Project Darwin (original base name unknown), estabilished before the nuclear war, was a classified genetic and biological research center located in a remote mountainous location in Nevada. The base was designed to be entirely self-sufficient, with a radioactive field prohibiting access to and from the facility and the adjoining town, with only a winding mountain route remaining as a clear connection to the outside world. The town served as a housing area for the massive research facility, with all necessities on-site, including a hospital, convenience store, bar, emergency chemical lab etc. While the research base provided enough living space for the base's personnel, the men simply chose to live in the town.
Background
The first (and only) director of Project Darwin was Irwin John Finster. A man with interests in mathematics, baseball, psychology and cybernetics, he led a dedicated team of scientists with the mission of creating life that would adapt to a post-nuclear war. The covert nature of the research would prevent the research team from gaining a Nobel prize in genetics, which was won by Andrea Mills from Sleeper One. This led to an escalating rivalry between the two research centers, which went even further as Irwin John Finster attempted to enhance his performance with aid from Base Cochise AI, turning into a cyborg. With that, he lost his humanity.
After the war broke out, Darwin became isolated. The town was self-sufficient and over time grew extremely xenophobic and withdrawn, but at the same time a haven for wasteland outcasts and those who couldn't fit elsewhere. One of them was Dr. Jekyll, who opened a Body Shop in the city limits. The base's police also became increasingly wary of any outsiders, sometimes shooting them on sight.
Darwin changed it's mission only slightly - now, it aimed to produce life capable of surviving in the harsh wasteland, useful life. As Irwin John Finster became a cyborg through the influence of Cochise's AI, he created a cybernetic interface called the Mindlink, to oversee the research and control the labs directly.[1] Other research team members were disturbed at the results of his research and eventually, Finster begun releasing some of the creatures into the town to terrorize the populace, locked up most of the staff in the lower levels of Project Darwin and infected lower ranking security and maintenance staff members with a disease to prevent them from reveling the truth.
Finster was cooperating with the Base Cochise AI, to fulfill it's goal of creating the perfect form of life that would inherit the Earth. The vision was madness to the common human - Earth would be transformed into a red planet, populated by mutants unlike anything any man could dream before. The labs of Darwin and the biodomes served as cultivators for the plague that would consume the Earth as we knew it.
Before the plan could come to fruition, however, Finster was assassinated by a group of Desert Rangers, who also shutdown the project permanently, to prevent the plague from being released.
Layout
Darwin Village is surrounded by a belt of radiation. In fact, the only safe way to visit Darwin Village is with a Rad suit, or by circling around and picking your way through the mountains from the north. Darwin Village is a good place to shop and to grind for experience for prospective adventurers.
Surface (Darwin Village)
Darwin Village has two shops, doctor, one library, a lab, and a bar. You can hire two comrades at Darwin Village: Metal Maniac and Mad Dog Fargo. The base itself is discussed in greater detail below. One shop of importance is the Black Market, where you can get pretty much any gun or armor (short of Pseudo-Chitin Armor) you want. You should drop by: the password is "CRETIAN".
Underground (Darwin Base)
You must have Secpass 7 to enter the Base and open the doors. This prevents you from entering the Base until after you've repaired Max and visited the Sleeper Base. The Base has three levels: one of which is home to the biological testing grounds full of dangerous monsters.
References
- ↑ Cochise AI: "Finster was a fool. He thought he could rebel, but he was easy to break. If not for me, he would have killed you"
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|