Corpo lifepath = solid story about freedom & family [SPOILERS]

[Shriex]

As I've been playing through the game as a Corpo V, I've started to notice a very strong thematic story that is possible to achieve through a playthrough. When I first heard about the Corpo lifepath, I (probably like a lot of people) thought this might be the 'evil' option, focusing on greed, killings, and becoming a soulless capitalist monster. The actual Corpo prologue is quite the opposite, but with the right choices in-game and ending selection, the Corpo prologue becomes a full story focused on shaking off the shackles of Corporate greed and finding freedom with true family.

Let's call it the Corpo Redemption storyline. It involves taking two progressive steps away from Corpo life, one the game dictates for you, and one that you can choose. This path also allows you to experience all three lifepaths, essentially, starting with Corpo, then moving to Street, and ending up with Nomad. The Corpo lifepath also works thematically with Johnny Silverhand.

To build out this story for your V, you need to:

1. Select Corpo lifepath
2. (optional) create a female V
3. (optional) romance Judy
4. Befriend Panam by doing all of her missions and not screwing her over
5. Select the Nomad ending

When we begin the story as Corpo V, she is puking in a bathroom due to work stress. As you move about the office, you can check her email and learn that her hormone levels are out of whack. I think there's a 'ticker' running across the top of your HUD reinforcing this. As V is flying to Lizzy's, her personal trainer calls and further reinforces this message.

This is a critical detail in the Corpo Redemption story. Long before V is saddled with a death sentence because of the Relic, she is already dying from Corpo life. That she's a miserable wreck is reinforced by her conversations with Jackie, who warns her that Corpo life is killing her. Beyond the stress she's suffering from, she is forced to accept a mission that sets her on a path for a much faster death.

This point is worth reiterating: in the Corpo storyline, Corpo lifestyle is the universal antagonist that V must overcome throughout the course of the game. The Relic (the ultimate evil of an evil corporation) then, becomes an extension of what is already a life or death struggle.

With the central challenge of the story set up, the rest of the Corpo Redemption arc is about V learning to leave behind the evils of Corpo life (and by extension, life in Night City) to find freedom and happiness with a new family. This occurs in two stages, each of which is further removed from her original Corpo life.

The first step is to be saved by Jackie and transition to a Street merc lifestyle. If Jackie hadn't been there, V would have been murdered by Arasaka, but he represents one step of removal from Corpo life and her friendship with him saves her.

The opening montage next shows V growing accustomed to her new life. At first, she is dejected about her fall, but as the montage progresses she begins to enjoy her newfound freedom. Various dialog choices during the next several missions reinforce this.

OPTIONAL: when V has her meeting with Dex, I recommend being non-committal when he presents his two stark choices. I chose the "the city decides for you" option. This doesn't matter in terms of gameplay, but it makes more sense in terms of using the game to basically roleplay a story for yourself. The key here is that V should be starting to realize that material things and even fame are not necessarily the path to happiness. In other words, we're starting to go down a path opposite from the one ending in the "one final score in space" merc ending.

Next, V and Jackie go on their ill-fated mission to retrieve the relic. Thematically, V gets into trouble and re-ignites her original issue (death by Corp) by choosing to enter that world again. In the Corpo Redemption arc, corporations are the primary villain and V's goal is to get as far removed from them as possible. Dipping her toes back into that toxic water was a mistake.

Saddled with a Corp death sentence again in the form of the relic, V now progresses through various missions in Night City. Thematically, Night City is an extension (or a symptom) of the Corps, and so there are now solutions to the Relic here. The Street offered one step away from the Corps, but V will need to take one more before she finds true redemption. Her excursion with the Voodoo Boys is a dead end, for example, because the Voodoo Boys are of the Street, and that's still too close to the central corruption of Night City.

To complete her journey and finally have a chance at ridding herself of the Corpo death sentence represented by the lingering effects on her body from the Relic, V has to take her second step away from the Corps: meet the Aldecaldos.

The Nomads represent a lifestyle far removed from V's Corpo origins, and they offer a level of freedom that is practically alien (background states that V grew up in a Corpo household, so this is the life she has known for most of her years). Moreover, in a Fast & Furious kind of way the Aldecaldos represent family. Family in the Corpo Redemption arch is always V's path to health and happiness. It began with Jackie, who saved V from her Corpo lifestyle. The Nomads offer the happiest ending currently in the game and the only ending that offers any strong hope that V will survive the next six months.

This is the bookend to that first scene of V puking from stress. It is only when V steps as far away as possible from Night City and the Corpos that she is able to purge the Corpo sickness from herself.

So in summary, the Corpo Redemption arc is a story about V progressing further and further away from the toxic Corpo "family" that is killing her until she finds her true Family with Panam and the Aldecaldos, who are the only ones capable of fully purging the Corpo toxin from her once and for all. The story is a rejection of materialism and meaningless fame. V learns that fancy pads, wealth, or fame as a merc are not important. Rather, freedom and family are her new path.

Why a female V? So you can romance Judy. If you do this it expands the family available to your V at the end. You get both Panam and Judy as you start your next adventures.

Why is Corpo thematically appropriate for the Johnny Silverhand storyline? Because who better for Johnny to get stuck inside than the very thing he hates, a Corpo? This is a classic story of two opposing personalities learning to come to terms, and growing as individuals, by being forced together.

 

[EuphoricM]

Agreed. I wanted to go Street Kid, but ultimately decided Corpo. Best decision I made. It made knowing Jackie a lot more sense, and felt V achieved quite a nice character progression by picking a nomad ending. Leaving the lies and promises of larger than life living told by NC for a quiet, humble life with those you care about. Almost the perfect ending.

 

[Aasimar-X]

i kinda liked the nomad start...
you also get your car back later... which is nice

 

[Shriex]

i kinda liked the nomad start...

Nomad could also be a satisfying story arc I think. Someone who had freedom from Night City making the mistake of getting involved with that corruption, paying a heavy price for it, and learning to re-appreciate what they originally had.

Post automatically merged: Jan 18, 2021

It made knowing Jackie a lot more sense,

Yeah this is one of my favorite parts of the Corpo lifepath. If I'm understanding how it went down, V was born into a Corp family and lived in that world with probably little / no exposure to other lifepaths until she got into some sort of trouble in Mexico (I think), and Jackie saved her. They became friends, but more importantly, Jackie was able to offer perspective to V that she wouldn't have gotten otherwise ("hey choom, your expensive car and pad and bank account don't ultimately mean anything and this lifestyle is killing you"), and ultimately the first step out.

 

[BigRock22]

This was pretty much my first playthrough - the only exception being a male V so no Judy romance but I don't believe that detracted from the story at all.

What I found slightly disappointing was the lack of choices at the end. Whilst having nomad support when you step away from the Corpo life makes sense, I would have also loved to be able to get another corporation's support in dealing with Arasaka. After all, that's the true Corpo life with no loyalty to the corporation and a dog eat dog world. So I feel like they've missed the opportunity to explore the dynamics between corporations in more detail and how far they are willing to go to achieve their aims.

They kind of set the scene in the credits where another Corpo war starts between MiliTech and Arasaka for the colonisation of Mars and space travel. So they might have kept it for a DLC.

 

[Shriex]

What I found slightly disappointing was the lack of choices at the end. Whilst having nomad support when you step away from the Corpo life makes sense, I would have also loved to be able to get another corporation's support in dealing with Arasaka.

Yeah they definitely made a very specific choice in terms of the story they wanted to tell for the Corpo lifepath. It really isn't about intra-corpo maneuvering, and more about either being a famous merc, dying a miserable and lonely death, or abandoning it all for sing-alongs around the campfire, fast cars, and presumably getting mad laid in a tent with your preferred romantic choice.

I would have liked to have spent a bit more time in the Corpo world before moving on to stage two (Street). It would have been cool to see V's original apartment, for example, to better sell what she was forced to give up, or to contrast more clearly with where she ends up in the Nomad world. But, that's a minor quibble. The current opening where she's a miserable asshole gets the point across.

 

[Casualclick]

Corpo has a real legitimacy problem establishing a friendship between Jackie and V. I could see it if it was more fleshed out as Jackie simply being one of many cut-out mercs used in deniable / false-flag ops by Arasaka, and then V"s fall from grace sort of pushes them together. I don't see a kid from the deep poor part of NC becoming a Corpo as easily. I know one of the side gigs has this as a background, but it's the least well fleshed out of the Origin stories.

Street Kid has the most claim, and strongest ties, as two kids outta Heywood.

 

[Shriex]

Corpo has a real legitimacy problem establishing a friendship between Jackie and V.

It's all in the background. As a Corpo you've know Jackie for the longest, but you don't get to "meet" him for the first time.

 

[Casualclick]

And that's almost a throwaway plot device. How did they know each other, and how does someone who's willing to subsume themselves into Corpo culture stay as close as someone who is almost salt of the earth, heart on sleeve city gangoons? That's why it doesn't ring true, esp. since Mama Welles lines in Heroes don't change - you were taken in, etc.,

 

[Uzziel91]

The only issue with any of the lifepaths is the same as been mentioned earlier. It's only the stories we make up for ourselves. The paths we create to make them appease our own designs for V.

Which is great don't get me wrong, but it would have been so much fuller, as an experience with a more fleshed out 'starting arc' which likely would have/could have run like an artery through the games story.

 

[jj284b]

yeah, its nice option ,but it also allows you to approach this from completely opposite direction and still be a sleezy corpo, betray people left and right, and then side with Arasaka for a gut punch ending... completely different experience...

 

[Shriex]

And that's almost a throwaway plot device. How did they know each other, and how does someone who's willing to subsume themselves into Corpo culture stay as close as someone who is almost salt of the earth, heart on sleeve city gangoons? That's why it doesn't ring true, esp. since Mama Welles lines in Heroes don't change - you were taken in, etc.,

The background story is the V got into some kind of trouble on a job in Mexico, and Jackie saved her life. That's how they became friends. If it wasn't for that, then she probably would never have had any exposure to someone like Jackie.

This relationship is key to the Corpo Redemption arc. V would never have stepped away from Corpo life on her own - in fact, she would have been killed by Arasaka agents shortly after taking the job to kill Abernathy.

 

[EuphoricM]

The background story is the V got into some kind of trouble on a job in Mexico, and Jackie saved her life. That's how they became friends. If it wasn't for that, then she probably would never have had any exposure to someone like Jackie.

This relationship is key to the Corpo Redemption arc. V would never have stepped away from Corpo life on her own - in fact, she would have been killed by Arasaka agents shortly after taking the job to kill Abernathy.

As a matter of fact, if you go to the Columbarium you can find the gravestone of your former boss in Arasaka (Arthur Jenkins), so yeah, Jackie is the friend that saved and took V in order for him/her to be able to start a new life.

 

[Guest 4375874]

As I've been playing through the game as a Corpo V, I've started to notice a very strong thematic story that is possible to achieve through a playthrough. When I first heard about the Corpo lifepath, I (probably like a lot of people) thought this might be the 'evil' option, focusing on greed, killings, and becoming a soulless capitalist monster. The actual Corpo prologue is quite the opposite, but with the right choices in-game and ending selection, the Corpo prologue becomes a full story focused on shaking off the shackles of Corporate greed and finding freedom with true family.

Let's call it the Corpo Redemption storyline. It involves taking two progressive steps away from Corpo life, one the game dictates for you, and one that you can choose. This path also allows you to experience all three lifepaths, essentially, starting with Corpo, then moving to Street, and ending up with Nomad. The Corpo lifepath also works thematically with Johnny Silverhand.

To build out this story for your V, you need to:

1. Select Corpo lifepath
2. (optional) create a female V
3. (optional) romance Judy
4. Befriend Panam by doing all of her missions and not screwing her over
5. Select the Nomad ending

When we begin the story as Corpo V, she is puking in a bathroom due to work stress. As you move about the office, you can check her email and learn that her hormone levels are out of whack. I think there's a 'ticker' running across the top of your HUD reinforcing this. As V is flying to Lizzy's, her personal trainer calls and further reinforces this message.

This is a critical detail in the Corpo Redemption story. Long before V is saddled with a death sentence because of the Relic, she is already dying from Corpo life. That she's a miserable wreck is reinforced by her conversations with Jackie, who warns her that Corpo life is killing her. Beyond the stress she's suffering from, she is forced to accept a mission that sets her on a path for a much faster death.

This point is worth reiterating: in the Corpo storyline, Corpo lifestyle is the universal antagonist that V must overcome throughout the course of the game. The Relic (the ultimate evil of an evil corporation) then, becomes an extension of what is already a life or death struggle.

With the central challenge of the story set up, the rest of the Corpo Redemption arc is about V learning to leave behind the evils of Corpo life (and by extension, life in Night City) to find freedom and happiness with a new family. This occurs in two stages, each of which is further removed from her original Corpo life.

The first step is to be saved by Jackie and transition to a Street merc lifestyle. If Jackie hadn't been there, V would have been murdered by Arasaka, but he represents one step of removal from Corpo life and her friendship with him saves her.

The opening montage next shows V growing accustomed to her new life. At first, she is dejected about her fall, but as the montage progresses she begins to enjoy her newfound freedom. Various dialog choices during the next several missions reinforce this.

OPTIONAL: when V has her meeting with Dex, I recommend being non-committal when he presents his two stark choices. I chose the "the city decides for you" option. This doesn't matter in terms of gameplay, but it makes more sense in terms of using the game to basically roleplay a story for yourself. The key here is that V should be starting to realize that material things and even fame are not necessarily the path to happiness. In other words, we're starting to go down a path opposite from the one ending in the "one final score in space" merc ending.

Next, V and Jackie go on their ill-fated mission to retrieve the relic. Thematically, V gets into trouble and re-ignites her original issue (death by Corp) by choosing to enter that world again. In the Corpo Redemption arc, corporations are the primary villain and V's goal is to get as far removed from them as possible. Dipping her toes back into that toxic water was a mistake.

Saddled with a Corp death sentence again in the form of the relic, V now progresses through various missions in Night City. Thematically, Night City is an extension (or a symptom) of the Corps, and so there are now solutions to the Relic here. The Street offered one step away from the Corps, but V will need to take one more before she finds true redemption. Her excursion with the Voodoo Boys is a dead end, for example, because the Voodoo Boys are of the Street, and that's still too close to the central corruption of Night City.

To complete her journey and finally have a chance at ridding herself of the Corpo death sentence represented by the lingering effects on her body from the Relic, V has to take her second step away from the Corps: meet the Aldecaldos.

The Nomads represent a lifestyle far removed from V's Corpo origins, and they offer a level of freedom that is practically alien (background states that V grew up in a Corpo household, so this is the life she has known for most of her years). Moreover, in a Fast & Furious kind of way the Aldecaldos represent family. Family in the Corpo Redemption arch is always V's path to health and happiness. It began with Jackie, who saved V from her Corpo lifestyle. The Nomads offer the happiest ending currently in the game and the only ending that offers any strong hope that V will survive the next six months.

This is the bookend to that first scene of V puking from stress. It is only when V steps as far away as possible from Night City and the Corpos that she is able to purge the Corpo sickness from herself.

So in summary, the Corpo Redemption arc is a story about V progressing further and further away from the toxic Corpo "family" that is killing her until she finds her true Family with Panam and the Aldecaldos, who are the only ones capable of fully purging the Corpo toxin from her once and for all. The story is a rejection of materialism and meaningless fame. V learns that fancy pads, wealth, or fame as a merc are not important. Rather, freedom and family are her new path.

Why a female V? So you can romance Judy. If you do this it expands the family available to your V at the end. You get both Panam and Judy as you start your next adventures.

Why is Corpo thematically appropriate for the Johnny Silverhand storyline? Because who better for Johnny to get stuck inside than the very thing he hates, a Corpo? This is a classic story of two opposing personalities learning to come to terms, and growing as individuals, by being forced together.

That's why I chose Corpo for my first play through. I wanted to see how the two would differ and I but heads with Johnny at every turn and disagreed with him. Makes for interesting and conflicting conversations.

 

[Shriex]

As a matter of fact, if you go to the Columbarium you can find the gravestone of your former boss in Arasaka (Arthur Jenkins),

Ha! That's awesome. I'll have to go take a screen shot next to that.

 

[HazadoV]

Corpo was most fleshed out lifpath IMO, still ended to abruptly

streetkid is most cannon I guess and my ideal role-playing lifepath - but the actual mission was not that amazing

Nomad was cool , but felt like they literally did it last minute (probably)

 

[enkee23]

corpo lifepath already deserves retribution from the start because V is already villian
friendship with jackie is strange, all corpos separated from the crowd
i don't like that nomad ending dumps dying V, who is responsible for nomad deaths, and whole clan on the shoulders of the fragile panam

it seems main canon is street kid because dialogue text and V sounds and feels like thug/punk

 

[NevaEilhart]

This is exactly how I played on my 1st playthrough and I felt exactly that way, though I wasnt particularly looking to make it like this from the start... which made the whole journey even better.

Slowly realising along with your character that Night City is what has been really killing you instead of the chip, and that there's no happy ending in such a city, was one of the greatest feelings the game made me experience. I feel for those who got spoiled and didn't see it unfolding in front of their eyes, because the journey was well worth it.

And as I drew near the end and didn't see any solution to V's problem, the nomads tagged along and eventually it turned out into this wonderful, sweet ending.

"The star" ending with Panam and Judy by my side made up for all the quirks, QOL issues and missing interactivity the game has. When this game works and all of its designs come together, it's definitely one of the best thing ever happened to gaming. Pyramid Song, the Arasaka parad, the Heist, Panam, the Peralez, US Cracks, so many wonderful moments I started thinking about as we come out of the tunnel with Panam.
How many games had you dig a tunnel under a gigantic corpo building and infiltrate it from the bottom, seeing the gigantic pistons protecting it from earthquakes ? How many had you dive with a potential love interest to discover a flooded city and hear your companion thoughts and memories as you go along ? How many games had you feel like a rockstar god playing gigs in front of an audience ?

I loved to see my corpo V losing it all, trying to then win it back with some vengeance while chasing the illusions the city laid in front of her by becoming a merc, only to realize the City is only there to eat you alive, as it did with Judy, with Rogue, with Jackie, all those broken souls who at some point believed in those illusions to end up deceived by it. What's important is being with who you care about, thus leaving the city as a nomad with Panam and Judy. Turned out the City had been my biggest enemy all along, not the chip. This Corpo becoming Nomad was sweet and emotional. It felt like a long lasting redemption. Like an answer which was always in front of her eyes, but she needed that particular journey to fully understand it. As Misty tarot showed.

I hope there is more in store for V, Judy and Panam. This trio, along with the other wonderful side characters featured in the game, made it overall one of the best narrative experiences I've ever played.

PS : female V is mandatory not because of Judy, but because of the wonderful voice actress. She brings so much on the table, it definitely contributed to making the overall journey unforgettable.

 

[UgzAube]

As I've been playing through the game as a Corpo V, I've started to notice a very strong thematic story that is possible to achieve through a playthrough. When I first heard about the Corpo lifepath, I (probably like a lot of people) thought this might be the 'evil' option, focusing on greed, killings, and becoming a soulless capitalist monster. The actual Corpo prologue is quite the opposite, but with the right choices in-game and ending selection, the Corpo prologue becomes a full story focused on shaking off the shackles of Corporate greed and finding freedom with true family.

Let's call it the Corpo Redemption storyline. It involves taking two progressive steps away from Corpo life, one the game dictates for you, and one that you can choose. This path also allows you to experience all three lifepaths, essentially, starting with Corpo, then moving to Street, and ending up with Nomad. The Corpo lifepath also works thematically with Johnny Silverhand.

To build out this story for your V, you need to:

1. Select Corpo lifepath
2. (optional) create a female V
3. (optional) romance Judy
4. Befriend Panam by doing all of her missions and not screwing her over
5. Select the Nomad ending

When we begin the story as Corpo V, she is puking in a bathroom due to work stress. As you move about the office, you can check her email and learn that her hormone levels are out of whack. I think there's a 'ticker' running across the top of your HUD reinforcing this. As V is flying to Lizzy's, her personal trainer calls and further reinforces this message.

This is a critical detail in the Corpo Redemption story. Long before V is saddled with a death sentence because of the Relic, she is already dying from Corpo life. That she's a miserable wreck is reinforced by her conversations with Jackie, who warns her that Corpo life is killing her. Beyond the stress she's suffering from, she is forced to accept a mission that sets her on a path for a much faster death.

This point is worth reiterating: in the Corpo storyline, Corpo lifestyle is the universal antagonist that V must overcome throughout the course of the game. The Relic (the ultimate evil of an evil corporation) then, becomes an extension of what is already a life or death struggle.

With the central challenge of the story set up, the rest of the Corpo Redemption arc is about V learning to leave behind the evils of Corpo life (and by extension, life in Night City) to find freedom and happiness with a new family. This occurs in two stages, each of which is further removed from her original Corpo life.

The first step is to be saved by Jackie and transition to a Street merc lifestyle. If Jackie hadn't been there, V would have been murdered by Arasaka, but he represents one step of removal from Corpo life and her friendship with him saves her.

The opening montage next shows V growing accustomed to her new life. At first, she is dejected about her fall, but as the montage progresses she begins to enjoy her newfound freedom. Various dialog choices during the next several missions reinforce this.

OPTIONAL: when V has her meeting with Dex, I recommend being non-committal when he presents his two stark choices. I chose the "the city decides for you" option. This doesn't matter in terms of gameplay, but it makes more sense in terms of using the game to basically roleplay a story for yourself. The key here is that V should be starting to realize that material things and even fame are not necessarily the path to happiness. In other words, we're starting to go down a path opposite from the one ending in the "one final score in space" merc ending.

Next, V and Jackie go on their ill-fated mission to retrieve the relic. Thematically, V gets into trouble and re-ignites her original issue (death by Corp) by choosing to enter that world again. In the Corpo Redemption arc, corporations are the primary villain and V's goal is to get as far removed from them as possible. Dipping her toes back into that toxic water was a mistake.

Saddled with a Corp death sentence again in the form of the relic, V now progresses through various missions in Night City. Thematically, Night City is an extension (or a symptom) of the Corps, and so there are now solutions to the Relic here. The Street offered one step away from the Corps, but V will need to take one more before she finds true redemption. Her excursion with the Voodoo Boys is a dead end, for example, because the Voodoo Boys are of the Street, and that's still too close to the central corruption of Night City.

To complete her journey and finally have a chance at ridding herself of the Corpo death sentence represented by the lingering effects on her body from the Relic, V has to take her second step away from the Corps: meet the Aldecaldos.

The Nomads represent a lifestyle far removed from V's Corpo origins, and they offer a level of freedom that is practically alien (background states that V grew up in a Corpo household, so this is the life she has known for most of her years). Moreover, in a Fast & Furious kind of way the Aldecaldos represent family. Family in the Corpo Redemption arch is always V's path to health and happiness. It began with Jackie, who saved V from her Corpo lifestyle. The Nomads offer the happiest ending currently in the game and the only ending that offers any strong hope that V will survive the next six months.

This is the bookend to that first scene of V puking from stress. It is only when V steps as far away as possible from Night City and the Corpos that she is able to purge the Corpo sickness from herself.

So in summary, the Corpo Redemption arc is a story about V progressing further and further away from the toxic Corpo "family" that is killing her until she finds her true Family with Panam and the Aldecaldos, who are the only ones capable of fully purging the Corpo toxin from her once and for all. The story is a rejection of materialism and meaningless fame. V learns that fancy pads, wealth, or fame as a merc are not important. Rather, freedom and family are her new path.

Why a female V? So you can romance Judy. If you do this it expands the family available to your V at the end. You get both Panam and Judy as you start your next adventures.

Why is Corpo thematically appropriate for the Johnny Silverhand storyline? Because who better for Johnny to get stuck inside than the very thing he hates, a Corpo? This is a classic story of two opposing personalities learning to come to terms, and growing as individuals, by being forced together.

Thank you, you just gave me another reason to enjoy my run.

 

[Shriex]

female V is mandatory not because of Judy, but because of the wonderful voice actress. She brings so much on the table, it definitely contributed to making the overall journey unforgettable.

Agreed. Her name is Cherami Leigh, and to be honest she makes the game. One of the reasons why I want V's story to continue, instead of other DLC options like playing a new character (Immortals Fenix Rising is doing this with two out of their three DLCs), is because this game just wouldn't be the same without Leigh's voice acting. I don't think I've ever experienced a voice actor this good in a video game.