[Spoiler Alert] Another "Ending" thread with my thoughts and potential solutions.

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Hi all,

I understand that this is yet another “Endings” thread among many in this forum, but I just wanted to fully express my thoughts, opinions and potential solutions to the endings we got. This also gives me the opportunity to vent my depression and frustrations about the endings themselves.

Now I might bring up some points and I could be potentially wrong or totally misinformed. I love the experience I’ve had with Cyberpunk 2077, but I don’t have a full understanding of the Cyberpunk universe or lore, so if I do say anything that's incorrect then please correct me in the comments and I’ll add an edit to the post.

As for my thoughts on the endings, when I say “Terrible ending” or “Bad ending” I don’t mean badly written or anything in that regard, I just mean the overall tone of the ending. I believe all the endings are great in their own way and give the player a lot of options. For first time playthroughs it would be great to discuss with people what endings they got and how they come to the decisions they made.

The idea of living with the consequences of these decisions during your first playthrough is what makes the biggest impact for me. You can always try to make the right choices, but in the end they could be totally the wrong ones. For example I was struggling to pick between working with Johnny or working with Arasaka. The only reason I thought Arasaka was because I believed they had the best chance of sorting V out, regardless of Johnny's pushback. I did in the end decide to go with Johnny and I got the Johnny to take control of V’s body ending. But the only reason I got that ending was because I got confused because I did originally think crossing the bridge was the right way to give V her body back, but when I started crossing she pushed me away and cursed at me. So I just assumed I was heading in the wrong direction and went in the well…. Lol!

*Will refer to V as her since I played a female*

Since then I have played the ending sequence every time to get all the endings apart from the “Don’t Fear The Reaper” ending, which I can’t get. But I know it works out the same. After seeing them all, now I have a problem. They are all essentially the same outcomes. I’ll list them in order of “Worst” to “Best” in my personal opinion and why.

1) “Suicide” Ending
I mean there isn’t a lot to say here. Again I like the fact the option is present, but the whole point of the game was fighting for survival just to give up at the last minute. Both V and Johnny die.

2) “Arasaka Chip” Ending
This for me is on par with suicide. You totally sold out to the corporation you were fighting against this whole time and Johnny would be totally ashamed. You can even see how sad and pathetic she is as she sits on the operating chair. Although V can potentially live again in the far future, there is no guarantee. Also her consciousness is properly locked away for eternity in this chip. How do you know she can’t still think and feel? Sounds awful. V “Lives” and Johnny dies.

3) “Arasaka Live” Ending
Although it's not exactly living. You didn’t “Fully” sell out to the corporation and decided to go off and live the rest of your 6 months until you potentially die. But you still betrayed Johnny for no reason at all. V “Lives” and Johnny dies.

4) “Johnny takes V’s body” Ending
This for me isn’t still a great ending. As much as I love Johnny, from the outset we know our objective was to remove Johnny from our minds and stop ourselves from dying. Johnny has already lived his life and died. You could argue that V also died when Dex shot her, but the game echoes the theme of second chances and immortality and living again. V deserves to have her own body more than Johnny does to take over it. Even Johnny himself wanted V to have her body back. But again V has the whole 6 months to live thing, which I’ll get to later. So Johnny Lives, V’s consciousness is sent with Alt beyond the Blackwall which who knows what that's like, is that eternal suffering?

5) "Johnny returns V’s body” Ending
This would mean that V ends up doing the Gig to Crystal Place. The reason this is lower is because it would mean that Rogue would have died because you went with Johnny. The ideal ending would be no casualties which I’ll get to later. But again we have the “6 months left to live” thing. However when I first saw this ending I screamed “Please let me play this bit!” when she's floating towards Crystal Palace. Something else I’ll get to. So V “Lives” and Johnny goes with Alt.

6) “V claims her body with Panam” Ending
This would mean V would depart with the Nomads at the end. I gotta say this is the better of all the endings. But I’ve got to rank one higher for one reason and that's just simply people die to save your life. The question is, is Vs life worth the life of others? Again we are left with the “6 Months left to live”. V “Lives”, Johnny goes with Alt.

7) “V claims her body on her own” Ending
Although I haven’t played the “Don’t Fear The Reaper” ending, I’m under the impression once you reach the ending, you either give the body to Johnny or go to Crystal Palace. But if you did the entire mission on your own, it would mean Adam Smasher couldn’t kill anyone or be killed during the invasion of the Arasaka tower. So in my book that’s as perfect as you’re gonna get, not sacrificing other people's lives for the sake of your own. Still, V “Lives”, Johnny goes with Alt.

Problems:

All these endings are essentially the same. Just told slightly differently the majority of which are the “6 Months left to live” thing. Which honestly really started to annoy me. Again if some of the ending was that, then great, but essentially all of them are. No matter how much effort or completion you put into the game, you can’t influence the outcome of V’s fate. It's always going to be the same.

I’ve seen arguments like “Well it's Night City bro, no happy endings bro” you may as well say “She dies because reasons”. Now yes I understand this is a bleak world. But here's the thing with RPGs. There is usually a range of endings from “Bad” to “Perfect”, but in order to get the perfect ending you usually have to discover some hidden knowledge or complete the majority of the game or find secrets or unlock dialog options. In your first playthrough, the chances of getting this ending are slim, but you always try to do it anyway and if you don’t you find out how to do it in your second playthrough. Here there is no such option.

The “6 months left to live” is just there for the sake of crushing your heart and soul. It's like “You feel depressed? Yeah well you should and there is no way to chance how you feel. Deal with it” The whole lore reason for this is that the Nineties in Johnny's chip have changed Vs biology enough that it's going to reject her consciousness and kill her eventually.

Solutions:

1) If the nineties of Johnny's chip changed Vs brain. Then why can’t the nineties of a new chip with V’s consciousness on it, change the brain back to its natural state?

2) Could there have been a potential “Status Quo” ending. I know I put this in “Solutions” but I honestly wouldn’t know how to go about this. But I was also hoping for an ending that actually merged both V’s and Johnny’s consciousness into one. Both Johnny and V became so close and so alike during my playthrough they may as well have been the same person. Which is exactly what was foreshadowed during the game, you might not be able to tell the difference between V or Johnny. The only thing I would desire for this ending is get rid of the whole “Die 6 months later” thing.

3) Have a pre-ending expansion pack that influences the outcome of the ending. An expansion pack that takes place before you go and see Hanako at Embers. This expansion will lead to an additional option when talking with Johnny about which approach to take. Meaning that people can still keep there ending if they want, while still having the option to take this new approach. This approach would lead to the outcome of V being 100% cured. The content of the expansion is obviously up to the developers. But in the expansion maybe you would come across someone who offers knowledge of how to completely cure you, which is what I was saying earlier about hidden dialog or opportunities that influence the outcome of the ending.

4) A post-ending expansion pack that explores a cure for V. Here's the thing, I personally want an expansion pack around Crystal Palace, because that looks epic as hell. Mr Blue Eyes even says so himself “You know why I hired you? Because you’d do anything at all for even the faintest chance at survival. Even if it meant coming to within a hair’s breadth of your untimely death.” So what I can gather is Mr Blue Eyes has offered V something related to the fact she's dying. V even says “Don’t forget your side of the offer” in exchange for some client data from Crystal Palace. So I think the cure lies with Mr Blue Eyes, he also has something to do with the Peralez storyline because he makes an appearance afterwards which makes me so very intrigued. Now the problem with this is if you choose any of the other endings you can’t get this one. So it needs its own list of solutions.

Crystal Palace Ending Solutions:

1) If you pick, the Suicide, Johnny takes body or Arasaka Chip endings, that is considered your head canon ending. Which is a perfectly fine way of ending the game anyway if that's your choice.

2) If you pick, Panem V Lives ending or Arasaka V Lives ending then I think Mr Blue Eyes should contact you. Because regardless of the option you pick you should still be considered a legend. The prologue to the expansion would just workout the same as the life paths. So each ending you have picked has a different “Life Path” So if you went with Panem that's the “Panam life path” for the expansion if that makes sense. In the end it just always brings you in contact with Mr Blue Eyes.

3) If you go with Panem, maybe you're at a Nomad camp or where they went to and Mr Blue Eyes contacts you saying he has a way to cure you in exchange for the Crystal Palace job.

4) If you go with Arasaka, maybe you’re still living in Night City in your apartment and Mr Blue Eyes contacts you saying he has a job for you. The problem here is V really considered a legend for selling out to Arasaka? I don’t know, maybe Arasake referred Mr Blue Eyes to you or maybe even Rogue.

5) If you go with Afterlife Legend, it pretty much plays out exactly how we see it during the ending, but maybe with a little bit more context as to how Mr Blue Eyes and V came into contact with one another.

6) If Rogue is alive during any of these endings I’m assuming she would have taken a back seat anyway reason I assume this is because if you do the “Don’t Fear The Reaper” ending, you still are in charge of the Afterlife despite Adam Smasher not killing her, but I’m just assuming her because I haven’t seen the full ending play out.

Thanks for reading and thanks for letting me vent and get my thoughts out there. If you have any corrections or thoughts to give then please comment. Again I’m not really that familiar with the Cyberpunk lore so maybe there is something I’m missing.

*Edit*
Fixed Bulletpoints.
 
The mods will merge your post with the main thread anyway... But those are some interesting suggestions
 
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