(Redirected from Christine Royce)
“[She frowns and raises her middle finger.]”
Christine Royce is a former scribe of the Brotherhood of Steel[1] and a knight of The Circle, trapped in the Sierra Madre in the Fallout: New Vegas add-on Dead Money.[2]
Background
Christine was formerly a scribe with the Brotherhood of Steel.[1] In her youth, she met another scribe, Veronica, and the two became romantically involved for a time.[3] Veronica's mentor, Father Elijah, used his status to separate the two.[4] This was unbeknownst to Veronica, who believed Christine left to distance herself from her staunch procreation parents.[3] Following this, Christine found a new purpose under the same banner, becoming a Knight within the The Circle.[4] After the Brotherhood's defeat at Helios One at the hands of the NCR, Elijah went rogue in search of "Old World" technology that could help him "wipe the slate clean",[5] leaving a trail of crimes in his wake. Christine was ordered by the Circle to track him down and kill him.[2][4]
Christine followed Elijah to the Big MT, tracking him to Little Yangtze experimenting on the survivors with bomb collars. Elijah used the survivors against Christine "like walking bombs" and was knocked unconscious. She was hauled by medical robots to the Y-17 Medical Facility.[2][6] At Y-17, she was lobotomized, having her head cut open and jabbed with electrodes, causing impairment in her ability to read and write, along with deep facial scars.[2][7][8][9] Another visitor at Big MT, Ulysses, arrived to rescue her, carrying her out to Ulysses' Point to nurse back to health.[10][11] Ulysses visited the Think Tank for answers of his own and met Elijah there, learning that his next destination was the Sierra Madre. Christine would repair a holotape recorder for Ulysses, before parting ways.[12]
At the Sierra Madre, Christine was fitted with a slave collar by Dog[13] and eventually trapped by Dean Domino inside an Auto-Doc for two weeks,[14] removing her vocal chords to replace with Vera Keyes' voice, as part of his Sierra Madre vault heist.[15][16]
Interactions overview
| Interactions | ||
|---|---|---|
| This character is essential. Essential characters cannot be killed. Essential status expires when Last Luxuries begins. | ||
| This character is a permanent companion. They grant the Signal Interference perk. | ||
 |
This character identifies as LGBTQ+. | |
| This character is involved in quests. |
| |
Other interactions
- When the Courier travels with Christine, she will be able to block out radio and speaker signals for a short time. She will also increase the amount of time taken for the collar to detonate.
- She knows how to counterfeit Sierra Madre Chips, and can give the player character the Coin Operator perk with the right dialogue options.
- If the player character has at least 75 Medicine and initiates "You were badly hurt by that Autodoc" dialogue option, there is an additional dialogue option when discussing Christine's love interest ("Oh, girlfriend") and one can easily calm her down, stating that the player character understands her situation; if the player character has the Cherchez La Femme or Confirmed Bachelor perk there is an additional interaction with Christine when they leave her at her post before the Gala Opening. If the Courier accepts to hold Christine's hand, they can promise that they will return for her.
- She can be intimidated with the Terrifying Presence perk to be forced into the elevator in the Mixed Signals quest. This results in a loss of Karma.
Endings
This section is transcluded from Dead Money endings. To change it, please edit the transcluded page.
| # | Slide | Voice-over narration | In-game condition |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  |
Christine, scarred by her hunt for Elijah and unable to let him go, perished in the Sierra Madre Casino. She never completed her mission, nor did she stop to consider what had driven her to accept the mission in the first place. Obsession is another form of greed, a lesson that Christine never learned. |
Christine is dead. |
| 2 | |
Christine, her mission complete, found new purpose as the Sierra Madre's warden. She watched over it silently - by choice. Over time, the ghost people came to see her as one of the Holograms. They would watch, silently, as she walked among them. At times, Christine thought of the Courier, who had kept Elijah's hand from her throat. The Courier reminded her of the other courier she had met in the Big Empty, and wondered if the two had found each other at last. She did not think of them again until she heard the legends of the Divide. The Divide, where the two messengers, the two couriers, fought beneath an ancient flag, at the edge of the world. |
Christine is alive. |
Inventory
| Apparel | Weapon | Other items | On death |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wasteland Doctor Fatigues Sierra Madre Armor, Reinforced (during the final quest), Explosive Collar |
Notes
- The player character must have a high Perception or Intelligence in order to understand her properly. Various skill checks require: PER 6, 8; INT 6, 7; Speech 50; Science 60, 75; Medicine 60, 75; Explosives 60. (Explosives 60 and Science 60 are both options in the same conversation and give the same result.) The Math Wrath, Cherchez La Femme and Confirmed Bachelor perks, as well as Power Armor Training and Brotherhood of Steel reputation, give additional conversation options.
- She is the third shortest adult character in game; her height is only 92% of the normal size. Other small characters are Sunny Smiles (95%), Sammy Weathers (92.5%), the Gomorrah floor manager (90%) and the shortest, Irate Ida (85% of normal height).
Quotes
- "Love makes people do strange things. Won't argue that. It can drive you crazy sometimes if you can't... connect."
- "The quick... the quick scribe... jumped over the lazy paladin."
- "The Divide? There's nothing there."
- "...wait, an explosion outside. Someone's here... someone's..."
- "Never going back... and Elijah was on his way here, so I couldn't stop to see if it was something I could fix... if you can even fix what happened to me when they jabbed the electrodes into my skull and turned my head into a flashlight."
Behind the scenes
| Behind the scenes |
|---|
|
“There are technical reasons (that I’ve gone over before) for why DLC characters can’t come back into the main game/reference each other. That’s separate from any narrative reasons why Christine and Veronica couldn’t interact, though I should also say that I conceived Veronica’s F:NV plot arc before/separately from what Chris Avellone developed for Dead Money.
I think Veronica is relatively happy (an important qualifier in setting where most things are miserable) and any tragedy in her ending slides has more to do with the state of the BoS than her personal relationships. Most other companions don’t speak of their romantic relationships. Arcade and Cassidy mention some in passing, but nothing in particular. Boone’s wife is the source of a lot of personal anguish. You could make an argument that Boone’s or Veronica’s relationships are more tragic than the other, but both of them qualify as not good.”— Joshua Sawyer on Tumblr[Dev 1] “I cannot speak for Chris Avellone (who wrote and directed Dead Money), but I believe we were limited by time/scheduling. Veronica was written and recorded for the base New Vegas game with (IIRC) only a few hooks for Dead Money. I think reactions to Dead Money content itself would have required a more comprehensive level of (way) advanced planning, i.e., we would have needed to know exactly what Veronica was reacting to in Dead Money at the time that we recorded her for New Vegas.
Either that or we would have needed to book Felicia Day for more studio time during the development of Dead Money. That can also be difficult and expensive, especially since voice actors and studio time are generally booked in multiple hour blocks. It’s difficult to justify if the character is only saying two or three new lines. It also gets a little messy when trying to decide where to draw the line. I think a lot of people would love to see some resolution between Christine and Veronica, but what about Caesar responding to the events of Honest Hearts? I wrote Joshua Graham and directed Honest Hearts, so I can speak more definitively to that. The limited reactivity Caesar could have about JG/HH wouldn’t really justify the expense of bringing John Doman back into the studio. And of course the new dialogue (minor as it might be) would still need to be tested. Caesar had one of the most complex dialogues in New Vegas, so it’s something we really tried to avoid messing with once the game shipped. I know that might seem a little silly, but because recording expenses can be high and recording sessions typically happen late in development, it’s often safer to err on the side of caution.”— Joshua Sawyer on Tumblr[Dev 2]
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- Christine's name was recycled from the Van Buren character, Christina Royce, who was intended to be Chrissy, a member of the Vault 15 Squatters in Fallout 2. In Van Buren, she would have held the rank of Corporal in the NCR, as well as being a recruitable companion.[Dev 4]
Appearances
Christine Royce appears in the Fallout: New Vegas add-on Dead Money. Her voice is also heard in the add-on Old World Blues and she is mentioned in the add-on Lonesome Road.
Bugs
If the player character has Dean Domino or Dog/God as a companion, the camera may center directly through the player character's head (or chest) during the first line of dialogue with Christine.
- A possible fix is setting any companions to wait before starting a dialogue with her.
Gallery
Christine in a cut endings slide
References
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- ↑ cybirdpunk: "Hi Josh, I just wanna say I'm a huge fan and new vegas is my second favorite game of all time. One complaint I always had though was the reliance on the "tragic lesbian" trope or having lesbians be victims of assault. Obviously the game is a product of its time but did you ever think during the development about maybe having a lesbian character who could be happy? (for example, why couldn't veronica and christine see each other after dead money or even have it be mentioned by mr. perlman?)"
Josh Sawyer: "There are technical reasons (that I’ve gone over before) for why DLC characters can’t come back into the main game/reference each other. That’s separate from any narrative reasons why Christine and Veronica couldn’t interact, though I should also say that I conceived Veronica’s F:NV plot arc before/separately from what Chris Avellone developed for Dead Money. I think Veronica is relatively happy (an important qualifier in setting where most things are miserable) and any tragedy in her ending slides has more to do with the state of the BoS than her personal relationships. Most other companions don’t speak of their romantic relationships. Arcade and Cassidy mention some in passing, but nothing in particular. Boone’s wife is the source of a lot of personal anguish. You could make an argument that Boone’s or Veronica’s relationships are more tragic than the other, but both of them qualify as not good."
(Fallout: New Vegas developer statements/Characters; Joshua Sawyer: Sexuality, 2016 December 18) - ↑ momodeary: "Hi Josh! My question is about F:NV and the DLC Dead Money (my favorite~ ha) I have to admit, after meeting Christine and running as fast as I could to Veronica to explain my experience in that world, I was disheartened to only give her a holotape from her previous Elder and not get a reaction from her about, who I assumed to be, her previous lover. Was there ever going to be a dialogue option about them? I guess I'm asking for closure :')"
Josh Sawyer: "I cannot speak for Chris Avellone (who wrote and directed Dead Money), but I believe we were limited by time/scheduling. Veronica was written and recorded for the base New Vegas game with (IIRC) only a few hooks for Dead Money. I think reactions to Dead Money content itself would have required a more comprehensive level of (way) advanced planning, i.e., we would have needed to know exactly what Veronica was reacting to in Dead Money at the time that we recorded her for New Vegas. Either that or we would have needed to book Felicia Day for more studio time during the development of Dead Money. That can also be difficult and expensive, especially since voice actors and studio time are generally booked in multiple hour blocks. It’s difficult to justify if the character is only saying two or three new lines.It also gets a little messy when trying to decide where to draw the line. I think a lot of people would love to see some resolution between Christine and Veronica, but what about Caesar responding to the events of Honest Hearts? I wrote Joshua Graham and directed Honest Hearts, so I can speak more definitively to that. The limited reactivity Caesar could have about JG/HH wouldn’t really justify the expense of bringing John Doman back into the studio. And of course the new dialogue (minor as it might be) would still need to be tested. Caesar had one of the most complex dialogues in New Vegas, so it’s something we really tried to avoid messing with once the game shipped. I know that might seem a little silly, but because recording expenses can be high and recording sessions typically happen late in development, it’s often safer to err on the side of caution."
(Fallout: New Vegas developer statements/Characters; Joshua Sawyer: Veronica and Christine Interacting, 2016 March 2) - ↑ Question: "@ChrisAvellone Is it possible for you to just outright state that yes, Veronica and Christine Royce were a pair?"
Chris Avellone: "Sure! It's true. They loved each other very much."
(Fallout: New Vegas developer statements/Characters; Chris Avellone: Veronica and Christine, 2019 November 19) - ↑ Chris Avellone: "[...] I also did the companion characters Corporal Christina Royce (NCR lieutenant CNPC, used to be part of the Vault 15 squatters in F2 as Christy or something, also a tribute to Wasteland) [...]"
(Chris Avellone/Fallout Developers Profile)
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