Sierra Madre

"City of the Dead"

The Sierra Madre is a pre-War casino resort in the wastes, a dead city surrounded by a poisonous cloud. Many travelers in the Mojave have sought it out after claiming to have heard a woman's voice on a pre-War radio broadcast, never to be heard from again. The Courier is lured to the Sierra Madre by that same broadcast advertising the gala grand opening.

Background
The city and the casino were designed and built by one man, Frederick Sinclair, his last venture a few years before the Great War. The Sierra Madre, especially the casino, was intended as a place for guests to reverse their fortunes and During its construction until the end, it remained a reclusive area. All conveniences were supplied to the inhabitants by unique vending machines, which provided a number of commercial and non-commercial services, and allowed the residents to live in self-sufficiency, even when cut off from the outside world. The goal of the entire enterprise was not only to create a great casino - it was to create the perfect shelter from the nuclear holocaust. Every element of the Sierra Madre's functions is to protect its inhabitants.

In design, Sinclair was drawn to the nostalgic Art Deco era. This is reflected in the architecture of the villa and of the casino. To make it a perfect opening gala, Sinclair strengthened its frequency emissions, normally reserved for emergency broadcast signals before the war. The kitchens of the Sierra Madre aimed for a 5 star rating, and sought to bring in the best chefs from around the world. In order to meet deadlines and budgets, the construction of the Sierra Madre was handled by two different companies, a well performing company for the casino and a cheaper, slacking, corrupt company for the Villa, creating numerous incidents during the construction of the Villa.

As guardian of his paradise, Sinclair forbade any other food or vending machines beyond the ones he'd installed there and banned any personal contraband like chems, alcohol, and "foreign substances", which created a black market from the workers within. Part of Sierra Madre security's role was to prevent such contraband from entering the Villa area. They were known to have conducted inspections of the Puesta del Sol construction offices, confiscating prohibited items.

Obsessed with security, believed due to his own financial losses in the 2070s, Sinclair installed holograms, a futuristic technology purchased on an exclusive contract by Sinclair. The doors of the Sierra Madre were designed to hermetically seal in case of emergency and the speakers were shielded to prevent vandalism. The Sierra Madre Casino was equipped with an automated front desk that would escort guests to their rooms upon arrival; and security systems that would stun those entering with foreign substances or contaminated by radiation.

There is also a darker side to the Madre. In return for the technologies supplied by Big MT, Sinclair agreed to have the casino and the villa act as proving grounds for various experimental technologies such as the saturnite alloy, hazmat suits and prototype matter recombinators. Sinclair was oblivious to the fact that previous such deals did not work out too well (as is the case with Hopeville and its disastrous meteorological research project). In the Sierra Madre, the catch came in the form of the Cloud, a strange toxin created in the laboratories of Big MT.

Appearances
Sierra Madre is mentioned in various posters and postcards in Fallout: New Vegas and in a terminal in the Fallout: New Vegas add-on, Old World Blues. It appears only in Dead Money.

Behind the scenes

 * The Sierra Madre is a reference to B. Traven's seminal 1927 Western novel, and later 1948 film, directed by John Huston, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.
 * The Madre look (a combination of Art Deco and Mission Revival) was conceived by Joe Sanabria and implemented by James Garcia.
 * The level has many connections to Albert Kinney, the designer of Venice, California. Kinney suffered from tuberculosis (attributed to a miasma through much of human history) and constructed a sanitarium, the Sierra Madre Villa Hotel in the San Gabriel Timberland Reserve. It was common for sufferers of tuberculosis to seek treatment in dry climates at the time. Additionally, Kinney's ghost is said to haunt Venice. Martin Wright