved.
Now lets talk about the Burned Man. I will admit, I had something entirely different in my minds eye when I heard he was going to be involved in this one. I was thinking Dark Man, and instead we got King Tut in a Salt Lake City police vest, and a .45 pistol. Not the image I was expecting from the man who makes the leader of Ceasars Legions wet himself in bed at night.
The Burned Man also has a penchant for scripture. After being doused in pitch, set on fire, and dropped down into the Grand Canyon, Joshua Graham found religion, becoming a more...philisophical, if not pious man. It did not, however, make him a peaceful man.
The winners in this DLC count to 2. First is the non-NCR Desert Ranger armor and helmet, so now you can walk the Mojave Wasteland in your trenchcoat and armored badassery and not have to worry about faction incriminations. The second is the various caves that dot Zion. Inside you will often find terminals detailing the trials and tribulations of a lone survivalist living in the valley after the bombs dropped, and how he became involved with the founding of one of the valleys tribes. It's well worth the trekking and cavern diving, just to find another piece of a rather sad, but touching story.
The story of Honest Hearts wins no prizes. It starts too late into it, and it feels like it ends too soon. If anything else, pick it up for the extra toys (there are many), and the Survivalists journals.
Honest Hearts can be procurred on PC and XBOX 360, and PS3's Playstation Network once they've recovered from their recent rashof bad luck.
--Doctor Scraps
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