I am trying something new with this post, which is to bold some of my review or theory commentary (review in this case) so that you can just read that if you’d rather skip the rest of the play-by-play. Also, pictures!

Starting out again I get a little distracted in the workshop. The whole place seems so messy, yet due to the location of crafting stations and the name “Sanctuary” I have the impression it is to be a home base of sorts. So I go about scrapping material and setting furniture back in the right locations in the houses. Then I decide the place could use a little defense so I start to build a gatehouse. It is very difficult to line up all the components and face things the proper direction, and not only is the crafting intimidating, it also clashes with the narrative a bit to walk around and instantaneously construct things. I almost wish I could lay the plans out more smoothly in overhead view and have my robot construct them.

Before I know it, it is night again, and I work into the night trying to line up different wall sections to start forming a fence around the neighborhood. About 3 a.m. a storm hits that turns quickly into some sort of radiation storm. It’s actually somewhat frightening even beyond the rad damage in a way, and I rush inside just in case it gets worse. I decide to sleep through it and wake up with a nice Well Rested perk for the next leg of my journey.

At the truck stop down the road I meet the dog that was a promised companion from all the advertising material. Just in time, because this is also the location of the first somewhat challenging fight as a swarm of mole rats attack. I’m pretty good with a gun so I don’t take much damage, but I have to actually move back a bit. I feel somewhat concerned for the dog’s safety so I try to pick off mole rats in VATS as they get close to it.

After that excitement follows exploration of the truck stop and a fairly calm walk into Concord. There’s a lot of boarded up buildings, but those still open have some good loot. A mutated deer with two heads wanders into town and I keep my distance (I’m flush with food by now anyway). I walk through an empty playground and work my way into a workhouse with still more loot before finally approaching the quest marker at the museum.

A man calls down something I can’t quite make out from the balcony about raiders and a laser rifle. I first think raiders are coming down the street but VATS gives me nothing, so I look around and find the rifle and other loot on two fresh bodies, then head inside.

This is the most difficult battle as it takes me a bit to realize I have to charge up the laser rifle to even fire it each time (there was a message but I misread it). I do some damage but have taken half my HP, so I duck behind a column and trade shots with some raiders. Fortunately they come to me and I switch to my pistol and put them down easily. Exploring reveals no other raiders for awhile, but interesting patriotic paraphernalia and a museum exhibit. I was a bit confused looking for the upper floor so I walked right in on two raiders. I try to shoot through a hole in the wall that VATS said was a high percentage chance of success but missed. There seems to be a slight problem with environmental obstructions and VATS chance to hit not quite lining up. Out of action points I’m not quite so good in a firefight, but managed to come through.

Surprising the two outside the barricaded door is easy, and they both die in the middle of raising their arms to strike my dog. Here I have my first real conversation with another person, Preston Garvey, who explains the Minutemen, a kind of local protective militia. The civilians with him look scared, and I’m asked to help get a power core from the basement to plug into some power armor and scare off the raiders.

I agree to help, though I do go about my typical looting strategy. Maybe because I took awhile to get the core, one woman says “These are our lives you’re playing with!” That kind of stings, so I hurry to the roof. As I am about to exit, the old lady says something terrible is coming our way and it is angry, or something along those lines. I get up to the roof and get the power armor. It is somewhat exciting stepping into it. I never wore power armor in the other Fallout games, and I never expected to get some this this soon.

I grab the minigun as raiders swarm below. Perhaps a bit brazenly, I fire in their direction, hoping to scare them off, but even though I take one out they are not scared. Then I remember the informational message about not taking falling damage so I jump off the roof and head towards them. It is exhilarating crashing to the ground and taking out one after the other with almost no damage to myself. I get to feeling a bit invincible. Explosions set off around me as I walk through the carnage.

Then in a flash of one explosion I see a deathclaw. It has a skull icon above it which I know means it is way above my level… even if I hadn’t had previous experience with them in other games. Other raiders are fighting for their lives and being torn to shreds by it. Is this random? Bad luck that the fight lured it? Am I supposed to actually fight this thing? I turn all my concentration it’s direction, not wanting to get too close, alternating VATS and firing blindly. More explosions take its health down much more than my shots and I’m starting to think I’m dead. But finally it’s health is dwindling. It’s limping towards me much more slowly, maybe a crippled leg. I go to finish it off, but I’m out of ammo. I know it’s still a threat, and I don’t really know what to do until I remember I have some grenades. So I backpedal, tossing grenades at the menacing creature as it lumbers after me, and finally it dies.

After looting, I return to the minuteman and the civilians. We talk. The old lady seems to have visions and says my son is alive, giving me a place to start looking. I humor her and listen. [It actually isn’t until later, writing this down, that I realize she may have actually predicted the deathclaw.] Preston says they are heading to Sanctuary. The old lady’s visions led them there. I walk with them in my power armor. It feels right to guard them on their way, even though the old lady tells me to go find my son as we are leaving. I want to get out of the armor at Sanctuary anyway.

Along the way, they comment about the region, about a statue of the original minutemen, they complain and they worry. I build them some beds when they reach sanctuary. I know I probably don’t have to, but I space the beds out so they can each have different houses. I put an extra one in my former house, a little sentimentality that sometimes comes over me in games. My character sleeps. Well rested bonuses can make a difference in these games, and I like that it encourages sleep even in the absence of something like the New Vegas survivor mode.