Wasteland 3 Colorado Collection

I came into Wasteland 3 expecting another serviceable post-apocalyptic RPG and walked out somewhere around the 55-hour mark still thinking about the choices I'd made two dozen hours earlier. That is not a common feeling. inXile built something here where decisions ripple forward in ways you genuinely don't predict - side with the autocratic Patriarch of Colorado, help one of his three chaotic children undermine him, or just roll your Kodiak armored vehicle into a settlement and start a war. The game does not flinch when those choices come back around. The combat is turn-based and grid-based, spending Action Points on movement, shooting, grenades, or skills each round. It has been streamlined compared to earlier entries in the series - redundant skill overlaps were trimmed, and mousing over a target position highlights which enemies you can hit from there, similar to how XCOM telegraphs shot opportunities. The result is a system that is accessible to newcomers but still rewards careful squad-building. Skill lines run from the expected (rifles, pistols, bladed weapons) to the gleefully strange - Weird Science opens up toys like the Frozen Ferret Launcher, and the Sneaky Shit skill lets a crouching attacker open fights with bonus damage. Maintaining a balanced roster matters because resources stay tight, and a squad that doubled up on the same weapon types will hit walls. Two-player co-op is supported throughout the campaign, which is a rarity for a CRPG of this scope and makes replays with a friend genuinely worthwhile. The Colorado Collection bundles in both story expansions. The Battle of Steeltown drops at squad level 9 and takes the Rangers into a factory setting with its own labor-dispute storyline that integrates naturally into the main campaign's world. Cult of the Holy Detonation is the second and final expansion, accessible at level 16 and set inside the Cheyenne Mountain military complex, where two mutant cults are at war over a nuclear explosion suspended in time. That second DLC introduces objective-based combat encounters - fix overloading reactors, manage ventilation systems, fight off infinite enemy waves to complete the puzzle - which is a genuine mechanical shift. Some players find it a fresh test of their build; others find the infinite-respawn format exhausting. Fair warning: go in at exactly level 16 and the difficulty spikes sharply. The rough edges are real. Launch-era bugs were significant, though most have been patched. The isometric environments can look washed out, and loading times have been a recurring complaint across platforms. The base game's story momentum is also uneven - a few questlines lose their thread before the end. But when Wasteland 3 is hitting its stride, the writing is sharp, the companion characters are memorable in ways most CRPGs don't manage, and the dark comedy (a swearing parrot in your combat squad, toasters hiding loot if you spec Toaster Repair) keeps the grimness from becoming oppressive. For anyone who has never touched the series, the good news is that Wasteland 3 reads as a standalone entry - the Colorado context is established in-game without requiring homework.

Alex · Scout Team

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