Nukaworld

I had two days alone.  Such a stretch of time is unprecedented, and I have difficulty with self-management when it comes to leisure.  Seriously, I don’t know what to do with myself when no projects are demanding my immediate attention.  Then I saw the Fallout 4 expansion was on sale, amusing since I just recently lamented on its price.  $12 is fairly reasonable, so I pulled the trigger, and many times thereafter.

[SPOILERS]

Ordinarily after buying a Bethesda DLC, one generally boots the game and waits around for a quest update.  In this instance, however, the update happened immediately.  Perhaps the DLC was feeling desperate and wanted my attention right away.  I was notified of a suddenly new radio broadcast, to which I listened and received a map marker–an entire train terminal that had appeared instantly.  How could I not investigate that?  I began my journey.

I arrived at the terminal and killed some Gunners, who were apparently there for the same reasons as I–murder and loot.  Then I entered the station and a wounded man pleads for me to go save his wife.  Further investigation reveals he’s a doorman of sorts, helping to lure people in.  I found his role largely unnecessary, seeing as I was already there.  And why wouldn’t I continue inside, seeing as I already spent the 12 bucks?  No matter, I hop on the monorail and await my destination.

My destination turns out to be a lethal obstacle course.  Who would have thought that raiders were so cruel?

At least they have a sense of humor

So I begin, with Piper–my eternally-faithful girlfriend–following along.  We shoot a lot of turrets.  Piper even goes so far as to taunt them.  She has a temper, that one.

That bullet to the knee doesn’t seem to faze her one bit

I kill things, evade traps, set off most of the traps…it was actually a really irritating journey, filled with things I hate in games: platforms and traps and lengthy dungeons.  And it took about an hour, too.

Then I arrive in the magical park.  I fight a boss battle, am immediately named the new boss, then I wander around the park for a bit seeing the new sights and picking up side quests, as is the Bethesda way.

Then I receive notice that I have to defend one of my settlements so I immediately leave, only to arrive too late.  Then then game graphics got all screwy so I did a hard reboot.

Upon restart, the cloud sync deleted all my progress since I installed the DLC.  I abandoned the game in irritation.

Maybe I’m just getting old and impatient, or my standards are too high, but I note that many of my game experiences quickly terminate with a glitch or crash.  This is why I find Apple’s rallying cry so amusing: “It just works”.  And how true is that?  If things just worked as intended, then I could actually get around to enjoying and evaluating them.

This wouldn’t have been so bad, had that intro not been so painful and had my saves actually saved.  I guess I’ll consider this my $12 Fallout cure.  I turned off the Xbox and went to do something else.  I’m sure adventure still awaits, but let someone else do it.  I saved the Commonwealth and rebuilt civilization.  I retire.

–Simon

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *