Operation: Anchorage brought the tools, and The Pitt, to some degree, brought the talent. Put together, Bethesda’s follow-ups for the Fallout 3 experience have proved a comprehensive DLC package, mixing an adequately enjoyable bunch of new toys and, certainly in the case of Pittsburgh, some accomplished fresh architecture and set pieces in which to play with them.

But what of the much-vaunted Broken Steel? Apart from the over-hyped ability to level up to 30, with the requisite new perks and talents such elevation will bring, this apparently final batch of DLC is also tasked with tackling the central story of the game and moving it on a stage or two.

Unable to fall back on virtual reality simulations or sealed prison mines, this is a chapter of Fallout lore set very much in the Capital Wasteland we’re all familiar with, and as such is required more than ever to deliver on the originality stakes.

What transpires is concoction of the good and the bad. Though you’ll spend most of the first quest infuriatingly hot-footing it around the Brotherhood of Steel’s Citadel base, effectively playing tag with a number of the Scribes there, before hitting those goddamned endless pitch-black subway tunnels for more ghoul-splatting, things soon start to open out into fresh experiences with new assets and plot points galore.

You’ll uncover the mysteries of just what the president gets up to underground in the event of a nuclear war, uncover some lost Tesla technology, and use it (in the form of the excellent Tesla cannon) to deal the Enclave the death blow you thought you’d managed first time around, before Bethesda decided to annexe this conclusion with the equivalent of that two minutes of extra footage you’ll get for sitting through the credits of a movie.

And it’s the rather anticlimactic air surrounding this new adventure that means the DLC never really gets off the ground in the way it should. Without wanting to offer too many spoilers, the game, however you chose to complete it, ended with dramatic finality. It doesn’t help that, on loading the DLC and picking a savegame just before the end, the completion sequence will still play out just as before.

If – and shoot us if we’re saying too much here – your character happened to die at the end of Fallout, the game will still tell how your death sent you down in history as a hero and a martyr… before flashing up a “two weeks later” message, informing you that everything’s perfectly all right and sending you off to battle evil again.

It’s here that it’s obvious how Bethesda may have caved in to fan pressure a little with this one, and while we relish the opportunity to continue the fight across the wastes, we wonder if there was a more inventive way to bring it about.

Still, for the money, you can’t argue about a few more things to do, ten more levels to aim for, entertaining new perks – including an infinitely regenerating canine companion – and the climactic ability to explode into a nuclear bomb when your health gets low. Perhaps most importantly though, the ability to keep playing Fallout 3 ad infinitum is now yours. Complete every side quest, build every weapon and grab every bobblehead. Bethesda has pulled the lid right off, and we can reasonably do nothing but be thankful for this golden opportunity to keep experiencing everything Fallout 3 has to offer, unimpeded… until the Brahmins come home.