Line #7 TearJerker/FalloutNewVegas


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/vera_let_go.png]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:The resting place of Vera Keyes. Note the Med-X syringes around her corpse.]]
3	'''As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked [[Administrivia/SpoilersOff as per policy.]] Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned.'''
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6	[[foldercontrol]]
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8	[[folder:Main Game]]
9	* Vault 11. If you didn't hate Vault-Tec and the Enclave already, you [[MoralEventHorizon will now.]]
10	** The Automated Solution Response is particularly haunting, especially considering how long it took to get there.
11	** To sum it up, the vault was set up so that the automated system within the vault would order the death of a member of the vault after one year, and the entire vault population would be exterminated if the people refused to send one of their own to their deaths in a chamber below the Overseer's office. After the first Overseer was "democratically elected" as the first sacrifice (read: as the bearer of bad news, the other inhabitants ''forced'' him to go out of spite), the Overseer was elected every year by the vault's citizens, and that overseer would be the sacrifice. For ''decades'', [[HumansAreBastards the people of Vault 11 callously voted for which member of their vault to kill, and some people found ways of manipulating the voting process to ensure that they would never be voted]]. This changed when a woman whose husband had made enemies with a corrupt voting party was forced to [[SexualExtortion have sex with all of the party's members]] or else her husband would be on the next ballot. Then, they betrayed the agreement and placed him on the ballot anyway. She decided that enough was enough and began [[SerialKiller murdering members of the offending party]], killing as many as she could knowing she would be caught all the while. Now the hands-down favorite to be elected to Overseer, she promptly changed the process so that the sacrifice should be determined by a random number generator instead of the now corrupt voting system (she could do this, being the Overseer). Because everyone now had an equal chance of being selected for death, some people didn't take it too well and a massive battle broke out. The few survivors, [[EverybodysDeadDave five out of literally hundreds]], fled to the chamber below the Overseer's office, to inform the vault system that they just didn't care anymore and that no-one would be sacrificed anymore. Here's the kicker: the vault was [[ILied lying]] about killing everyone in the vault if they refused to take part in the voting process. If the people of Vault 11 defiantly stood up and refused to sacrifice one of their own to save their own hides, they would have actually been ''rewarded'' for their "commitment to human life". [[SecretTestOfCharacter The whole thing was a test to see where the average person stood]] on the SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism, with the desired outcome by the system being to prove that RousseauWasRight. [[RousseauWasWrong And they failed.]] '''[[RousseauWasWrong Hard]]'''. [[FridgeHorror This means that the hundreds of people sacrificed "for the good of the vault" actually]] [[SenselessSacrifice all died for nothing.]] The five remaining survivors became suicidal upon the realization of [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone what they'd done]] and with the exception of one (who escaped into the wasteland), [[ShootTheShaggyDog they all killed themselves]].
12	** Though by counting the number of skeletons in the killing chamber, the vault test only went on for 17 years before the revolt, which arguably makes things ''worse''. 17 people went to their deaths to save the hundreds in the Vault only for their sacrifice to not only be absolutely pointless but for those hundreds to kill each other until there were only five left.
13	** Another thing of note is the fact that no matter how hard you look, you can't find the survivor. His code exists in the game, but it seems that he was DummiedOut at some point, meaning that either he left the Mojave to get as far away from Vault 11 as he could or that he was unprepared for the Wasteland and ''died out there.'' (Though if the Vault really lasted only 17 years, rather than the 204 between the Great War and the start of New Vegas, he’d have died of old age anyway, unless he became a Ghoul or Super Mutant.)
14	* There's another Vault, Number 34, where the people inside were apparently given similar orders to the one in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'', namely, not to leave the vault, ''ever'', even if it means you'll die horrible, horrible deaths if you don't. This becomes a serious problem due to food shortages causing a need for "population control", leading to a full blown revolution (thanks to the fully stocked armory inside the Vault, it's an extremely violent one, too, complete with bombings and everything) that ends up causing a reactor leak, killing some residents and turning many others into feral ghouls. The thing is, you encounter someone (middle aged) who left the vault a few years ago for personal reasons, and while in the vault, you get a message from someone trapped inside over the computer who needs to have access transferred to him in order to save his family. This means that these events happened weeks, or even just days, before the events of the game began. The irony is, just outside of the Vault were plenty of Golden Geckos, just primed and waiting to be shot and killed for dinner, which would be simplicity itself, given how heavily armed they all were (and they had plenty of Rad-X and Rad Away in stock to deal with the radiation). If they had been allowed to leave, they'd have found plenty of people to trade with for food. Heck, the ultimate irony is that their vault is practically directly underneath a sharecropper farm! There was plentiful food all around them except inside the vault that they could never leave.
15	** Chris Haversam, the man who walked out of the vault mentioned above, is a case himself. He was assigned to work on the vault's reactor, and became convinced he'd become a ghoul after his hair fell out. Thing is, he's a normal human being with a husky voice and male-pattern baldness. The REPCONN Ghouls tried to convince him he's human, but he was having none of it, so they gave up and kept him around for his technical skills, planning to abandon him at the rocket launch because humans can't survive the radiation at the launch site. You can tell him the truth and either help him sabotage the rocket or talk him into trying life as a human again. Either way, his reaction is understandably distressed.
16	--->"Oh, God! You're telling the truth, aren't you?!? They lied to me! ''For two years, they lied to me!''"
17	* In the quest ''Return to Sender'', if you decide to turn in Chief Hanlon for trying to sabotage NCR's defenses at Hoover Dam he gives a speech over the radio confessing that he had done something wrong and [[DrivenToSuicide shoots himself]].
18	-->Rangers, this is the Chief. I know I can ramble on sometimes, but I need you to listen close for the next minute or so. I got some bad news. I messed up, made a mistake. I thought I could help us get out of here, but it didn't work out. Rangers get injured all the time, it's part of the job. But if you lose a few fingers, get a bad break, that's it. You step down. We rely on each other too much to let our infirmities become a liability. A ranger knows when it's time. Only I didn't. Somewhere along the way, something broke inside me. I couldn't find us a way out of this desert. I wrestled with it, and it took me down a dark road. I wish I could explain it to you. The old chief's finally at a loss for words. Send me all the Legion you can; I'll be waiting for them.
19	* It's a tradition for every NCR soldier to write their own "if you get this, I'm dead" letter to their family and friends. Many of them are quite tragic. For example:
20	-->''Letter of a Random NCR solider'': "Dear Sister, they're sending me into the no-man's land tomorrow, and by the time you read this, I'll be dead. That means that once again you were right and I was wrong. Ever since we were kids, I was always a thorn in your side, always doing everything you told me not to. Now, as I am about to go off to my death, I realize you were only looking out for me all these years. I am so sorry. I can only hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me. Kevin"
21	** "For Carla." Especially traumatizing if you know the backstory. For those that were lucky enough to not find the letter yourselves, here's what was written on it:
22	-->''Boone's letter to his wife:'' "Carla, If you’re reading this, then you know. Sorry. Wanted to make it back home to you. The pension won’t be much but it should help you and the baby get by. Want you to remarry when you meet the right person. Don’t want you to have to be on your own. Not sure the right way to say how I feel about you. Think you know already, though. Always seemed like you knew what I meant, maybe better than I did. Wish I was there with you now. There are things I couldn’t tell you. Tried. Whatever you learn over time about my service in the NCR, hope you can forgive me. Lastly, know you were against it, but if it’s a girl, want her to be named after her mother. Know it’s playing dirty to win the argument this way, but too bad. It’s worth it. Craig"
23	** There's also a NCR soldier who tells his little brother to avenge him or he'll haunt him for life. You'll find this letter on a corpse of a dead NCR trooper who's entire unit got wiped out.
24	-->'''To my brothers, If you're reading this, then I was probably killed by some slimy Legion scum who got lucky. Hopefully the bastard is dead and six feet under, but if not, you better avenge me or I will haunt you until the day you die. Quincy p.s. Kill all the Legion dogs that I wasn't able to."
25	* The situation Camp [[MeaningfulName Forlorn Hope]] is in is riddled with this. Morale is absurdly low at this camp, due to it being a frontline location that doesn't receive anywhere near the resources it needs to properly combat the Legion. As a result, there's theft, death, and misery afflicting the camp.
26	** Before a patch removed them, there were ''maimed'' NCR troopers laid near or on top of landmines in the No-Man's Land between Forlorn Hope and Nelson. The troopers are barely conscious, missing at least one arm and leg, and begging to be [[MercyKill put out of their misery]].
27	* Raul Tejada's backstory. In the 200+ years since the Great War, he was forced to watch everyone that he loved or cared about die horribly around him while he was unable to do anything about it. First, his entire family, save for his younger sister, were burned to death in their family ranch by hostile refugees who even put a bounty on Raul's head when he retaliated against them. Then, his sister was tortured to death by a group of raiders while trying to scavenge for medicine to help her brother who was suffering from radiation poisoning. Finally, decades after that, the ReplacementGoldfish for his sister was killed by ''another'' group of raiders before he could rescue her. By the time you meet him as a slave of the crazed nightkin Tabitha at Black Mountain, he's totally disillusioned with life.
28	** Becomes even worse if you don't complete his companion quest before the end of the game (something likely to happen due to certain [=NPCs=] involved with it being notoriously buggy). Never having the epiphany that traveling with the Courier gave him, Raul continued to wander aimlessly in the wasteland, never finding peace nor purpose in his super-old age.
29	* Veronica's quest, where she tries to convince her Elder to open the Brotherhood to the outside world. You just know she won't convince poor stubborn-but-well-meaning Elder [=McNamara=] (and has even less of a chance to convince Hardin), but it's heartbreaking to listen to her get all [[SarcasmFailure quiet and desperate]] as she tries.
30	-->'''Veronica:''' We'll die out.
31	-->'''[=McNamara=]:''' [sadly] [[WhamLine I know.]]
32	* Craig Boone's [[ColdSniper stoicism and cold nature]] tends to make his own trauma all the more wrenching. Even his quest titles, "One For My Baby" and "I Forgot to Remember to Forget", hint at how his past often bleeds through his stoicism.
33	** Boone sounds genuinely sad when you finally get him to open up, which makes it that much worse. He tries to hide it, but you can hear it in his voice.
34	** Telling Boone to go back to Novac instead of the Lucky 38 can be depressing. He says something to the lines of "Well, I guess I'll go there, try to figure out what to do with myself. See you around." Especially bad if you've ever been in his room and seen all the drugs and empty whiskey bottles he has lying around.
35	** A couple of Boone's [[http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout:_New_Vegas_endings#Slide_22:_Craig_Boone endings]] are quite sad as well, particularly NCR Victory + Vengeful Boone.
36	** There are two ways to approach Bitter Springs: from the front, and through the canyon the 1st Recon snipers were guarding during the Bitter Springs Massacre. Approach from the latter path during the final leg of Boone's companion quest, and Boone gets a good look at what's become of that passage since the massacre...and you can hear the pain in his voice when he comments.
37	---> '''Boone:''' Christ. They put the ''graveyard'' here.
38	* If you didn't already hate Cook-Cook for his rapist tendencies, pyromania, slaving, and cannibalism, maybe the way [[FriendlySniper Ten-Of-Spades]] nearly ''breaks down'' over the way he and [[ButchLesbian Betsy]][[note]]who was raped as a result...[[/note]] got ambushed:
39	--> '''Ten-Of-Spades:''' She trusts her life to the newbie, and [[ItsAllMyFault I let her get raped]] by that... [[VerbalTic p-p-piece]] of shit...
40	* Once you get past the fact that Lily's a Nightkin prone to fits of psychotic rage, she's just a kindly grandmother who was dunked in a vat of the FEV. The fact that she's delusional and is constantly talking to you like you're her grandchild just reminds you that she's never gonna see her real grandchildren again. If you're in Novac with her, she may say "Look pumpkin! A dinosaur! Do you want to ride the dinosaur?" Now picture that as a nice old woman saying it to her young grandchildren.
41	** She doesn't get any happy [[http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout:_New_Vegas_endings#Lillian_Marie_Bowen endings]], either. When either completely forgetting her grandchildren or going on a futile search for them are the best ones, you have yourself a certified [[TheWoobie Woobie]].
42	** The worst thing is that one of her possible endings has a Hope Spot moment, being that if the Courier recommends that she drink her full dose of medicine, even if it makes her forget about her grandchildren. Lily has faith that she still has the holotapes to remember them, only for the epilogue to reveal that she threw away the holotapes.
43	** The plight of the Nightkin in general. Normal people taken against their will and turned into schizophrenic monsters. By the time of the game, there are only a few who have some measure of control of their faculties. Even then, they're mentally broken down, replacing the commands of the Master with the voices in their heads.
44	* Around Nipton, you may encounter a couple named Jacklyn and Tomas in a gunfight. If Jacklyn survives and you talk to her, you might mention the Sunset Sarsaparilla bottle caps. She probably won't know what you're talking about. So, just leave her to her business. And then proceed to have her open fire on you. After dealing with her, go to Tomas's body and read the diary he's been keeping. Things were apparently looking up for him after he met this Jacklyn girl. Then she found out he had some of the Sarsaparilla caps...
45	** Fortunately, you can intervene and save Tomas. He's unhinged and a little sad that this happened, but at least an innocent man's alive.
46	** To make things worse, it's very easy to end up killing Tomas in your first playthrough. When you see the gun fight, Jacklyn is screaming for help while Tomas doesn't say anything, which probably will make you think that he's the one who started shooting and proceed to kill him to save Jacklyn. It's only after some karma loss and Jackyln opening fire against the Courier that you realize you picked the wrong side of the conflict...
47	* Speaking of Nipton, the fate of the town is awful, even if the people weren’t good. They sold each other out. The sex, gambling and drugs could someday have been abandoned once they got wealthy enough to start a proper town, maybe even like Goodsprings. It’s possible they would have become better and started to make a new civilization...but because of their vices and the Legion showing up, all that potential is gone. All that’s left is a man who was crippled (and who can be made to overdose on Med-X) and a Powder Ganger who’s all on his own after the “lottery”.
48	* During the quest "Someone to Watch Over Me," you're hired by Mrs. Hostetler to spy on her daughter because she's hanging out with a rough crowd. You find out she's planning to rob her mother and run away because she wants more than a life as a farmer. If you manage to talk her down, you can convince her to run away and never return. If you choose to not involve yourself in it, you stand in the sidelines and watch her ''gun down her own mother.'' Her mother falls down after a few shots, but she doesn't stop firing until her clip empties.
49	--> [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone What... what have I done!? Mother...]]
50	** For extra salt in the wound, you can tell her that she did a great job and all she can muster is a WhatTheHellPlayer.
51	* Oh, the Enclave Remnants. Not only do they make players feel like monsters for destroying the Western Enclave, but for leaving their citizens and soldiers to a FateWorseThanDeath. Arcade, who was little more than a child when Navarro Air Force Base was overrun by NCR, is imprisoned and tried as a war criminal by the NCR in at least one ending, and simply because ''he was an Enclave citizen.'' And of the Remnants, while all their stories are heartbreaking, Orion Moreno stands out. He was loyal to a fault and believed with all his heart that the Enclave knew what was best for them. His DespairEventHorizon was flying away from Navarro as the NCR overran it, and he said to a young Arcade, "Kiss America goodbye, boys." The NCR took away the one thing that he loved more than anything else, and when the player meets him, [[BullyingADragon they're harassing him for squatting.]] The local NCR are lucky the Courier arrived when he/she did.
52	* Little Melody, a little slave girl at The Fort. Taunted by a dickish houndmaster, and doomed to spend her life being a piece of meat to the sexual predations of the Legionaries... [[{{Squick}} If she isn't one already.]]
53	** Also, one of the slavers took her teddy bear. As if being a little slave girl wasn't bad enough.
54	*** And if you're feeling especially dickish, you can win the bear back for her and ''rip it right in front of her.''
55	* Speaking of dogs, the ending for Rex if you don't complete his sidequest is absolutely heart-wrenching. His systems eventually shut down, one by one, until he eventually dies from his condition. Gets even more heart-wrenching when you realize that you could've averted this easily if you had gone through the effort to find him a new brain before initiating the endgame. Turns into BittersweetEnding if you have ''Old World Blues'' and built Roxie, as her ending indicates she found Rex and dragged him ''all the way to the Big Empty'' so he could be fixed. Good girl.
56	* Many of the songs playing on the radio invoke this feeling, even the cheery-sounding ones. About half are sad love songs that ended or are implied to have ended poorly for those involved. Then, we have the ones that just make you feel so lonely as you walk over the many hills and desert plains such as Lone Star and Shadow Of The Valley. Finally, there are some that are just depressing in the context of the game itself. ([[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt Love Me Like There Were No Tomorrow]], for example.)
57	** ''Johnny Guitar'' was a killer, possibly more than usual if you've got Boone with you. For some reason, a V.A.T.S.-assisted firefight just makes it worse.
58	*** Or, even worse, ''Where Have You Been All My Life''. The song is supposed to make you warm and fuzzy. Now try to imagine the song from Veronica or Boone's perspective.
59	*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nz30L9NYFf8 The Streets of New Reno]], a brilliantly adapted cover of "The Streets of Laredo". Somewhere, Marty Robbins and Johnny Cash would be proud, because the cover is just as goddamn sad as their versions. "Red River Valley" also gets a Fallout remix as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_G0q95hrIa0 New Vegas Valley]]. So does "Home on the Range" as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24C6a-MLUCg Home on The Wastes]]. Hearing that people 200+ years in the future after a terrible world-ending apocalypse still know these songs, after so many songs and history and books have been lost, could bring a tear to many an eye.
60	* The Legion's slaves. Unlike the slaves in Paradise Falls, they can't escape and those that did won't learn to know how the slaves who are inevitably left behind are savagely beaten by their Legion masters. This means they're unwilling to run for freedom even after you freed them and killed the Legionnaires.
61	* It's hard to really find a way to keep everyone happy. Mr. House just wanted to save a part of his world, literally worked his ass off doing it (as well as a few other parts), and... [[CrueltyIsTheOnlyOption three out of the four end paths require you to either kill him or disconnect him and leave him to slowly die from infection]]. And it's hard to not feel for the Brotherhood when your favorite companion is Veronica... but you '''must''' destroy the Brotherhood when allying with House. About the only ones who have a 'good' way out in all endings (save Legion) are the Followers and the Kings. And you have to be careful with the Kings.
62	* While at first he comes off as simply ''[[AxCrazy insane]],'' Antony, the Legion's houndmaster, has a pretty heartbreaking story. His people, known as the Hangdogs, lived near Denver, and made peace with the city's wild dogs through generations of cooperation, viewing them as their spirit animals. When Caesar came, [[HopeSpot the tribe actually managed to fight him off for a good while,]] [[{{Determinator}} and even when they were being beaten back they seemed determined to oppose him to the last man...]] Then Caesar started burning their sacred dogs alive. Distraught at the thought of their spirit animals [[FateWorseThanDeath burning forever in the afterlife]], the tribe's elders surrendered unconditionally, the men conscripted as animal trainers while the women and children were made slaves. The worst part is that Antony recalls all of this without the rose-tinted glasses that the rest of the Legion wears, and the flimsy justifications he provides come off as a desperate attempt to keep what little remains of his sanity intact. If the player doesn’t have the Animal Friend perk and can't pass a Speech check to make him just hand the bear over, the dogs have to be fought and killed to win it, and Antony doesn't take it too well. It's probably easier to hate him than it is to hate his dogs, who show that canines can still be as loyal and loving to humans as ever, even after the apocalypse.
63	** To make it worse, Antony's text files note that, he tries to convince HIMSELF rather than The Courier, that what happened to his tribe was a good thing for him.
64	* The quest for the Lucky Star Sarsaparilla caps. You're told that there's a great treasure if you can complete it. Some people (possibly including yourself) have ''killed'' others purely on suspicion that they ''might'' have some of these caps. In particular, you are warned about a man named Allen Marks who is known for doing this. And in the end, it turns out it was a promotional stunt, and the reward is a stupid story about how they came up with the recipe, or a fancy toy badge if you badger Festus about it. Somewhat mitigated that you find several hundred then-worthless bottlecaps in the same room, as well as a unique laser pistol... on Allen Marks' body, as he managed to scrounge up fifty star caps, found his way to the plant, made it to the "treasure", and somehow locked himself in the room, which was airtight, so he eventually ran out of air and died. He even leaves behind a recording where he essentially [[HeelRealization admits that this is what he deserves for killing so many people.]]
65	-->'''Allen Marks' Last Words:''' I guess this is it. Not much air left now. Minutes, maybe. And this is what I have to show for it. I guess the joke's ''[gasps air]'' on me. Prolly shouldn't ''[gasp for air]'' have killed... all those people, Prolly shoulda stayed home... ''[gasp for air]'' and [[EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas taken care of my ma.]] She... always used to say people who... murder and steal... [[KarmicDeath die bad in the end.]] Said they... ''[[[KilledMidSentence gasp for air]]]''
66	* As frustrating as it may be to deal with Deathclaws, it can still be a little sad to kill the Mother Deathclaw and watch all the babies whimper and cry.
67	* A few of Yes Man's lines hint at StepfordSmiler tendencies.
68	-->'''Yes Man:''' I wish I could throw myself on a grenade!
69	-->'''Yes Man:''' I need you to like me! I feel empty inside!
70	[[/folder]]
71
72	[[folder:''Dead Money'' DLC]]
73	* The full story of the Sierra Madre. [[ArcWords Let go, and begin again]].
74	* Christine's ending in particular. If you don't convince her to let go of her desire for revenge against Father Elijah, she dies in the hotel. If you do, she stays behind, watching over the casino and the villa for the rest of her life.
75	** Christine's story in entirety is fairly sad. It starts off with her being the (very heavily hinted at) lover of Veronica before they were driven apart. Then she hears that her only love died in a huge tactical blunder, driving her mad with revenge. The only way to get this vengeance is to sign up with the Circle of Steel, enforcing the very ideals that drove her away from her love. She pursues Elijah only to be captured and lobotomized by the Think Tank, after which she is left unable to read or write. Fortunately, she gets rescued. Of course, the only thing she can do is continue to pursue Elijah. She ends up at the Sierra Madre. Then, she's trapped in a tube, just barely big enough for her, that is constantly doing surgery on her, eventually tearing out her vocal cords. When she is rescued, it's only to work with the very person who locked her in there, and for the very person she was pursuing. She has either the good fortune or the misfortune of meeting the Courier, who either saves her, or lies to her, promising one thing, while really taking her to her worst nightmare. Eventually, she either dies killing Elijah, or becomes the warden of what amounts to hell on Earth. All because she wanted to be with the woman she loved, and couldn't let that go.
76	* Creeping through the poisoned streets of the Sierra Madre Villa, littered with the remains of those drawn to the treasure who succumbed to greed and set traps and taunts for their rivals... and coming across a box of supplies beneath the graffiti "Whoever's reading this, I'm sorry you're here." A moment of kindness from the dead for the lost.
77	* A possible ending to [[SplitPersonality Dog/God]]'s final quest "Put the Beast Down", upon finding them Dog has had enough of constantly switching between himself and God, and is about to detonate his collar, killing himself and destroying the Sierra Madre via a gas leak. To resolve this, you can 1: Fix the gas leaks and kill Dog, 2: Make Dog the main personality, 3: Pick God instead, or 4: [[SplitPersonalityMerge Meld the two personalities into one]]. Choosing to meld them causes both personalities to end their conflict and warn you that they won't be able to remember you, and therefore not help you. Continuing the process creates a single personality, knowing nothing about where he is, but vaguely remembering that you've helped him.
78	** Hearing God desperately pleading Dog not to detonate the collar is quite harsh. Remember, that's the same personality who constantly taunted you earlier.
79	** Despite being a borderline evil Jerkass, God is utterly horrified that Father Elijah is using Dog to bring people to die in the Sierra Madre.
80	* Dean Domino himself, despite being a greedy {{jerkass}}, has a rather somber ending if he dies. Which he probably will if you haven't spent the entire time kissing his ass.
81	-->''Dean Domino, entertainer, singer... thief... had his last show on the Sierra Madre stage. The heist he spent over two hundred years planning fell apart, just as the first, by underestimating his partner's strength. Not long after the Courier left the Villa, the lights in the theater shut off, one by one. Only Dean's Hologram remained on stage, singing silently to an empty room. Still... as consumed as he had been with its riches and ruin, the Sierra Madre had held him captive long ago.''
82	* Everything that happened to poor Vera Keyes. Her recorded final words from her security holograms with her pleading with Sinclair to let her go is genuinely upsetting. She sounds like a lost child. You can find the remains of the real Vera still inside her suite, having OD'd on Med-X when she realized there was no way out for any of them.
83	* Everything that happened to Frederick Sinclair. He even dies trying to destroy the trap he had set up to kill Vera and Dean because Vera told him about the heist. You can find his pitiful remains on a steam pipe just outside the gold Vault, having died alongside everyone else when the hotel sealed up during the War.
84	* Walking into the Sierra Madre for the first time, seeing how intact it is, and listening to ''Begin Again''... then realizing how the area is too toxic for the hotel to ever be used again.
85	* The fact that thanks to the insidious one-sided deals with the Think Tank and compromised engineering, the Sierra Madre would collapse eventually. Meaning that the physical traces of the tragic tale of Vera Keyes and Frederick Sinclair will soon be lost forever.
86	* While also heartwarming, Vera Keyes' final recorded broadcast upon finishing Dead Money is this as well. After all that happens, knowing well that the Sierra Madre can never be used again and to spare others from foolishly going into their deaths, the best you could do is switch the radio off once it's over.
87	--> '''Vera Keyes:''' "Wait a moment, before you go. I... we... hope you've enjoyed your stay. Farewells can be a time of sadness. Letting go, difficult. As a guest of the Sierra Madre you know that truth more than anyone. Frederick Sinclair believed that one's life could be made anew every day. That fortunes were more than the wealth in your hands. Love. Life. Family. Those to care for and those who will care for you. To those who know these joys, the Sierra Madre holds little they don't already have. Out in the world, beyond these walls, that is your chance to begin again. I hope that you will return in happier times. Until then the Sierra Madre, and I, will hold you in our hearts."
88	* "Elijah's Message". After completing Dead Money, you can search Elijah's room in the Abandoned [=BoS=] Bunker. Inside, you can find a recording made by Elijah that can only be opened by Veronica. It's heartbreaking enough to tell her that her mentor and father figure is dead/trapped in vault forever, but when she watches the tape, it's clear she just fully realized what he'd become. To make it worse, [[TheUnreveal we never find out what he said to her.]]
89	* There is some harrowing environmental storytelling about the people who were trapped in the Sierra Madre. The sealed doors outside have several skeletons piled up around them, presumably having died pounding against the door, maybe even having trampled others to death. Several skeletons deeper in are surrounded by syringes or alcohol bottles, or have a gun lying next to them. Of particular note is the backstage of the Tampico: two adult skeletons with a child-sized skeleton between them, with both syringes and a gun next to them. You do the math.
90	[[/folder]]
91
92	[[folder:''Honest Hearts'' DLC]]
93	* [[http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Randall_Dean_Clark Randall Dean Clark]]'s backstory from Honest Hearts, whom the Sorrows remember fondly as "The Father", is especially sad. And more than once in the entries left behind, he's tempted to point a gun at himself and end his suffering but never going through with it. Hell, his entire life after the apocalypse was just one hardship after another, and the only reason he ''didn't'' lay down and die is because [[{{Determinator}} some part of him deep down outright]] ''[[{{Determinator}} refused]]'' [[{{Determinator}} to let him die.]]
94	** On the day the bombs fell, he was returning home from a solo backpacking trip, and had the sheer luck to be facing ''away'' from his hometown when the attack came. One of his first acts after waiting for the impacts to finish was to MercyKill an old couple who hadn't been facing away and subsequently were blinded by the flashes of the nukes going off.
95	-->''[[DrivenToSuicide Should shoot myself.]]'' ''What I deserve.''\
96	''Can't. Maybe soon.''
97	** Knowing that his home at Salt Lake City was [[YouCantGoHomeAgain now a nuclear crater,]] he hiked back to Zion and took cover in one of the caves to wait out the fallout, living there for almost ''a year'', barely subsisting, and unable to leave because of how high the radiation was outside. When he is finally able to emerge, he is able to behold the aftermath of the Great War.
98	--> ''There is nothing alive out there.''
99	** Five years later, he starts seeing signs of life again, but he is still alone. Eventually, against his own better judgement, he makes a journey to SLC in a vain attempt to find the remains of his wife and son. His later musings on the terminal make it clear the ''massive'' amount of SurvivorsGuilt he carries, despite forging on.
100	--> ''Look at it coward and listen don't turn away face it. If you'd been brave lucky man you would've found a spot and blown your brains out.''
101	** His first sign of human contact is a group of Spanish-speaking Mexican refugees, ostensibly having ventured to Zion to seek out a new home. Despite chiding himself not to form a bond (and his own refusal to let them know of his prescence), he begins to care about them, especially when he witnesses them getting hurt, and even leaves a bottle of antibiotics for them when one of the kids gets injured.
102	--> ''Will they make it through the winter?''
103	** Unfortunately, a group of hostile survivors from Vault 22 attack the refugees, killing all the men and many of the women and children, and capturing the rest. Clark tries to mount a rescue, but he discovers he is too late, due to a [[IAmAHumanitarian horrifying trait]] of the vault survivors.
104	--> ''They ate them.''
105	** Thus begins Clark's RoaringRampageOfRevenge against the Vault 22 group, intending to decimate them or run them out of the canyon, the latter of which he successfully does after reducing their numbers from over 100 to a bare 34. Unfortunately, even winning against the Vaulters does nothing for his guilt.
106	--> ''Victory. 10 months of killing. All I feel is cold.''\
107	''They deserved every goddamn bit of it.''
108	** Not long after chasing the Vaulters away, however, is surprised to find a straggler from the group -- Sylvie -- stuck in one of his traps. After relenting and sparing her, he nurses her back to health, to his own surprise, and the two begin developing a bond, then a relationship...which culminates in an intimate encounter and Sylvie becoming pregnant. For his part, Clark is scared out of his wits...[[HopeSpot and yet, hopeful]]. But it all crashes down when Sylvie suffers a breech birth and she loses the baby...along with her own life. For the second time, Randall Clark has lost his family, and is alone in the wasteland once more.
109	--> ''I think I can finally do it. Blow my fucking brains out all over this goddamn cave.''
110	** Despite all this, Clark continues to survive, now alone, in the post-apocalyptic wasteland that seems to not give two shits about him at best, and at worst is actively trying to kill him or, failing that, make him suffer. After a brief battle with feral ghouls that leaves him wondering about his own sanity, he detects the presence of more survivors in Zion Valley -- this time, a group of children. Two dozen of boys and girls, no older than 14, apparently fleeing form someone called "the Principal". In spite of himself, Randall soon begins caring about this scrawny group of what he dubs the "Childrens Crusade."
111	--> ''[[PapaWolf Principal better not show up or I'll blow his goddamn head off.]]'' ''I can still shoot straight.''
112	** For the next year, Randall does his best to silently care for the children, leaving them books, supplies, and encouraging letters for them, becoming "The Father" in their eyes and gently teaching them values to be kind but protective of one another. However, he's on borrowed time, as his age has finally caught up to him, giving him a bloody cough and increased difficulty breathing that marks his approaching the end of a long, hard life. Not wanting the children to find his remains and realize he was only a frail, sad old man, he prepares for a final journey out into Zion, but not before leaving a final letter to the children, telling them how [[ButNowIMustGo he will be silent from now on,]] but still watching over them.
113	--> ''Lying, then. Oh yes.''\
114	''Lied to you, Char. And Alex. And Sylvie. Told you I'd be with you forever. But I wouldn't go back and unsay it once if I could.''
115	** Finally, his journey takes him to a bare hillside, where the nighttime winter cold will claim him before his sickness does. Here, under the stars, he reflects upon the life he lived after the Great War, and how, despite it all, he never gave up.
116	--> ''Maybe the only point of all this living was to keep those pictures in my head going for as long as I could. It was the only life I could give you. Not a day went by without.''\
117	''It wasn't choice. I chose to die again and again. Just never did. Body had its own drive.''\
118	''Well, the little ones will need it. Species will need it if it's to continue. That blind drive onward.''\
119	''I wish them well. It's been a gift to me, at the end of it all, to behold innocence.''
120	** And so, Randall Clark, the ex-soldier, the apocalypse survivor, the silent protector of refugees and vengeful revenant to those who would harm them, the man who lost his family, twice, the Father in the Caves, silently and contentedly passes away under the stars of Zion Canyon National Park.
121	-->''Goodbye, Zion.''\
122	''Randall Dean Clark''\
123	''Feb 5th, 2053 - Jan 2124''
124	* The crashed tour bus. Turns out the day the bombs hit, they were given a school group a tour. You find a whole bunch of children's skeletons, all innocent victims dead because of the war. [[ArcWords War. War never changes.]] It's worse and better than what caused the founding of the Little Lamplighters. They survived their school trip, but had to suffer after the apocalypse to take care of themselves when the adults died, and weren't allowed into Vault 87. Though that turned out to be a blessing in disguise.
125	* The fact that even Zion, which escaped the twisted fate that befell [[VideoGame/Fallout3 Point Lookout]] in Maryland (another natural area that wasn't hit by the bombs), wasn't entirely spared from the Great War and the wider turmoil of the wasteland. Be it the crashed tour bus, Randall Clark's encounters with the Vault 22 expedition or the White Legs' attempts to invade.
126	** It's a small detail and only brought up in the ending where the Sorrows evacuate Zion, but it's mentioned the White Legs turn Zion into a "polluted cistern". In a world where the [[GaiasLament ecology has been ravaged]] by the Great War, Zion stood as a shining beacon of healthy nature, and the White Legs destroyed it.
127	* Joshua Graham gives a very simple but powerful line that gives a glimpse into the turbulent emotions swirling inside him:
128	-->'''Graham:''' For many of us, the road is a difficult one, but the path is always there for us to follow, no matter how many times we may fall. \
129	'''Courier:''' Do you ever "fall?" \
130	'''Graham:''' Every day. Some days are... harder than others.
131	** When he talks about his past as the first legate. There is also something sad about how Joshua paused and corrected himself after mentioning Caesar's real name.:
132	-->'''Courier:''' How did you end up as Caesar's legate? \
133	'''Graham:''' This way lies the path to hell. Edw-...''Caesar'' needed me to translate. Translation became giving orders. Giving orders became leading in battle. Leading in battle became training, punishing, terrorizing. A series of small mistakes before a great fall. And I stayed in that darkness until after Hoover Dam. After I failed Caesar and he had me burned alive, thrown into the Grand Canyon.
134	* While Daniel is seeking a peaceful solution to the conflict between the White Legs and the other tribes, he's still willing to use violence to defend himself. If the player questions this, saying that "The use of violence only leads to more violence", Daniel responds [[https://youtu.be/SPS1w9TLj0s?t=1769 with this:]]
135	--> '''Daniel:''' Try walking alongside a tribal child, a refugee, and holding her hand for three days because her parents were killed by NCR prospectors. After the prospectors have stalked the remainder of the tribe, they fire off a few shots to scare them, and the tribe bunches together for safety. A grenade comes rolling in and kills another six people. The only reason you survive is because someone else's body absorbed the shrapnel. You're left sprawled out on the ground with ringing in your ears and a little girl's hand in your hand because that's all that's left of her. After you've done that, if you can look me in the eye and tell me it's better to stand aside, maybe then I'll listen to you.
136	* In the backstory, there is the sacking of New Canaan. The New Canaanites were good traders who willingly donated medical support and food to those who needed it. Documents from Van Buren also show that the New Canaanites were fully integrated (at least 3 ghouls, one of whom was a glowing one, and a nightkin were active members of the church and friends), allowed squatters to live outside the gates of the city (the only reasons they weren't let inside were security concerns and some moral objections) but they were always willing to help people. The White Legs butchered everyone in the city, killed in their beds, nailed their corpses to the wall and then salted the Earth there so nothing could grow again.
137	** One death, which can be described by Daniel, was Bishop Mordecai's. Mordecai was old, disabled and the leader of their church short of [[VideoGame/FalloutVanBuren Jeremiah Rigdon]]. He burned to death in his room.
138	*** To make matters worse, Ulysses told them to do it. He told them that to destroy New Canaan, they had to kill everyone. His tapes you find in a later DLC mentions that New Canaan made him think about his ways. He had helped destroy an ancient culture and beliefs pre-dating the pre-war world who only helped the weak. Even after all he did, he was wondered if there really was a place where this "God" exists with a twinge of regret in his usually CreepyMonotone. Joshua lampshades this earlier on, commenting that waging war on good people can change you. He cautions you to note this fact, because "it's the most important thing I will ever say to you."
139	* [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone "FORGIVE ME MAMA."]]
140	* Even in the good endings, Daniel never gets a break. Whether the Sorrows leave or remain in Zion, he spends the rest of his life haunted by doubts on whether he did the right thing. Though at least he takes ''some'' small consolation that there's still hope.
141	[[/folder]]
142
143	[[folder:''Old World Blues'' DLC]]
144	* Old World Blues in general. Your first encounter is with a bunch of goofy {{Mad Scientist}}s. And they send you out into Big Mountain/Big Empty. It really hits hard when you visit Higgs Village. You see that the houses are nice and clean on the outside. Inside, they're a mess. They completed the brain-upload procedure. They go into their former homes. Dr. Dala attempts to hug a teddy bear. Borous tries petting an animal. 8 tries enjoying music. Klein is picking up a bottle of alcohol. And none of them are capable of interacting with the things that made them happy.
145	* You can get Dr. Borous to talk about his dog Gabe and the memories they had together. And then realization starts to take hold, and the largest of the Think Tank's {{Large Ham}}s trails off and suddenly turns quiet.
146	--> '''Dr. Borous:''' "You know, I am having the most perplexing feeling squiggling through my biogel. I can't quite... pin it down..."\
147	'''Courier:''' "It sounds to me like you hurt someone who loved you very much."\
148	'''Dr. Borous:''' "As odd as it is, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone I believe that is the conclusion.]] And... I wonder why it didn't hit me before, until I saw that memory in your hands."
149	** The Courier's line hits very close home to anyone who has hurt someone whom they were close with.
150	* Hearing Dr. Mobius' regret about what has happened to him, his colleagues, and how the Big MT failed in its purpose.
151	** Poor Doctor Mobius. When you finally catch up to him, you see that he practically destroyed himself in a bid to keep the Think Tank contained in the Big MT. A once brilliant man, now senile and detached like Lily is. You just wanna hug the poor guy.
152	*** For some reason, there's just something especially sad about Dr. Mobius. It's largely PlayedForLaughs, but anyone who's familiar with what senility can do with people can be hit a little hard by some lines. It gets better in that, if you leave your brain there largely for the stats benefits, it goes on to become something of his apprentice in its good ending.
153	* Maybe it's a bug, but sometimes if the player dies while wearing the Stealth Suit MK II, you can hear the suit [[PleaseWakeUp desperately trying to pump stimpaks in order to keep the Courier alive]], [[DiedInYourArmsTonight to no avail.]]
154	[[/folder]]
155
156	[[folder:''Lonesome Road'' DLC]]
157	* The backstory of ED-E is absolutely heartrending. Whitley treated the little guy like a son. He even let him watch old-world Saturday morning cartoons!
158	** And what's worse? ''You'' likely killed Whitley in ''VideoGame/Fallout3'' at the end of the ''Broken Steel'' DLC by either shooting him in person, or blowing up the base with the Killsat.
159	*** To the Lone Wanderer, Whitley was probably just another nameless Enclave scientist. It really makes you wonder WhatMeasureIsAMook [[FridgeHorror How many other characters have we mowed down that turned out to be fundamentally honest, decent people?]]
160	* At the end, ED-E can choose to [[HeroicSacrifice sacrifice himself]] to stop the nuclear warheads from raining down on the NCR and Legion.
161	--> '''Courier:''' [[TrueCompanions NO! ED-E! You can't... you just can't do this if it means you're going to die!]]
162	--> '''ED-E:''' [[Awesome/FalloutNewVegas <Determined series of beeps and then his theme>]]
163	--> '''Courier:''' [[TearJerker If... if... you're absolutely sure...]]
164	--> '''ED-E:''' <Beep.> <nods>
165	** You might think to yourself "Maybe when it's over, I could bring what remains back to the Mojave so his sacrifice wouldn't be forgotten." That never happens because after he overrides it, he fucking ''explodes'' and you can't pick up the pieces.
166	* Both Ulysses and the Courier (especially one with good karma) are revealed to be Woobies. The Courier suddenly learns that s/he destroyed a decent, genuinely happy community. Several dialogue options show the Courier denying any fault or blame, but picking these options easily shows that s/he's not trying to convince anyone but him or herself. Meanwhile, Ulysses has [[UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom made many mistakes]], and you can see the regret he has for the massacre of New Canaan and for his lost tribe of the Twisted Hairs. He's a patriot without anything to be patriotic for, and the reason he's the man he is today is because the Courier destroyed the home he could've believed in.
167	** Even worse if you believe what Ulysses said - that the Courier helped build the Divide by bringing supplies to it. That it was your home as much as it was Ulysses'.
168	[[/folder]]

Context TearJerker / FalloutNewVegas