Nicholas

I like the deep south idea too, but I think Texas would fit would better than New Orleans. LA is too small and there isn't enough variety in the surrounding area unless you were going to do stuff in the Gulf, too. But the Texas map can be huge. I could even see them including a Battle for the Alamo and a new faction called the New Texas Republic

I could be wrong but I don't think Barb is going to be one of the one's that gets thawed in Vault 31. That whole experiment was about continuing the Bud's Buds program past the end of the world. The group's members were hand-picked Vault-Tec junior corporate employees, including recent Vault-Tec University graduates, not high ranking executives, like Barb. I think that executives were kept somewhere completely different because they would be needed to operate the company through the end of the world and beyond.

Where Winds Meet is already using gen AI communication with NPCs. They have a mini game where you need to accomplish a conversational task with NPCs like getting them to agree with you, coming up with a plan, or listening to their stories. If you succeed, they become a friend that gives weekly gifts. It's still pretty basic and easily spammed but it's an interesting concept that will likely get fleshed out even more in future titles. I think it adds to the immersion and roleplaying aspect of the game, but I can see how some people would be turned off for having to speak to a bot.

Unrequited love is the worst. No man would go through that much trouble for a woman he wasn't completely in love with and yet, Peach keeps stringing him along. He says that he's happy being her "really good friend", but deep down, he wants to get married and have a family. Unfortunately, at the end of the day, Mario's a simp, as sad as that is to say.