Fallout 3 DLC : The Pitt: review

• Format: PS3 (version reviewed), 360, PC
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Bethesda
• Developer: Bethesda
• Players: 1
• Site: http://fallout.bethsoft.com

Bodies hanging from the bridge lines, check. City sky-line steeped in red cloud and smog, check. Fire belching from buildings reaching far into the night sky, check. Mass slavery and depression, yup, you’ve found The Pitt mate! And isn’t it tantalising, don’t you just want to run across that bridge and see what trouble you can get into? Well go ahead, you’ll only get your legs blown off! This is not a friendly place, and you should have worked that out before you even got here!

Like other DLC packs, your awareness about all this is brought about from a signal on your Pip-Boy, this time it’s a hard march across a huge stretch of Capital Waste to find the source and when you get there, your suspicions would not be paranoia. The signal has been coming from an escaped slave, when you find him he tells you that he’s been searching for somebody, anybody, to help him free his enslaved brethren. After a little chat you hatch a plan to get yourself into The Pitt, how you achieve this is up to you, but it all works out the same; all your stuff is confiscated and you become a slave.

Upon entry to The Pitt, you have to make contact with a woman who gives you the low-down on what’s been happening and gives you tasks to get yourself associated with the city. Here, the exploration of the city is generally a free affair, just don’t overstep your boundaries and you’ll be all right. The atmosphere of the place is done brilliantly, it has the feel of a city brought to its knees by the aftermath of the war and encapsulates the feeling of being in a massive prison. This will also be the first time you’ve been in a proper built-up area. Whereas almost all of the Capital Wastes are barren, The Pitt is a working, living city that’s teeming with life. However, nearly everyone you meet is either a slaver or a slave, and neither are very keen on chit-chat. The slaves don’t want to get shot and the slavers would shoot you for looking at them the wrong way. Suffice to say, it’s best to keep your head down and only speak when you’re spoken to.

As a DLC pack, The Pitt brings a mass of new gear to wear, and some fancy new weaponry too. One of our favourites is the Auto-Axe, kind of a whirring blade/chainsaw that’ll make proper mincemeat out of anything dumb enough to stand in front of you for too long. Then there’s the Infiltrator, a scoped semi-automatic sub-machine gun. The clothing ranges from a simple slave’s outfit that makes you look ready for a whipping from Mistress Pain, to things like the Gamma Shield Armour, Iconoclast Armour and the Raider Ordinance Armour. However, none of this will be available to you the first time you get shoved into The Pitt’s mining area, that happens to be full of things called Troggs. Sounds like a new pair of trainers? You wish! Troggs are people who have had a similar exposure to radiation to Ghouls, unlike Ghouls though they are able to climb vertical surfaces and attack you from every angle and happen to be very fast, think ‘Aliens’ minus the acid for blood. If you can survive your visits to the mining areas you’ll eventually get the chance to fight for your freedom in The Arena, survive this and the entire city’s fate will be in your hands.

This DLC pack is atmospheric, tense, and fills out the Fallout world perfectly.

4/5