The first chapter of the "travellers guide" is done. Pre-war stores do have food for survival, but also raiders for a bit of spice. Met a kid outside the store who had troubles with an ant infestation back at his town outside the store, so that seemed a bit more interesting that irradiating myself or walking into a minefield for the guide's next chapters.
Turns out the ants can now breath fire. Awesome. Thanks for letting me know that tidbit sonny-boy. The laser gun is pumping through the energy cells trying to drop these suckers before they get into napalm range. The kid's dad is dead anyway, but I break the news gently to him.
Turns out a scientist has been experimenting to reverse their size, but has so far only managed to make them breath fire. Makes me want to recant my scientific abilities. I actually find him alive down at the centre of the problem and agree to help clean up the mess he's made. Crazy coot can do what he likes now. I'm not coming back. Nice Ant Vision perk and a lab coat for my time though.
Dodging land mines looks like the next main thing to do. Not too keen on following Dad just yet as Megaton is quite comfy. They are running out of money though. I think I'm the richest guy in town at the moment and no-ones got any more spare change for my junk.
On my way up north I pass by the school again and find there's still a few raiders based there, so they make a nice diversion for more caps. The leader's dog ripped me up a bit, but with stimpaks the new pseudo currency for bartering it's not such a big deal.
Looking at the map it seems that Lucy's letter home is more or less in the same direction and it would be nice coming home with 2 people happy to see me. On the way I stop for another happy snap looking west along the Potomac valley.
Talkie toaster is there along with a teddy bear and gnome I've picked up along the way.
one thing I've been pretty impressed with is the dramatization of the battles when in VATS mode. You get a wide variety of angles watching the action unfold with bullet time zooms, victim-cam, etc. Here's a collection of shots from battles on my way north:
Reached Lucy's home town only to find another parental massacre. This really isn't turning out to be a nice place to raise a family. There were also a couple of sad stories in Big Town too about it being decimated by super mutants and slavers. I'd like to help, but it seems a lost cause. Managed to revive one of their townsfolk though, so that should give them some extra backup when the next raid comes.
Everyone's got problems. Lucy's family is dead, but the sheriff still wants me to hunt down "The Family". He's a bit sketchy on the directions though. They are also living in a fairly precarious spot on top of a bridge over radiated water. Wouldn't want to sleepwalk.
I;ve noticed that there looks like a border around the map, and I'm kind of close enough to the westerns side to see how expansive the game is. Sure enough it's a hard limit. Most of it is walled off naturallly, but I found a place to shimmy though only to be greeting by a "you can't go any further" notice. I don't think I mind. The place is gorgeous and you really get the feeling it's open everywhere, and there's more than enough stuff going on to keep me entertained within the borders. I wonder if it moves on to other areas once the story progresses ala FC2?
Another scenic shot from an abandoned train station:
The station is clean, no gang in there. So too is the next potential location; a hideaway cut into the hillside. It's full of radscorpions though and they are tough suckers. They aren't worth the effort to kill as you spend more ammo on them than you could ever get back in 'parts', so I skirted around most of them just grabbing whatever was in easy reach. Seriously considering getting friendly with the animals so that I don't have to waste ammo.
After a quick trip home to sell up I'm done for the night. Only one spot remains for "The Family" so it'll be action straight up next session.
