Sunday, November 02, 2008

Adjunct to the Anecdotal Post

I thought an earlier post could do with some supplemental reporting. Dial-up users, beware!

You may recall that, tragically, a series of grenades (launched by my foes!) utterly annihilated me. It was quite graphic - more specifically, it looked a bit like this.


Yeesh.

After the unfortunate incident with the poorly-timed quicksave, I loaded from an earlier save, defeated the Raider scum (this time creeping behind their base and turning their own machine-gun turret against them), and, having been certain to save by multiple methods, set about recreating the disaster, this time from a safer view-point.

To "spark the blast", I set several fragmentation mines in the center of the cars. I then backed away and tossed a frag grenade at them, causing a moderately large explosion. (It wasn't really big enough to warrant a screen-shot.) The result looked something like this.

Note the grenade held in my hand.

The car smoldered for a moment, then blew up. I waited. The surrounding cars were aflame, now. They smoldered - then -

HOLY CRUD.

In the higher-resolution version of the picture - which should be available with a click - you can see that I've had an arm and leg blown off by the explosion, even from fifty feet away. The rest of me isn't in much better shape.


This is all that remained. Experimentally, I ventured into the smoldering wreckage. My geiger counter began to crackle wildly; the remains of the cars, which I had destroyed with conventional explosives, were violently radioactive. In other words: they were atom-powered cars.

Fallout really is a lovely game.

Celebrating it further, below are yet more screenshots, tracking various things alternately spectacular and just plain silly. (Probably best viewed at full resolution.)


Staring out over the ruined countryside, trusty las-pistol in hand. (Note the detail on the back.)

Rather a bit later, standing near the bones of some long-dead unfortunate.

Occupied in ENTIRELY LEGITIMATE WORK. You can tell that it's legitimate because he's wearing a lab coat. Criminals NEVER wear lab coats. (He's still carrying that las-pistol, though at this point it's been repaired so many times that practically none of the parts are the same.)


An eminent statesman, encountered while recovering treasures of the distant past. How can you tell that he's eminent? One, he has a wig. Two, he's programmed with the personality of Thomas Jefferson.

Also, that isn't the old las-pistol I'm holding. It's a las-rifle. Looks pretty similar, has more than twice the punch. Pretty classy.


And finally, a depiction of our hero engaged in one of his most difficult tasks. (There are such facilities all over the place - this particular one is atop a half-ruined overpass. More screenshots by request.)

An excellent note on which to end this post!

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