Fallout New Vegas: What happened to the hardcore mode?

I'm running the PC version, never even crossed my mind playing in other than the hardcore mode, and then, all of a sudden, I see this:

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What am I missing, they have it disabled in the last patch or what? I have the Steam version.

Nonetheless I still have things like hunger and thirst working in my game... :|

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Edit: I'm level 21 and somewhat far in the game already...

Why do you mind if it's still on?

they ask you at the beginning of the game if you want it on or not

they ask in the 1st hour if you want to turn it on.

i guess you cant after that...MFDOOM1983

Why do you mind if it's still on?

N30F3N1X

Because I want the achievement from playing in hardcore mode from start to finish, now I don't know if I will still get it.

Maybe it's still in Hardcore Mode, but it gets locked in that mode once you reach a certain point in the game. The only ones who know the real answers are the devs. You may want to go to the official Fallout 3: New Vegas forum and ask about that.