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This is an observation about Sandstorms.
After driving driving for 1100 kilometres, I had seen sandstorms couple of times in the distance, however, no more than 20 times I think, so they aren't a common occurrence. Turns out, that is a good thing.
I previously held a belief they are just a visual impairment, should you get into one. It is a bit hard to see inside one, but once you're out, life goes on like it always did. At around 1089 kilometres traveled, I encountered one on the road, and armed with my presumptions, decided to just drive through it.
There was a slight downhill, so my bike started to pick up speed. Wait a minute, it is picking way more speed than it should... Ok, this is unnatural amount of speed picked up in a downhill, send help! Oh it stopped, phew, maybe that was just a glitc... I'm moving backwards? Uphill? This vehicle doesn't even physically have a reverse gear! Now I'm in the air, this vehicle doesn't even physically have wings!
So yes... Turns out, the sandstorm starts to throw you around wildly, while you're in it. This might be more pronounced in my case, since I'm using one of the lightest vehicles in the game. At best I estimate I was flying in the air at speed of 100km/h, at height of 3-story building.
Multiple hard hits to the ground were experienced, at a speed which I know for sure would have left a bloody mark on a car's windshield. Also while being thrown around in this big natural tumble dryer, every single part of my moped was stripped away, with the exception of the compass I had bolted above the headlight and the sausage I had hanging from the handlebar.
Now, this is a bit of a meta-gaming thinking: I think the moped and the motorcycle was introduced after the health bar system? Before the health bar, the game had a health switch; Either you were alive or you were dead. Alive was the normal state, dead occurred when either a bunny touched you or you crashed hard into something after previously crashing hard into something (having a bloodstain in the windshield and then crashing again). However, if the moped and motorcycle were added after the health bar replaced the health switch, there was no reason to program in the health switch to them, but neither there is gradual health bar loss from crashes programmed in for them, so maybe that is why I was still alive after being thrown around by that sandstorm like a ragdoll, hitting stuff hard enough multiple times so badly it stripped off every single bolted piece of my moped.
Now, this is bit of a game challenge philosophy: I am playing this save with dead-is-dead mentality, meaning, if I die, I delete the save. For that, I also have a rule of no save scumming, which means, if situation looks bad, I can't load a previous save and continue like nothing happened. Following this rule, and seeing my bike was now completely dismantled, in the middle of a desert, I should not load a previous save to get myself out of this situation.
However, I did. My reasons for allowing this was the following: I was able to find both wheels of the bike, so I could have continued my journey as if nothing happened. Of course, I had lost every other piece of the moped (mirrors, headlight, speedometer, etc), but they are not essential for the operation of the vehicle. My survival and well-beign was not challenged by any means after recovering the wheels. But, one of my scientific researches was. I am trying to see how long the road is, according to the odometer. I have driven straight on the road, without taking any detours or alike, and that distance is saved on the og. odometer I have on the bike. And the odometer was thrown to God-only-knows-where during the storm. So... That was my reason for loading from a save in this particular situation.
I didn't know sandstorms had that bad of an effect when you're on a moped. I've experienced several really bad storms but nothing strong enough to pick me up. Used to have a "storm chaser" save where I outfitted a Dacia as a storm chasing rig.
So yeah, the sandstorms are nothing to sneeze at (see what I did there), and now I'm getting some ideas for experiments, i.e. walking into them or flying on a broom into one.
By the way, epic job so far. I still can't believe you've made it this far in TLD without dying.
One thing to note:
Getting blood on the moped is possible. I myself have experienced this when I downloaded the "fast pedal" mod and played around with it. After crashing into a pole at over 100 km, every part fell off and my blood was all over the handlebars.
I have been giving this thought recently. It is rather intriguing. I certainly am observing the same behavioral patterns with the temper and physical characteristics with the teeth of the rabbits. However, I have one further thought to inject into this:
We have the radio host making that passing regard to a person who "started to make pig-like noises after eating two slabs of bacon" or something along those lines. Now I am making two presumptions about specific realities, however, they are relatively passable to get to the present situation:
1. The Bacon has mutagenic properties. When you consume the pig bacon, you will, over time, grow pig-like features.
2. The rabbits, either through forcing or through natural occurrence, have consumed the pig bacon.
Theorizing these two events have happened, and consumption of pig bacon by the rabbits has happened, it would explain one event as well; When a rabbit spots you, it will turn to face you, stand on its hind legs, and... Make a squealing noise? This is eerily reminding me of that radio host mentioning the person starting to make pig-like noises after consuming too much pig bacon.
I previously made calculations on the Pig Apocalypse Bacon Factory and how much bacon they are producing per day, minimum. However, one thing I did not mention there, but which now caught my attention after thinking about this: Their radio "advertisement" says something along the lines "You have probably seen some of our products during your travels...". I presume from the way they portray this, that they are intentionally leaving their products (the bacon) along common travel routes. It is not like we have functional shops or anything, so they would be referring to the bacon we just find lying around in the world, which they have intentionally left there.
Now, it is known that most herbivore animals, such as rabbits, are also opportunistic carnivores. Meaning, they eat mostly plant-based food, but won't shy away from meat, should an opportunity, or necessity, present itself. Necessity such as... Living in a dead desert, with not much anything but a slice of bacon, left there by somebody, to eat. From this perspective, it is possible for the rabbits to have consumed the pig bacon, which would cause them to take pig-like features, such as squealing, more aggressive behaviour, and growing to a size more fitting for a pig.
Further (conspiracy) theory: If this is correct, why is the Pig Bacon Factory doing this? As the recent new proverb goes, "If a company is not asking you for payment for their services, you are the product". They are not giving out the bacon out of their kindness. Instead, they want everyone to eat it, to turn them into pigs. Why do they want to turn everyone to pigs? Pigs have even greater metabolism than rabbits, being able to consume almost anything for their nourishment. Including their own feces.
We, the player, when starting the game, have bacon in our home.
It can be assumed we have been consuming it as well, in the past.
We, the player, can also consume our own feces, for nourishment.
We are already turning into a pig.
Judging by the name of the factory, this makes sense.
I don't know about you guys, but I refuse to accept this demise. XD
Closest explanation I was able to come up for it was that these red lights have something to do with the abduction process from Earth to Mirror world. The red light reported in the magazine would be the one that teleported us, the player, to the Mirror World. Equivalent red dot exists on the Mirror World, acting as the "destination" dot. In a way, they could in certain way be artificial worm holes.
Then it became piling a theory on top of theory; Explanation for the other red dots would be that once upon time, they abducted/teleported different things from Earth at different times; cars from the 1950's, cargo ships from the 1960's, us the player from 1970's.
Yellow and Green dots might be teleportation ends from some other planets than Earth? Or also connected to Earth, but waiting activation, after which they turn red as well?
However, one theory I had is bit on the dark side, but worth sharing:
Mind-altering Fungus.
Some of you might have heard of Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis, or more commonly known as the "zombie ant fungus". It is a fungal growth that affects ants and curiously, has the power to take over their nervous system and change their behaviour and, in a way, control them.
What the fungi does to an infected ant, it makes it leave the nest and look for a place suitable for fungal growth, such as a moist thicket close to the soil. It takes few days for the fungi then to consume (kill) the ant and after that, the fungi continues to grow at the optimal spot where the ant carried it.
One curious feature of this fungi is production of substances that act as anti-bacterial agents that protect the fungus-host against pathogens during fungal reproduction.
Now, you probably have noticed that every single living creature exhibits hostile behavior? Most obvious sign of this is the rabbits and zombies attacking the player on sight. However, it is not limited to this; The radio host on Chat Till You Die FM quite honestly tells you "If you meet a woman, you don't make love to her, you kill her!", as if this would be normal behavior in this world. I suppose we don't have to even mention Angry Greg radio host.
However, this aggression also seems to be contained in its own way: Rabbits don't attack other rabbits. Zombies don't attack other zombies. Zombies and rabbits don't attack each other. Zombies are actually quite peaceful, just confused, in their idle state when they haven't spotted the player. The people on the radio seem to act reasonably normal... However, they are also alone in their station, not a single one of them ever talks to another human being in the radio station itself, just few of them talk to callers over phone, not visually seeing the other person. Even on the frequency where two people are talking to each other in non-English language, it is clear they are talking to each other over radio contact, not in person.
So, the theory: Almost everything living in this planet is in some stage of infection from fungi, virus or something equivalent to the Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis fungi. However, this fungi (I just call it fungi from now on, again, it could be a virus), instead of using ants as host and growing in soil, uses any living creature as host and reproduces in any organic matter.
So just like the Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis makes the ants look for soil, this fungi makes the host look for organic matter. This is why rabbits and zombies don't attack each other; They are already carriers. However, the player is not, so the fungal-infected rabbits and zombies see the player as a potential "soil" to infect.
If I would make a wager, I would say the rabbits are at late stage infection, most of their mind is gone and all they can do anymore is idle or attack. The zombies are at middle stage of the infection, they immediately attack, but are still remembering fractured pieces of themselves from the few uninfected parts of their brain. The other humans mentioned on the radio are in early stages of infection, attacking people on sight, but are justifying these actions with "well, I needed fuel, that's why I attacked without even asking first".
The stage of the infection is visually apparent as well; Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis causes the ants' body to grow pores and turn orange'ish. That is eerily similar how the zombies' skin looks like in game. We can't see the rabbits' skin, but their eyes certainly don't look healthy.
Also, remember the this fungi production of substances that act as anti-bacterial agents that protect the fungus-host against pathogens during fungal reproduction-part? Remember how none of the food ever rots in this game..? It could also be infected by the fungus, which kills any and all mold bacteria trying to take root in the food.
Side note: Ever wondered why idle zombies lament that they are hungry, even though they might be in a room full of food? It is because they don't see the fungus-infected food as something to consume, their fungus-infected brain in effect makes them blind to it, as the fungus would only lose if it would make the host consume fungus.
Related to that, remember when we couldn't figure out why would Pig Apocalypse Bacon Factory be producing food for free? It would go against any sense and reason in apocalyptic settings for people to produce and give away food for free, let alone distribute it far and wide, also for free. Unless... The people who are doing this have their brains infected by a fungi that tells them to spread the fungi in form of bacon. This of course would assume the fungi can understand relatively complex distribution methods, but as said, it might not even be fungus, just something similar, that might be advanced enough to operate at level of this complexity.
Oh yeah, the aliens? We have established and observed they are monitoring the planet, but not interacting with it. All they send on the planet surface are... Unmanned space crafts. They know the planet is infected, they don't send manned space crafts. This planet might be their quarantine/research station for the fungi; The last disease their advanced civilization hasn't found a cure for yet. And they are using abducted humans as test subjects. Thus they don't want to interact with us, only observe. Now that observed behaviour from the aliens would also have an explanation.
The Long Road? Brought here by the aliens. They discovered the infected humans spread the infected meat along infrastructure humans find familiar, thus a road was chosen. And indeed we do find the bacon and other food in abundance on the Long Road, left for us there by the infected. The aliens have observed this and are regularly sending unmanned spacecrafts, emitting gamma radiation, as a test to use the radiation to combat, or research the effect of the radiation, on the fungi; What better way to do that test than have the infected to bring the infected samples (test subject) to road (test area) constructed by you, along which you can then send a pre-programmed vessel (test agent) to sail on.
This also explains why the UFO only appears during night; Sunlight dissipates Gamma rays, converting them to low-energy light. The Gamma ray treatment, or experiment, the aliens are performing on the food would yield unusable results.
It's not clear if radio hosts are alone. The host of Neon Synth Radio sometimes call "Jeniffer" to play a song etc. Wiki claim that Jeniffer doesn't exist, and that Shane is the same Shane from Steel Pants Radio. But wiki have none evidence. But Shane from Steel Pants Radio once ask George about the name of survivor who confuse hungarian sausage with italian, and get an answer. The other time he claim that he work alone, but like to pretend that he have co-workers.
What about Jizz-O-Nit (car polish)? Not only that it's for free basically, but... You probably know that they have written on them "100% bunny sperm". Which bunnies? Those mirror world mutated ones? Does someone make a profit on it?
I don't know if you already cover the topic of broom that can fly or not.
1. We don't see any fungus-like growth on any affected organisms(think Clickers), as well as food,
2. Viruses probably have a higher likelihood of causing behavior that you talked about; fungi causing this is possible, of course, but more likely a virus.
3. Food containing fungal growth would at least look moldy, right? However, none of the food appears to be spoiled (the meat mayyyybe...it's hard to tell).
4. A virus obviously is invisible to the naked eye, and would spread much easier and much farther in a wider range of conditions than a fungus. Doesn't most kinds of fungus require damp, humid environments to maintain growth? The desert would seem to be an awful hard place for fungus to grow...
1 & 2. I am agreeing, a virus, or something similar, might be more plausible. By "something similar", I mean on this assumedly foreign planet, influenced by assumedly alien beings, might have some completely foreign microscopic parasitic life-form, that shares behavioral patterns with neural viruses and fungi that live on our Earth, but does not fit into any of our classified life-forms, or existing things similar to life-forms.
3. That much is true. However, from what I learned in the case of the Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis, it keeps the host matter completely in the outward state it was before the infection.
Curiously, this fungi is not even the most well-known being of doing this. The most well-known being of doing something similar to this, is the humble yeast; This similar fungal being we mostly use for baking and brewing, but in its natural state when found in nature, it tends to grow on (dead) fruits, using the fructose of these fruits as its own nourishment, while "sweating" out alcohol to prevent other fungi and bacteria from eating the fructose.
Not directly linked to what we are looking at in this fungi/virus case, but still, a curious coincidence.
4. Completely agreed and virus has the added ability to stay dormant in a dead environment, even being able to activate centuries later when optimal circumstances present themselves, while fungi does not have that ability.
@ Aiden Araneo
About the oil cans, I do think they pre-date the current apocalyptic settings we live in. While the text on the cans is as you said, the outward appearance of the oil cans is very worn, having scratches and rust patches all over them. My assumption is, when we got transported to this desert world, or as I call it, The Mirror World, oil canisters, that were already aged, got transported with us here as well. Could be when they were new, they used to be sold in desert-like place, and having the label "Available everywhere in the desert" coincidentally.
As for the radio station hosts, this I need to study further (AKA listen to the radio) to have complete confidence in my theory. But from what I remember hearing, there are several cases when the radio hosts talk to other people, or mention other people, but it is always in a way they are not in direct visual contact with the other people.
I remember one case in which a kid calls the radio station, asking where his mother is. In this case, these people do not see each other. The radio host then says to someone they should send someone for the kid, but then notions, oh, he is actually alone at the station. One case I have mentioned before, is the Talk Till You Die radio host, saying he heard someone saying their mother started to make pig-like noises after eating too much pork, but again, no mention they were in direct visual contact.
I do assume, this virus operates in a way that it stays dormant in our system, but once we visually confirm another (uninfected) being in the proximity, we would attack that person, controlled to do this by the virus, in an attempt to infect the uninfected person/being.
This might also explain why sometimes, the rabbits are mentioned as "friendly" by some people; These people are infected (by the virus), thus the rabbits (controlled by the virus), do not attack them, as this would not serve the benefit of the virus (can't infect a target that is already infected).
When I load my save for this Moped Playthrough & Scientific Research save, the ground disappears from underneath me and I am left dropping endlessly into the void with my moped. I have tried loading the save multiple times, but it happens every time, with similar result.
Would there be any sort of a solution to this problem?
The only think I can think of is to go to the multiplayer beta, load the save, go into god mode, and fly out of the void onto solid ground. However, you will still have to save your moped somehow.
To save your moped, one solution could be to download the physics gun mod, spawn it in, and grab your moped and fly out using god mode. Unfortunately, both of these methods use cheats, sooo...
I mentioned this before a long while back...
Always keep multiple backups on hand for stuff like this!