Rejection: In a Zombie Apocalypse, the Important Thing is Heart

Something odd happens this session when I reload my save. The girl we briefly met last time talks to K-Ko. She asks if she's going somewhere again. Mariko, as I don't think she was properly introduced, it just sort of happened. K-Ko explains our current goal again, we have to go to the nuclear power plant. Mariko is lonely, and K-Ko just tells her not to worry. I can then walk out to her in-game, but this causes the same text. Only this time, her name is girl.

I know people probably expect me to make fun of this, and I kind of already did with this entry's title, but goofy as it is, it kind of works. Sure, it's annoying that we're focusing on the struggles of one single girl, when camps full of people have been tortured or killed by soldiers, but this is a small, easy to deal with problem. Zombies and soldiers are for practical purposes, impossible to fully eliminate outside of a small area. Unless you're taking out a town of 1,000, that's a lot of work and I think I've barely reached that in-game. This is Tokyo, which does not contain 1,000 people. Speaking of which, I guess I better get on lowering that number.

Now, where do I go next? I ponder this for a moment, before I joking think, yeah, the keep out area, that sounds right. Nuclear power plants certainly are keep out areas. Then I realize that might not be a bad idea. Last time I was coasting a bit at the end because where I had to go was straightforward, so I need to reopen my map and calculate my route. West of the camp, then down.

Wait a minute, these aren't zombies! Well, I need the XP anyway and...wait, this guy dropped a Beretta 93R. This is basically the burst fire version of the 92F, I think. A lot of games ignore this and make it autofire. The game stops while I try to ponder what I should replace this with. Ah, screw it, the Colt's not very useful at this point and I have the rocket launcher for special occasions. Let's test it out.

I made the right choice. It shoots short bursts, and it has no recoil. It has the usual range problem, of course. More interesting, I now have a rangefinder. I'm not quite sure what it exactly means since both numbers seem to jump around without necessarily corresponding to damage. Defense and offensive strength, maybe? Since I seem to do better damage against guys with lower first numbers. I realize it later, my rough damage and how much health is left.

If you look closely, the foregrip is up, which is incredibly rare in a video game.

In the next area the game stops again. Because one of these guys dropped a Steyr AUG. The question with this is what I'm going to give up for it. If you've seen Die Hard, you've seen this one, it was the gun the guy who was trying to avenge his brother was using. Generally speaking, despite getting close to being able to collect a pension, it's a futuristic-looking weapon, at least here in America, though that might not be as true as I think anymore. (Let me know if you want me to link information about real weapons whenever they come up) Let's hope there's not another new weapon, I think this is like the 5th new gun in two hours. Give me a chance to enjoy something.

I drop the Skorpion for it, let me tell you, it was a wise choice. The AUG here has no recoil and only uses six bullets per salvo. This is going to be great. Even if I do get hit more than I'd like against the mutants I find in the next area. They're still alive, apparently.

Now, the Keep Off Area, this is fairly straight forward, you start north and then continually go south with the occasional side tunnel, with nothing of value. A lot of enemies, who seem to mostly be at a fair pace with what I'm at now. A lot of cybernetic guys. So I keep going deeper without yet starting a map. This is unwise for reasons which will become clear. Nothing really threatens me, but I'm very aware that I need ammo now and can't just knife my way back. Everyone has a ranged attack now if they didn't before.

Somehow, I make it to the area I need to. It's just saying this is the nuclear power plant in a tone that says she's impressed. Or he. It doesn't sound like K-Ko. There's a voice so low under the music that I wonder why they even bothered. This is a weird area.

So, it's not a nuclear power plant apparently...it's a submarine nuclear power plant. I wonder if this is a misunderstanding that there's a difference between submarine and substation...but that would be confusing too. There are also these things that don't actually go after me, but are blocking me a bit. They're hard to hit too, but if you do hit them, you've just caused them all to get angry with you, so don't do that.

More enemies, I guess K-Ko really isn't that unique if everyone is running around with power armor. I don't notice anything special about them. The 93R doesn't really hurt them and the AUG doesn't work much better. The M60 all the way; Until...

I find a minigun. Actually, THE Minigun. The General Electric Minigun, the one they put on tanks and helicopters. 3000 ammo, but it seems to be a burst fire at about 24 with some being more. I definitely burned through a lot more than that rate would dictate. I'm not actually sure it's an upgrade over the M60, because quickly I find myself up against...

A tank. This tank is, unfortunately realistic. The guns I have are useless, I need to use the rocket launchers. Oh, and the LAW doesn't kill it. So I wander around the previous area, it's set up quite simply, I don't need a map for it since it's straightforward, four side rooms in a square hallway with one hallway seperating the halves. I then find a grenade launcher. It's basically a weaker rocket launcher with multiple shots. Still functions on launcher rules, run out of ammo and K-Ko tosses it, even though you can actually get more ammo for it. Weird.

The tank is just a mini-boss, because there's an elevator up and an ammo box. (And a levelup) There are more floors to this place. Which is unfortunate. These Coatwall guys, they don't take damage from a lot of guns, including the Minigun I just picked up. The M60 was damaging them, so that means that the Minigun isn't actually that good, but for now it also means the only gun I can use to take them out is the grenade launcher...because I gave up the AUG for that. Trust me, I'm reloading after some of these decisions.

On the second floor, I find this guy, and he has a lot to say. This is Lieutenant Colonel Misaki and he knows K-Ko's father, Colonel Kihara. He knows that she's been fighting a war since the meteor hit. A group of officers are dissatisfied with the current government's state of affairs, he's one of those officers. Originally, the plan was to not entangle ordinary people, but they should have known about the others intent; To blow up the nuclear reactor and probably use the nuclear arms on the submarine.

K-Ko is shocked at the nuclear arms bit and wonders their aim. (Do we really need to wonder about this when we thought they were blowing up a power plant?) He sort of ignores this to say that their opposition was put in confinement. K-Ko explains that she just came here after that. One of the things she overheard was that they were leaving after the explosion. He says he can't tell her the code, it's engraved in an artificial tooth. It'll have to be cut out. She says that's not necessary, she can destroy the handcuffs and they can go to the control room together. He says he can't, because they infected him with Kusomoanfitamin, and in a moment he'll change. He might be too powerful since he's an officer, so this is is last chance. K-Ko says she can't bear to do that, and he keeps insisting that she kill him.

Then he is killed, I presume by K-Ko and I get his Deringer, those old west self-defense guns which could have up to four barrels. This reminds me of the Resident Evil remake, except in this case you don't kill the guy, he kills himself and the gun doesn't suck there. Here it shoots two bullets at a time, and you only get six bullets. It doesn't really shoot that well either.

His desk has a memo. I don't know what it reads, but it's apparently from a researcher. Seriously, it's one massive string of nothing but Kanji at one point. Which gives me that feeling that I'm not missing anything by not reading it...except that it also says that it can be used to mind control people.

Moving onto the third floor, I don't find much until I meet this blue guy. I'd call him a blue oni, but once I start shooting him, he's a loser. That's his name, really. Might as well call him Blue Loser. He's a soldier, which is how he knows that K-Ko is wearing power armor. He's curious about how she got it, since it belongs to his organization. He also threatens to use the virus to bring her back to life. Naturally, K-Ko has an issue with that and it's boss time. I didn't catch it at the time, only later, but he mentions something odd, "You've come from Ichigatani", a name. Either hers or someone else's.

It's at this point that I've put myself in an unwinnable situation. I can hurt him with bullets, but by now I don't have enough ammo for him, and knifing is too weak. I'm not really sure how I can get past him because I need too many weapons and to hold onto too much ammo. Unless...I drop the Beretta for the grenade launcher, and pick up the Minigun after the tank.

So I reload a save back at the camp and decide to find an alternate route into the nuclear section. Because I don't want to get into a gun battle, which doesn't work out like I had hoped. Instead, I get a Calico M.100, which I didn't recognize at first since the only Calico I recognize is the pistol variant. In real life they're basically novelty items, because its cylindrical magazine is quite annoying to reload and has the rear sight. Which if you don't understand, means that every time you changed the magazine you didn't actually know where you were going to be shooting. Here, it's about the same as every SMG at this point, reliable, short bursts and low recoil. Not actually worth the change.

My only other real aspect to this plan is to get another level, possibly pointless, but every little bit helps. At least that's what I think until I fight the tank again at a higher level than before and barely get hurt. Still costs the rocket launcher and most grenades. It then occurs to me, well, the Deringer isn't going to help me...why don't I go back to where the soldiers are dropping free guns and pick up another AUG? Because K-Ko won't let me go out. I don't need to translate it to know why.

Finally I return to the Blue Loser, with full ammo. He takes the entire Minigun, all six Deringer shots, and most of my M60 ammo. Some weird messages popped up and he seemed to last a lot longer than he should have. What I think happened is that I missed something about the Deringer bullets being some sort of super anti-zombie weapon I should have finished this guy off with, but I managed to do it with the knife. Guess that level up really helped.

Now I can use the codes to deactivate the reactor or whatever. Which is what happens. I get another ID card, guess that leaves the third exit I saw back near the camp or maybe that room in the war college. Which means a trip back to the camp against ranged enemies while I have limited supplies. Also to see Mariko I guess. Goodie.

Only, on my trip back I can just use my knife, because the enemies here are only rarely hurting me. Consequently, my XP gain has fallen dramatically. Which I suspect is intended as an indicator that you shouldn't be wasting your time here anymore, much like with the sewers way back when. Instead it's the enemies in Shinjuku that cause me trouble. Weird.

The camp leader has more dialog. K-Ko tells him that she stopped the explosion. He congratulates her, but K-Ko can tell something is off with him. The army is starting to track down the camp. That means they can't gather supplies anymore, but they're okay on bullets. K-Ko decides that she should attack their base. K-Ko asks about this Ichigatani fellow. He was someone with the first army group sent in. There's not any more dialog with Mariko, oddly.

I'm not really sure how much longer this game is going to be, but logically we should be near the end. Mind you, my normal logic is a bit wonky here. We're getting endgame stage weapons, I'm about 5 levels away from level 20, a common endgame level, and it doesn't make much sense to have another hub at this point, and I only have two places left to go. Dunno which one leads to the army base I presumably need to take out, but just following the usual logic of going past the areas with things I can now successfully kill should work.

This Session: 3 hours 30 minutes

Total Time: 19 hours 00 minutes