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One thing I wasn't sure would actually happen is... well, some really interesting random happenings. It's not just about who's being paranoid or randomly suffering a grievous injury without any excuse for how or why it happened, much less its aftermath... there are some situations where you get to DO something given fairly out of the ordinary things going on...

A lot of them play out a bit like a choose-your-own-adventure snippets, where you're presented with a more or less blind choice regarding it with certain unknown outcomes and impacts on your party's vital stats and supplies. So... do you have the nerve to commit to whatever might come your way and live with those consequences, or are you just going to run away and always wonder what could have been?

...now, to be fair, with these random incidents, they have a common thread of almost always seeming incredibly sketchy, possibly even sinister... but I feel like most of them just want to give you SOMETHING for being a good sport and playing along... the mean stuff happens without your consent, after all, so why punish people for being adventurous when they aren't required to be? (Please don't answer that question, Organ Trail... I'm sorry I doubted your malevolent spirit!) I will say that I've seen that they ALSO seem to offer opportunities to compromise on your morals and do stuff that may or may not be on the level, and I'm incredibly wary about a game that's actively trying to convince me to do things and then call me out on them... so maybe it's not ALL fun and games and whimsical adventure amidst the bleak apocalypse. (I still always secretly worry that the whole situation will just turn itself against me for daring to think happiness and material wealth can be gotten so cheaply... but the open road can do that to you even more surely, so perhaps not...

On the other hand, choices you can make with less pressure and more knowledge beforehand seem to have built-in calculations of their own... that is, for instance: is a job that promises a potential onslaught (even if it's only a "Normal" one) of zombies, is the bullet expense actually worth a mere $10? (Fortunately, Indianapolis happened to sell bullets by the box of 20 for just that rate, and I only had to shoot my gun 15 times... at least if i was so inclined to spend my earnings in such a fashion.) This is to say nothing about how biting off more than you can chew might as well be a self-inflicted wound with no upside at all...

I think with this little bit of extra messing around with it, we can confirm that going to the overall map while trying to decide which way to go at an intersection provides a serious exploit when it comes to hand-picking what should be a hard-chosen bit of free will based on risk and reward. It's neither risk nor proper reward if you can fix the outcome for whatever illogical cause-and-effect relationship the program has accidentally assigned!

Speaking of those upgrades, whether for your car or your party leader, it's pretty clear by their price tag that they're the real game-changers, letting you tweak certain vital conditions and effects to your own personal advantage... though it's also pretty clear to me that not all of them are created equal. I don't know that I'd personally value the ability to make bullets travel faster, but now that it's on the table (because I glitchily PUT it there, for SHAME!), the ability to reload faster seems highly appealing. Similarly, outfitting your car so that a horde encounter turns into a sure-thing (without caulk!) seems like a real winner.

Y'know... the system messages seemed keen on reminding me that I have absolutely NO backups for my vital car parts, but when trying to economize the necessities of food, fuel, and ammunition, there's really no room for "extravagances" that typically cost over twice as much... apiece. Well, how extravagant are we feeling NOW that it's definitely NOT optional anymore? Then your ONLY options are to either wait for random trade opportunities or, from what the description suggested, er... fishing them out of the water?

Both of those options sound like they'd be incredibly time-consuming drains on precious resources... or, they would be, but trading is ALSO afflicted by the same apparent glitch in which time and food no longer pass on by while we're sitting on our hands... and I'd feel really bad about that if we weren't down to mere single-digit hours of food in reserve...

Of course, when it rains, it pours... hooligans down upon you... uh... where's Max Rockatansky when we need him?! It is a funny little diversion that takes a different spin on the driving minigame we'd already seen, though... as long as you don't get caught, I suppose. I really don't want to know what happens THEN.

Man, it's been quite a day for Ophie... at least getting to take a shower counteracts stray bullets and prepares your nerves for hostage situations. (Just don't tell anyone that we're almost out of food...)