Journal entry 9: Journey's end

Seeing as how I've been playing periodically during a prolonged house move, I've been playing more than I've been blogging.  As such, this post sees the end of a lovely little adventure.  I've enjoyed this on the whole but I've found it far harder to inject any personality into Sir Vaulter than I ever did into Dragonbjorn, mostly because there are fewer avenues for me to abuse simple game mechanics.  Despite Skyrim literally being under threat of attack at all times by a fire breathing dragon, Fallout's world was far grittier, far more desperate and far less easy to poke fun at.

And yes, I do know you can put grenades in people's trousers.  But come on, I'm not above dick jokes but I'm very much above the levels of You've Been Framed slapstick involved in that.  I do have some standards, they're just imcomprehensible.

So, let's start from the beginning.  Let's start with a man who was very rude to me.

Let's start with a very stupid man who turned his back on an armed mercenary whom he had recently personally insulted.  That's what happens Roy.

I then came across an unusual light fixture.  Got to be honest, I'm not into this.  It seems a little too "welcome to the fortress of dooooom!" for my liking.  You can't trust people who use the word "doom" too much.  They're either way too into random humour or trying too hard to intimidate.  Either way, this is a lot of effort for very little overall output and I'm just not impressed.

I realise that "Nuka Cola is a comically bad and unethical company" is the entire gag behind this dungeon but I love this.  I love that the company has a standard condolences package and that they compensate the bereaved with cheese.  I liked writing that sentence.  In fact, just the phrase "bereaved with cheese" almost has me smiling.  I really want to find one of these packages just to see how impressive they are.

Oh good.  They also come in blueberry.  A bastard for every flavour.  Can't wait for the cinnamon ones which breathe fire 'cause why not?

Well... yeah, I mean I guess that's crippled.  Not by the literal definition, sure, but it's functionally accurate.  So is everything else but let's not split hairs for once.

It's funny and all but a sign like this would really make me watch my step more than the bland warning signs we get in this day and age.  Look at that guy, he's having an awful time, probably broken his glasses and everything.  I don't want to be him.  I'd better watch where I put my big stupid feet.

Sir Vaulter has become a militarised Ned Flanders.  I think the sunglasses scream "suave" while the wispy moustache suggests "but don't let your kids play near his house".

I am upset at my lack of ability to put an ace of spades in the band on the helmet.  However, thanks to a tireless modding community, I bet there's an add-on that lets me do it.  There's probably a mod to give the helmet breasts or to attach a pair of balls to my rifles, too.  The Internet's great.

A very elegantly organised survivalist hovel.  I'm quite stunned actually, this is more organised than my own kitchen and that's indoors.  Doesn't it ever get windy here?  There are helicopters all over the place and very little shelter.

Ah, level 20.  Well, I'm as good as I can physically be.  Where do we go from here?

Infinite "press c to win" points?  Don't mind if I do, actually.

In the future, people are going to take the Nikola Tesla aesthetic and they are going to run with it so hard that they're not only in the end zone, they're out of the entire stadium.  Like a Raygun Gothic Forrest Gump.  I'd watch that.

Is Raygun Gothic half the point of the Fallout 3 world?  Arguably the other half is categorised by TV Tropes as crapsack world.  I guess they can overlap.

I like the idea of a surgeon with a rocket launcher.  Good for appendectomies.  Appendectomies and fending off malpractice lawsuits.

You couldn't get any more of a mad scientist look if you tried.  And really, none of this machinery does anything.  The guy's trying to control ghouls or something, I fail to see how giant Jacob's ladder style machinery is going to help.  Surely that's a terrible use of electricity.  But hey, with this demolished population and all the nuclear power we're slinging around here, I suppose the energy crisis is the least of anyone's concerns.  Dying of cancer by age 25 is likely a bigger deal.

For all the evil they've done, you can't deny that Vault-Tec really did help.  Kind of.  I mean, there'd be fewer people without them so that's got to count for something.  I can't say I'm sympathising exactly but... they did better than no Vault-Tec at all.

It bothers me that I can kill all manner of things, pilot a giant suit of powered armour, wield any weapon with reasonable skill, open locked safes without keyholes using a bobby pin, hack computers by guessing their passwords telepathically but yet stealing a helicopter is out of the question.  I want that helicopter.  I want it so badly.

This is the only person in history who has spoken to me like this in a video game and walked away.  Kudos Mel, you're the 1%!

It was mostly because it was funny to watch him piss himself.  Ha!

As a meeting room it's very effective but I've got two main questions here:
Why would you shine the lights directly in the faces of the people who are meeting?
If there's very little clean water, what's in the coffee cups?  Do they just have the cups to remind themselves of a better time?

Star Paladin Cross.  Nope, I don't like that.  That's an elf name.  You may be keeper of the ARM but I'm Sir Vaulter Raleigh, keeper of the BOOT.  Namely the one that's going straight up your lute-playing, tree watching arse.

Liberty Prime was kind of cool.  Unfortunately, I can't get over how much I'm bothered that they balanced a cup on the computer.  This is how you ruin computers, it's really basic stuff!  Come on guys, you're meant to be the best!

The brotherhood of steel let me steal all of their guns and didn't get upset at all.  We're friends now.  That's how you keep me from killing you, you let me take everything you own with any material or emotional value.

It's not a great relationship, admittedly.  I won't kill you but I will keep coming back for more stuff at a later date.  It's kind of a protection racket, really.

Was the robot programmed with a need to creatively express itself or did it pick that up over time?  Do they feel angst?  Sorrow?  Is this how Marvin started?

Fancy digs, but again with the spotlight in the face problem.

Suited and booted now.  This is all looking pretty nice.  That unarmed bandits continued to charge towards me with nail bats amuses me.  That they're still moderately effective does not.

You cannot travel to Foggy Bottom and this saddens me greatly.

I'm glad the future has pedantic nerds.  As technology marches on, I suppose we're going to become ever more numerous.  I'm also feeling that there's a very distinct, non-zero chance of a future Bethesda character of mine being named Mastadonald because that's pretty baller.

In a world with computers, we're still using typewriters.  No, I don't think I want to subscribe to this future.  Not one bit.

Sir Vaulter attempts to compete with Dragonbjorn for the "most metal pose" title.  He failed spectacularly but he's still an individual with whom you would not wish to fuck.  Downside is it's going to take hours to take all that gear off.  Plus side, he seems to sleep in it, which should be setting fire to his bed with all that arcing electricity.  Still, it's nice to find a style that's uniquely yours.

Auditions for the live action "Mr Tickle" adaptation did not go well.  Mostly because that's not a thing, Sir Vaulter just crept around and goosed people to death for a while.

Three Dog pulls of the "comically full of myself" thing without being too annoying.  I kind of took to him after a while.  It turns out that I hate having companions but I do like having someone chat to me without getting in my way.  Rock on, Three Dog.  You're probably only alive because you have a quest and killing you would have incurred karma loss, but you're alright by me.

Hey, another of those big guys!

Nope.

It's funny how much architecture got ruined but the statues largely survived.  Maybe a vault made of bronze would have worked out pretty well, even above ground.  Sure, radiation is a problem but apart from that.

Tiny Car!

I'm not allowed to steal this, either.  Might be for the best, I can't be responsible around almost anything, this would just let me be a horrible felon much faster.

Aaand another doofy dog.  Still loving these guys.  They're so much cooler than Dogmeat.

Seeing all the exposed scaffolding makes it look like a cheap sci-fi prop.  I like that.  I'm not really up on what the monument really means to Americans but it's an impressive presence on the horizon.

Oh, I have GOT to get in on this.  But then, I'm not that familiar with my colon to be brutally honest.  It's like milk, you may not be necessarily 100% sure of the entire process involved in getting it from the cow into those plastic containers in the fridge at the supermarket but you're glad that it all happens.

Y'know, like pooping.  That's what I'm getting at.

I'm trying to decide if this is some kind of socio-political commentary.  I don't think it is, but you can read almost anything into anything, right?  Kind of poignant in a really blunt way.  Hmm.

Please do not ride the minigun.  It has many moving parts.  Not that you people have genitals, but you'll ruin your thighs.

You wouldn't expect the brain to remain that intact, considering his head was literally blown open.

Okay, glad I found this.  You'd think that the last bastion of human civilisation would have a bigger office somehow.  It doesn't even have parking.  I don't trust a place without parking.

How many of these did they make?  I hope it's just a cheap replica.  Those things don't look cheap to produce and they can't be mass producing them in bulk then painting the numbers on.

Words cannot describe my hatred of these.  These things were more trouble to me than any number of power armoured soldiers and they were so, so numerous in downtown DC.  Bollocks to the lot of them.

I really should photoshop some piles of cocaine into this image.

Grafitti tagging your cool guy hideout is what seperates an organised militia from a rabble of vigilantes.  And not in a good way.

They do, however, have an excellent threat deterrent in place.

So I've got one nuclear slingshot.  I add another nuclear slingshot.  We chop and change the parts using our self taught knowledge of gun repair which we picked up by fixing pistols and body armour and we kind of mash the two together with tape and a ball peen hammer.

I'm only a danger to myself here.  942 damage is going straight into my face.

Now that I really look at the light fixture, it's not that dirty.  He's just humping her thigh.  That doesn't look satisfying for either of them.

90S ACTION MOVIE POSTERRRRRR!

I'm sure if I were American, this would also be very meaningful indeed.  As it stands, I'm more caught up on how many rotundas are in DC.  I'd never even read the word "rotunda" prior to playing this and I'm loving how much use I'm getting out of it.

Bloody mess never quite gets old.  Dragonbjorn needs it.  That's the only thing that would have made my time in Skyrim more offensive.

A book on lies and some bottlecaps behind the main podium in congress!  I AM ASTOUNDED!

Really, this is laying it on a bit thick, even for someone like me who only has a passing interest in poltics at best.

I can't imagine this being as interesting as people seem to think it'll be.  It's very short, too.  There's a year in there, tops, and chances are it's not going to contain any of the really juicy stuff.

This, however.  I'm all over this.  The Great Emancipator sounds like a pretty badass name for a hero, just the kind of guy that'd have an action figure with kung-fu moves and posable limbs.  HYA!

Wouldn't this run on black powder?  That I was able to fire it at all was a bit of a mystery.  I don't think this stuff is authentic at all.

Okay, yeah, this is where the ghouls live.  They're really reinforcing that whole "we're not evil, we're just being oppressed by a race of bigots" thing.  I will grant you, the underworld was the most obviously habitable place in the museum but you'd think they'd decorate a bit and not make it look like the kind of place that Conan would break into looking for things to steal and have sex with.

Yep, skulls, big chamber, I get it.  Spooky.

For all that they complain about being oppressed, they sure do like the word Smoothskin.  I can't think that it's being used as a term of endearment.  I'm going right off these guys, y'know.  Doesn't help that they look a bit like falmer.

Oh no, more racism.  Speciesism?  What... kind of discrimination is this?  I mean, they all have a kind of advanced medical condition so I suppose us normies are ablist?  Yeah, I can handle that.

Now this is nice.  I could get used to this.  Shame it's water and therefore irradiated, but it's nice all the same.

DOOF TROOP READY FOR DUTY!

This is a level of detail that I'm really pleased with.  They could have Lorem Ipsum'd this, it wouldn't have been a big deal, or just had it damaged.  But nope, it's all there.  Presumably.  I've never been as far north as DC.

Prior to playing this, I would have used the word dome.  Now I can only refer to these things as rotundas.  This is going to get me in trouble, I know it is, and it'll leave me open to a lot of "well actually"s but I don't care.  I'm having this word.

This lady was lovely.  I had a little chat with her, she helped me kill a few things when we were inexplicably under siege, she helped me to find a shortcut through a quest and you know what?  She largely stayed out of my way, was good at sneaking and didn't try to talk about politics, didn't try to tell me I was behaving in an immoral fashion and told me very little about her personal business, she just got on with the killing and was happy for me to loot everything.

I will make her my bride.

Except that nobody is allowed to ally with me.  Not ever.  Sydney, you knew the risks before you joined team Vaulter.  The spirit of Dragonbjorn runs deep within him.  You were not worthy of our combined glory.

I reloaded to bring her back to life because sometimes I like to pretend that I have the divine ability to resurrect the dead, but mostly I didn't want to fudge the quest.  Shortly after, Clunky the Dickbot stepped up, inserted a laser directly into her chest and just let rip.

Look at her expression.  It was about the same as mine at the time.

I hate those fucking robots.

Sirrah, you have the devil's courage to approach me and say such incendiary things directly to my face.  You had best have an apology prepared for I will tolerate NO SUCH SLURS.  You come to me, the saviour of this colonial hellhole and directly insult our royal majesty?!

No!  No, this will not stand!

YOU BROUGHT THIS ON YOURSELF, CUR!

I killed a super mutant while it was peeking through a door.  It got its head stuck.  Considering I shot it with a magnum, I'm surprised it had that much head left.

So I took a quick snap from the side to emphasise how goofy this looked.  He clearly wasn't moving.

Sydney got on board to pose for selfies.  I'm really loving this woman's style.  She thinks like I do.  It's a shame that you can't marry in the wasteland because I'd have shacked up with her in a New York minute.  Of course, all the priests are dead except that guy from the church of atom so... marriage probably isn't a big priority.  You know, over survival and trying to propagate the species when half the population has likely been rendered sterile by radiation exposure,

The bad ghoul man wanted me to kill Tenpenny.  He was the only guy I wasn't allowed to talk it out with but thankfully he isolates himself a lot so nobody knew what a terrible thing I'd done.  I decided to carefully dispose of the body and was next to a very convenient pit.  Off the edge with you, then!  Well, after I took his trousers.  Chap has a bit of a bulge there, now that I look.

I then jumped off after Tenpenny to see if his body hit the ground.  I fell a few storeys then died by getting my arm stuck in a closed window.  I died suspended from my arm and I broke it so hard that it killed me.  I'm not sure what this powered armour is even doing.  You'd hope it could have suspension to cushion my ill advised short cuts but you'd be disappointed.

Piles of money and empty bottles of booze doesn't suggest "I'm a wealthy playboy and I'm ever so gangsta".  It suggests "I can't tidy up after myself since I moved out of my mum's place".

A lot of rappers would do well to remember that.

You must have a real party going on downstairs 'cause up top you've got a Karl Pilkington thing going on.  How exactly do you define "too much man", anyway?  Did one of them tell you no a time too many and you assumed she was spent rather than just tired of your advances or something?  I don't like how this guy operates.

But yet I can't fault him for his decor and Sir Vaulter respects a keen sense of style.  This is tasteful and clever.  It works on a lot of levels.

I turned off collision detection and walked into the wall to see if the back half of the cow was behind this plaque.  It wasn't.

Why do you keep giving me these opportunities?  This is going to be worse than Highwater Trousers, isn't it?  It's people like me that started this war so I suppose it had better be people like me that'll finish it.

You're seriously willing to consider this.  Wow.  That's got to incur karma loss.

Power armour so amazing it's got to be kept in glowy blue energy.  I'm definitely the right person to be wearing this.

It could do with a bit more reinforcing around the crotch but apart from that, it's pretty nifty.  Shame is doesn't increase my carrying capacity.  It's like a man-shaped vehicle after all.

Ladies!  Art thou prepared!  Gird thy loins for Sir Vaulter is out on the prowl!

I'm upset that the powdered wig offers no protection whatsoever because I'm rather liking it.

A scientist got stuck inside the corpse of a deathclaw and ran on the spot for a while.  I watched with middling interest but he didn't seem to be planning to achieve much more that this so I shot him.  I don't have time for lollygaggers.

Lollygag sounds dirty now that I'm an adult.  Just think about it for a second.

These bastards!  These are the things that made me ragequit my first playthrough all those years ago!  Well guess what Sonny Jim, I've got power armour now.  And all the guns!  You're nothing to me now!  I'm going to ride you and I'm going to make you thank me for it!

Get squealing, asshole.

They look pretty cool when you frenzy them.  I got a lot of pleasure from this.  An awful lot of pleasure.  Very cathartic indeed.

So I'm consenting to be injected with a physical enhancer which will mutate me.  This is literally what it's designed to do.  This guy has genetically engineered ants using FEV to breathe fire and I'm letting him shoot me up with magic science sauce.

He's injecting me with FEV, isn't he?  This is how everything went wrong!  Literally everything apart from the nukes, this is what happened and I'm about to drop my britches and take it like a trooper!

It's like I'm not learning anything.

I got tired of looking for the kid that gives the quest in the end so I made a new one.  They seemed happy to interact.  The problem is that I also had a little problem with laziness when I got to Rivet City and was told to go alllll the way back to town to tell the kid he was okay to stay there so I... made a third one.  There are three of these kids now.  I hope that's not going to be a problem for their foster mum.  Or their psychological health.

We'll just file that under "somebody else's problem" because I have all the loot from this quest now and I don't care about this child's problems while there's no discernible profit to be made from their suffering or lack thereof.  I don't need karma now that I've maxed it out.  I'm not trying to be Ghandi here.

Well, that's not creepy.  There was a bed down here.  It's like Helga's cupboard from Hey Arnold down here but without the preteen sexual overtones.

Or was I reading too much into that show?

Here, the US military shows us the correct way to store live incendiaries.  A great big pile.  I hope Dc doesn't experience many earthquakes, fires, robberies...

Now you're just going out of your way to upset me.  I should be able to plop down a grenade in here and create an explosion you can see from orbit.

After all this time, I've only just realised how rusty the needles are on stimpacks.  I basically drink these things now because I used endurance as a dump stat.  Is lockjaw a solved problem in the wasteland?  It seems like the only medicine we have here is stimpacks, there's no penicillin or anything.

Here's your classic "insanity means never having to press the space bar" interpretation of someone getting a little upset.  Not enough marbles left to punctuate but more than enough to express themselves, even if they're a little intense in what they're saying.

Do people do that when they're stood on the bleeding edge of a serious mental health problem?  You know, I bet some people do.  It must be terrifying.

I know I'm supposed to be concerned with the undefined death code, being the one that was used when dozens of people were FEV'd to death, but it was the phrase "sudden death syndrome" which caught my eye.  And looking it up, it's totally a thing.  I didn't have any idea!  It's apparently most commonly attributed to heart attacks though and I fixed one of those with stimpacks so I'm a little suspicious.

If you zoom in here, you'll clearly see what I was going for.  Grunting out a deuce, mostly.  Plasma weapons raise some unique questions.  If I crit with them, the opponent melts.  I'm fine there.  They usually melt before their armour but maybe creatures are less cohesive than armour.

How I'm able to pick up the armour afterwards is what's really bothering me.  Unless I'm slathering myself in the goo as a kind of protective shell.

Well, this is one slight power outage away from being hilarious.

All the best future science is powered by glowy blue stuff.  Keeps your armour pristine, keeps serial murders stuck, keeps deathclaws asleep.  Does the alien blaster fire blue stuff?  I think it does.  Blue is a powerful colour.

You can't tell me all this stuff fit in that locker.  I should take the literal locker, it'll take care of all my personal storage problems.

So the president is a computer.  I can't claim to be incredibly shocked because he never stops broadcasting on the radio.  But then, neither does Three Dog.  He got all kinds of genocidey, more even than I tend to, and I started to get a little upset about his motives.  It really did secure the thought in my mind that Team America wasn't entirely on the side of good here.  The problem is, I like them, I think they're well written, they have justification for their actions and actually seem to think they're doing the right thing for the right reasons.  It's hard to completely say that I think they're evil even though I disagree with their methods because these are hard times.  Maybe we do need someone to put their foot down and exert a bit of force.

Then I noticed it was possible to talk him into killing himself.

So that was easy.  Fun, too.  He wouldn't shut up about the magic science juice he wanted me to poison the world with.  Still, he didn't seem too bothered about my intentions once I had it.  I'm a little uncomfortable with just carrying it, I take a lot of blunt trauma and I don't think this stuff is too fussy about who it infects, one crack in the glass and I'm a pile of goo on the floor, but health and safety ceased to exist quite some time ago.  I may as well be running with scissors for all the difference it'll make at this point.

I thought this would be a happy little friend who'd help me with my enclave killing.

I was very, very wrong.  I was wrong in every conceivable way.

At this point, I'm revelling in the things I'm undoubtedly going to be blamed for.  I haven't blown up a whole building yet and I've let off at least two precision-aimed missile strikes.  This is a new personal best.  It's a shame that I was at level 20 because I just killed a lot of people.  That's good exp.

Well, that's rude.  He didn't move at all.  Didn't even blink.  I'm not sure what he thought he was doing but she soldiered on very admirably.

I know I'm supposed to love liberty prime.  He was impressive, had some good lines, was very destructive and basically invincible, threw nukes... still, I couldn't get over two fairly big problems while I was following in his wake.

I think I could have killed those guys faster myself
I wanted to ride in him

I know a lot of people say that video games are empowerment fantasies and yes, I do recognise that it's satisfying to mow through a whole troop of enemies who are offering only a token resistance when I've spent many hours working myself up to become a force of nature but I don't really look for that in a game.  I want a decent narrative and an engaging world.  Maybe just some really fun game mechanics.  I just wasn't that interested in following the destroyer of worlds and letting him do all the stuff that I was already good at.  Hell, I could have just fast travelled to the memorial that he was cutting his way towards.  I'm not sure he was even incredibly necessary when you get down to it.

Up until now I've really been enjoying the experience so I can't gripe, but I could have done without this chap really.  Maybe something a bit more interactive than this cinematic bit.

Then he blew my arm off to make me start paying attention to how amazing he was.

Well played, liberty.  I've done worse to plenty of people for far less and with less provocation.  I can't really say anything here.

A completely unmanned vertibird.  And still I can't steal it.  This would have been a much better way to get to the rotunda, surely?

As we got close to the end of the game, the objective got all indecisive.  I like "Or not.".  It's so wonderfully passive aggressive.  Like "yeah, you could do that.  It's the kind of thing someone like you would do, isn't it?  Or you could not, that's what a person would do if they weren't a monster.  But sure, you have a choice."

At this point, it seemed like a good time to do a little housekeeping so I went home for a bit.

Yep, that worked out well last time, didn't it?  I'm going to say it again and I know I've said it before but it bears another mention.  Some of us grew up, Butch.

I really want to see this kid work his way to the surface and get his arse absolutely handed to him by a mole rat.  I want to see him run back to the vault in tears.  I want all his friends to be there and I want them to laugh.  I want to see all of this and I want to record it.

Well, I see nothing wrong here.  You just rock on, buddy, you've clearly got this doctor situation on lockdown.

There was an option to ask him to heal me.  He refused.  I've spoken to a few people who gave me unique dialogue options for my having a high intelligence or a high medicine skill.  I'm surprised I was willing to allow this thing anywhere near me considering it can't even cut a cake.  I mean, even I can cut a cake and I can barely hold a pen.

I'm not sure if this is subversive grafitti or an art statement.  Work sure is work though.  I'm glad we cleared that one up.  I'm sure it's a statement on the drudgery and oppression that everyone in this vault experiences on a daily basis but I wasn't in a sympathetic mood at this point.

I have picked master crafted locks.  I routinely carry a rocket launcher and an entire picnic cooler full of grenades.  I am the single most powerful and dangerous individual in this world.  Why is this sign having any effect?

The enclave could have taken project purity right now if they put up a few of these around the Jefferson memorial.  That'd have foxed all of us.  "Can't fast travel to this location because it'd be breaking the rules".  Yep, can't get around that.

Once I finished the collection, I was left wondering where I got the stand from.  Most companies would just make a little glass case to display things like this, I don't see why I need a free standing 3 foot tall lump of metal to store these things.  A bookcase would have been fine, that's how I present my trinkets in my own home.

And we finish on a powerful image depicting freedom or something.  I don't know.

I wasn't super into the ending, I gather that it's a common sentiment, but I'm glad that they didn't feel the need to absolutely make it a happy ending.  I'm okay that Vaulter canonically has to die, it's very noble and to go out as a martyr also absolves me of all responsibility.  I've killed and stolen many things and now I absolutely can't be held accountable for any of my actions!  Plus, if there is a heaven, I have enough karma banked to get a cushy government job when I arrive there!

So overall this was a pretty fun experience.  Not as goofy as Skyrim and I rather wanted that.  It's easier to write about silly things, even if they're not meant to be silly.  Still, it did have its funny moments and I liked the gritty aspects of it.  It made the world a lot more immersive and the constant desperation and scrabbling for gear in the beginning really hammered home the "you're literally rooting through filth just like everyone else" angle.  It felt more profound.  The world's still full of utter bastards too, I couldn't save the entire world and I couldn't fix every problem.  Slavers still steal kids, people still kill for food.  One man can't save everything even if I have improved things.

Yeah, I actually feel good about that.  Satisfied.

G'bye Sir Vaulter.  It was good to have known you.

Thought for the day

It's amazing how well stealth continues to work while you're listening to the radio.  The pip-boy didn't have a headphone jack, I'm sure it was just a set of speakers on the unit.  That little computer is truly the greatest mystery of the modern world.

It's probably interfacing with my brain in the same way that the targeting system does.

What the fuck, VATS.