Friday, August 12, 2016

No Man's Diary #2


Day Two
I spend the first hour or so continuing to explore Coyote Tango. Setting out from the Trading Post I'd parked at, I stumble almost immediately on an upgrade for my Exosuit, increasing my inventory space by one. It's the first of three I eventually find, though I fill them all with mechanical upgrades, leaving my actual carrying capacity entirely unchanged.

As I explore - mostly from the air now, which is faster but requires a lot more Plutonium with repeated takeoff - I come across a Manufacturing Plant, which has a door that needs to be blown open. My mining laser doesn't make a dent, so I wander off. By the time I realise I can switch the multitool into a combat mode, I've lost track of where I am, and can't find the door again.

I spend about another hour trying in vain to relocate the Plant, but just find more outposts and beacons, as well as enough alien sites to increase my known word count to over 30. Eventually I give up on ever finding the door again, and blast off to investigate the system's third and final planet.

The newly-christened Striker Eureka is a Paradise (the game's term, not mine), covered in vibrant red and green grass. It has an abundance of flora, nonexistent fauna, and the first oceans I've seen.

Also, very little plutonium, I quickly learn.

It has lots of outposts, though, and I discover that landing either on a pad or next to one of the glowing orange ship beacons doesn't require fuel for takeoff, so I start using those and explore on foot a bit more.


I find another new multitool in one of the outposts, but my current one still feels "new", so I can't bear to part with it yet. In another outpost, a robot points a glistening needle at my face and requests something called a "brain excavation". I politely decline, and lose some reputation with his faction. I consider this an acceptable trade for keeping my brain where it is.

Follow beacons and ? icons leads me to more alien ruins, some beneath the sea. I can't hold my breath for very long, but discover that I can dive deeper and more quickly by flying my jetpack as high as it'll go and doing into the water. There's more eerie fungus (green, this time) at the bottom of a lake.

I eventually find an upgrade for my multitool that's enough to tempt me; though it's expensive, it has grenades, and I experiment with explosive landscaping. The bedrock proves somewhat indestructible, but I'm able to dig a bit of a tunnel, reminding myself of the Artilleryman from War of the Worlds.

On my next visit to the system's space station, I discover that I can interact with other ships at landing pads, and as well as regular old item trading, I can put in an offer to buy the ship! Definitely going to keep an eye out for nicer rides parked nearby in future.

Might need to start stockpiling units.

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