I will go over one by one, and give my general impressions at the end.
The Forest
When I left Vault 76 it was already night time, and most players had left the initial area in front of the vault. I ventured north, where I found a lonely cabin left abandoned in the woods. Inhabited only by mongrels, there's where I found a short hunting rifle and some water for the way that I had ahead.
The forest is green and beautiful, every way you look you seem to find something new. However, this is where most players gathered, so I avoided it a little whilst I embarked on my own journey. I stumbled upon a town named Helvetia, where the pre-war American government was conducting a voting experiment with an automated system. Most of the inhabitants are now turned into fossil, and those who remained turned into scorchedfolk. Most of them gather in the local chapel where they worship an owl-like figure and perform sacrifices to its name. I also found a little workshop where a lady was (before the war) tinkering with some robots that the town major wanted to install for some anual festivity that never got to happen. In the auditorium there's an array of instruments prepared for a concert, where I played for a couple minutes before moving on.
Savage Divide
This zone divides the six areas of the map; all of them intersect with it. I was greeted by some beautiful vistas of the Forest whilst I was there. This zone is less lush than The Forest, but still not quite apocalyptic, at least not most of it. Scorched seem to be more abundant around this region, as well as some more of the mildly-irradiated creatures such as Mirelurks and Supermutants. There are encampments scattered throughout the region, although most have fallen in the hands of Supermutants, who now lack their hound companions from Fallout 4 (which were made by the Institute). I stumbled unto a lonely cabin playing Country Roads on the radio, where I was ambushed by a pack of three wolfs who almost devoured me.
Cranberry Bog
The Cranberry Bog is one of my favorite zones in this game. I did not spend too much time on it during the B.E.T.A., but I did during the stress test, so unfortunately I don't have many pictures to document my experience since that was under NDA at the time. When I first entered the region, I went through a ranger tower station and decided to climb the stairs and see what I could find at the top. Through its stairway I noticed that most of it was full of little plantations and bountiful harvest, and helped myself to it. As I was looting the top, I looked back and... there were too corpses, on bed, holding hands. These poor people probably died overnight of the disease that seemingly killed everyone on the Appalachia. Their faces decaying, it was sad. I decided not to loot the pocket watch the female had on her.
This zone is easily the hardest in the game. I was ambushed by eight gulpers at the same time, and I only survived because a Scorched Mirelurk Queen got in the way and chased them as I fled. I also found a nuclear launching code in a roaming feral ghoul military officer. As you saw on the screenshot above, the area is mostly flat, but there are what I can only call trenches everywhere, which are useful for escaping high level enemies or just hiding because everything in here wants to eat you. Clustered pink forests are also abundant in this region, and they're dangerous. As you walk to them you'll get poisoned if you don't equip a gas mask (which I didn't have). If you spend close to a minute inside them unprotected you will acquire lung disease. Super Mutants seem to like to lure survivors inside these pink forests, where they have small Super Mutant shantytowns and can easily overwhelm their prey there. One thing I'd like to say about Muties in this game is that they finally have different voices, and they also don't have the same armor(s) they did in Fallout 4, which are neat little touches. I should also say that this zone seems to be the one that Scorchbeasts live at.
The Mire
I first played through this region today, and oh dear, do I adore it. It's by far the most Fallout-y region in the game, reminiscent of Fallout 3. There are old churches, abandoned Red Rocket gas stations, old mansions. Reminds me a lot of Point Lookout. The best part? The region is inhabited of the most twisted and straight-up weird creatures the game has to offer. At one point I found myself on top of a small makeshift hamlet on top of tress; giant tree-houses built by the immediate survivors of the nuclear detonations. As I was on top of there, I observed quite the spectacle of enemy in-fighting. Giant Crickets, Bloodbugs, Anglers, Radroaches and Gulpers fighting amongst all of them. Surprisingly, the Anglers were victorious, which allowed me to escape since they're so slow and don't like to crawl outside of their murky waters.
As I ventured deeply into The Mire, I found half a vehicle and decided to loot it, since I was low on, well, everything. To my surprise, a damned Giant Hermit Crab jumped out of it and decided that it was going to loot me instead. Got to say, I loved these in Far Harbor, so I'm glad they were brought over. After those little interruptions, I found in a Vault icon in my compass, which really pleased my character, Sully Silly Salt. It was none other than Vault 94! Reminded me a little of Vault 24 when I first got there due to all the plant life residing on it. The vault was sealed, which makes sense — its experiment was still ongoing. However, I did read on a small terminal that the Vault was plentiful on food, but I didn't really had the time to read its contents too much since I was already halfway through the B.E.T.A. I did read, however, that to enter it you needed a special access code. Whether this is a tease for future content, something already hidden in the game, or an in-game explanation of why the vault can't be opened, I don't know. Time will tell.
As I was ready to depart and leave The Mire for good, I stumbled upon this little fella called Jack-O'-Lantern. He was rambling about never having too much pumpkins and straight up implored me to bring him some. So I looked around, and lo and behold, he does take his pumpkins quite serious. I entered his home where I found a dead body, probably the owner of the Pumpkin House (name of the location) who programmed the robot with his pumpkin obsession. When I ventured inside, well, of course I found pumpkin pie, I don't know what else I was expecting. I left good old Jack to his own devices because I didn't have the time to search for pumpkin just yet, but hey, at least I got a pretty hat. Some time after, an Eyebot was on the road playing the flute and four radrats following him. I was laughing, what a cool little nod to the Pied Piper of Hamelin. Then I stumbled upon these two Mister Handy arguing, one 'male' and one 'female' (or whatever since they're robots). They were talking about the most mundane topics, such as what was the correct pronunciation of Appalachia or whether the other was single or not.
Toxic Valley
Toxic Valley is the most depressing zone. It's basically the Glowing Sea from Fallout 4 but without the constant radiation bath. Even though its devastated, I didn't find it too plentiful on radiation or toxic air. The white powder that's spread throughout most of this region is the result of a chemical facility that was nuked during the Great War. Most of the creatures I found here were humanoid; scorched people, ghouls, Supermutants — though I spotted an Albino Deathclaw far in the distance. I couldn't stay too much time on this zone because a Scorchbeast spotted me and wouldn't leave me alone, and since I didn't had my C.A.M.P. there nor I had the caps to pay for fast travel, I had to abandon it.
A point of interest I found was some sort of Mirelurk den, though. Two Mirelurk Queens, multiple Mirelurk Kings and tons of regular Mirelurk were attacking an army of bloatflies and Supermutants. It's also the location of that water park with the giant crocodile on it.
Ash Heap
The Ash Heap is the last zone I visited and the one I spent the least time on, as the B.E.T.A. timer for today was running short. Since it was night time during my session at the time, I couldn't take any really clear pictures — sorry about that. The Ash Heap is the region around Blair Mountain. For those not familiar with the history of West Virginia, Blair Mountain was the location of a major battle during the "Coal Wars", a nationwide miner workers strike during the late 1800s and early 1900s, I believe. I did find Blair Mountain in the game, and it serves as the location for that giant drill we've seen in the marketing material. Though I couldn't venture too much, this zone is mostly populated by Mole Miners. To my surprise they seem to speak, although I didn't understand a word of what they were saying. Oddly their 'ranks' seem to be work-related, such as Mole Miner Supervisor. These things are hard to kill and often carry missile launchers, so be wary when you tread around these parts.
As its geography suggested, the Ash Heap is full of mines and excavation sites. The region is plentiful in mineral deposits which the player can mine. There are also excavations that are powered with fusion cores, which of course you can pick up. At the end of my session, I became friends with a Vendortron and left my session to expire.
So now, a few notes. Also, I'm sorry for any grammatical errors/odd wording choices/pacing disparities. It is quite late here and I just want to vent out my experience with the game.
Caps, meds and ammo are insane to find in this game. You only find them in places that make sense, such as pharmacies, military stations and such. I like this, encourages crafting and player-to-player trading.
The Scorched aren't limited to people. Every single creature in the game can be scorched, and they all seem to cooperate together even if they would fight one another in normal conditions.
I found the survival mechanics to be a side activity rather than the focus. Eating once and drinking twice a day keeps you okay, and you can find food and water rather easily.
The map is really huge. Don't take my tour as an indication that you can see everything in four hours. You can't, and you shouldn't. I literally completed zero quests and just ran everywhere avoiding enemies along the way. Speaking of the map, it is pretty dense, despite what Bethesda said. Marked locations are a little afar from one another, but there are a ton of unmarked locations that are also really well made. It's easily the best map Bethesda has produced yet for either Fallout or Elder Scrolls. They clearly have better technology and experienced map designers.
Item condition isn't too bad, I never had anything break on me and I just repaired my rifle once.
DLC enemies from Fallout 4 are used as mid/high level enemies, and most of them have new variants (like the one I mentioned, Scorched).
Diseases are far more a problem than needs are. You get diseased from sleeping on a mattress at floor level, drinking dirty water, eating raw foods, stepping on a decayed corpse, walking through toxic air, etc. It's hardcore stuff, and antibiotics are hard to come by.
I don't know what they did, but the framerate is a lot better than on the stress test. I noticed that some ground textures were reduced in quality, but not too much. Perhaps that was it? I still noticed drops, but it was far more playable and even a step up from Fallout 4's launch framerate issues.
There are some audio issues. The most prominent one I found was enemies not announcing themselves with their growls/noises and just silently attacking you. I only noticed this with some feral ghouls and all mole rats.
Overall, I had a great time. 7/6.
