Factions weren't so black and white? You do realize you're talking about the game with Caesar the slave lord right? Sure the faux military were bland as hell, but they weren't straight up evil like that, and like the casino guy who wanted to live forever. I've finished NV several times, and I seriously have no idea what player agency you're talking about. So I liked the game, but the writing wasn't anything to write home about.
no faction in New Vegas was full of saints. There is no truly good alternative to turn to, unlike FO3. And, yes, while Caesar and his minions were pretty savage that didnt make the terrible things the other groups did any less so.
I mean i guess you played a different game than i did. I played a game that didnt direct me to a good path, didn't force me to kill myself at the end when there were viable alternatives, and i played a game where I could choose to align myself with any faction. or not at all. and what i did regarding those choices had tangible consequences
I chose to not align myself with anyone, btw, and took over the strip myself. the game ended when i, as the player, decided no one was fit for this job but myself. That level of freedom is not something fallout 3 had the nerve to hand me with its own ending.
It's easy to point to the obvious evils in new vegas but, unlike fallout 3, you'll find yourself wasting days of your time trying to find what persons or factions are truly good. that, and the absence of anything other than of binary moral choices in the main thread of a game's narrative, is something bethesda has yet to pull off in any of its recent rpgs.
