Fallout 3 Operation: Anchorage

All three of these shots are taken inside the 'simulation.' One is a shot of the approach to a Chinese base. Another is a shot of a player, donning a winterised version of combat armor looking out over a lake. The third, and most sexy shot, is a "Chinese Stealth Suit". If worn, it will greatly increase the stealth rating of a PC while crouching. It makes for a quite interesting fight when equipped by enemies as well...

A bit of both, but mostly we were always intrigued by the Battle of Anchorage. It's a very compelling bit of Fallout lore, and we figured we could really do it justice.

There definitely is a story here - the Brotherhood Outcasts are trying to acquire advanced military technology, and the only way to open the vault containing these relics is by completing a tactical simulation only the player can enter. The bulk of the gameplay in this DLC is gunplay and stealth, along with some 'team building exercises.'

Since Operation: Anchorage can be entered at anytime, we've made sure that the player will feel challenge no matter what their level is in the main game. And, since it's a simulation, we've taken liberty to add some traditional game elements to it since it's justified in this context - health and ammo replenishing stations, for instance.

The player will be able to choose, from a limited resource pool, what type of team members will accompany him or her on several missions within the simulations. These choices include different troop types like snipers or heavy weapons troops. They'll also be able to make tactical decisions on how to deploy these troops in certain situations. The Chinese Stealth Suit was what I was hinting at last week - it works similar to stealth boy every time you crouch!

"What the hell are we doing?" is much closer to the mark. We opened up to ideas from the whole development team, and Operation: Anchorage is just one of several that rose to the top.