Hey guys ! This post will contains spoiler about pretty much all aspects of the story and romances so don't go further if you don't want to be spoiled 
.
I think i'm not the only one seeing how much forum thread already exist about the different issues regarding the story but i wanted to condense all my thoughts and problems into one post and share my opinions after all that's why forums exists.
I went with a female nomad character.
First the life path:
As a lot of other people already pointed out, people including myself were waiting much more from what life path actually are. A 30 minutes intro felt lacklustre to put it nicely. I can understand why it has been done that way. Doing 2-3 hours of content X3 for each life path isn't a good idea because even if we the people complaining on the forums are willing to do multiple playthroughs to experience everything the game has to offer, it is understandable that a majority of players and casuals won't do it. Hence why doing hours of content that will not be played by 1/3 of the audience can be seen as a waste of resources for a developer. Let's say I'm willing to disregard this even though I'm was already quite disappointed and felt betrayed by the promises and how marketing was making us feel it was going to be a bigger deal than what we got.
Jackie my dear friend :
Who was this guy? Oh yeah! The one I did a mission with at the beginning of the game. I think we can all agree it was surprising, to say the least when we saw a short cinematic trying to build a relationship with a character. It seems so obvious that it was just cut content mashed together in one cinematic. I wasn't even sad when he died. There was not enough time to build a bond with a character it's like those movies when a character dies in the first 20 minutes it's like "Yeah whatever, he wasn't that important anyway". It also reinforce the feeling people have about the length of the game. If we had 2-3 hours of gameplay from the life path and 2-3 hours to build this relationship with Jackie I think people wouldn't feel that way.
Panam romance and ending:
Here was my tipping point, I started to seriously doubt about this game ability to be the great game I was waiting for. From the get-go I knew I wanted to romance this character just seeing the trailers but guess what? I couldn't because I'm playing a female character! What a pleasure to experience rejection in video games that's all I ever wanted #NoFunAllowedHere. I saw other people say they were disappointed because they couldn't romance Judy as a male character (and i understand them).
I can understand the idea behind Gender locking the romances, after all, the world doesn't revolve around our character and those NPCs aren't here to serve our interests. Our choices have consequences you might argue and while true, the thing is the choices we have in this game only seems to take things away from us and I didn't feel they had any positive impact on my story. Moreover, I felt like the fact that the Panam romance was gender locked was even worse because she has an ending directly related to her. It felt really bad, for a video game which is supposed to revolve around choices and the liberty to choose your fate now it feels I have to play as a male character (Where's the fun/choices ?) to achieve my ideal ending which I don't want to do.
I won't talk about how the game was supposed to be about saving yourself rather than saving the world and the fact you can't even do that. Everything has been said and it even became a meme at this point...
What now?
I've seen people talking about DLC's and how it would be cool to have something where we play the missing bits I eluded to with life paths, Jackie or some even suggested a DLC following the Casino heist ending but the truth is: It won't work. It's just too late for this. Even if I have a DLC with Jackie It won't make me go back in time to feel sad about his death. I'd even say I'm scared they will do DLC's with missing content like this. I don't want to support a developer taking things away from a game to release them after in a DLC. Feel free to change my mind on this subject but I don't really see how a DLC like this could work and be interesting since it won't have an impact on the story that already happened. The only thing I'm hoping right now is a patch where they change their mind on the Panam romance so I can at least finish my playthrough with a "satisfying" ending for me.
Now what I would like to know, do you guys think it is possible for them to save this story without a complete overhaul like No man's sky or Destiny 2?
.I think i'm not the only one seeing how much forum thread already exist about the different issues regarding the story but i wanted to condense all my thoughts and problems into one post and share my opinions after all that's why forums exists.
I went with a female nomad character.
First the life path:
As a lot of other people already pointed out, people including myself were waiting much more from what life path actually are. A 30 minutes intro felt lacklustre to put it nicely. I can understand why it has been done that way. Doing 2-3 hours of content X3 for each life path isn't a good idea because even if we the people complaining on the forums are willing to do multiple playthroughs to experience everything the game has to offer, it is understandable that a majority of players and casuals won't do it. Hence why doing hours of content that will not be played by 1/3 of the audience can be seen as a waste of resources for a developer. Let's say I'm willing to disregard this even though I'm was already quite disappointed and felt betrayed by the promises and how marketing was making us feel it was going to be a bigger deal than what we got.
Jackie my dear friend :
Who was this guy? Oh yeah! The one I did a mission with at the beginning of the game. I think we can all agree it was surprising, to say the least when we saw a short cinematic trying to build a relationship with a character. It seems so obvious that it was just cut content mashed together in one cinematic. I wasn't even sad when he died. There was not enough time to build a bond with a character it's like those movies when a character dies in the first 20 minutes it's like "Yeah whatever, he wasn't that important anyway". It also reinforce the feeling people have about the length of the game. If we had 2-3 hours of gameplay from the life path and 2-3 hours to build this relationship with Jackie I think people wouldn't feel that way.
Panam romance and ending:
Here was my tipping point, I started to seriously doubt about this game ability to be the great game I was waiting for. From the get-go I knew I wanted to romance this character just seeing the trailers but guess what? I couldn't because I'm playing a female character!
What a pleasure to experience rejection in video games that's all I ever wanted #NoFunAllowedHere. I saw other people say they were disappointed because they couldn't romance Judy as a male character (and i understand them). I can understand the idea behind Gender locking the romances, after all, the world doesn't revolve around our character and those NPCs aren't here to serve our interests. Our choices have consequences you might argue and while true, the thing is the choices we have in this game only seems to take things away from us and I didn't feel they had any positive impact on my story. Moreover, I felt like the fact that the Panam romance was gender locked was even worse because she has an ending directly related to her. It felt really bad, for a video game which is supposed to revolve around choices and the liberty to choose your fate now it feels I have to play as a male character (Where's the fun/choices ?) to achieve my ideal ending which I don't want to do.
I won't talk about how the game was supposed to be about saving yourself rather than saving the world and the fact you can't even do that. Everything has been said and it even became a meme at this point...
What now?
I've seen people talking about DLC's and how it would be cool to have something where we play the missing bits I eluded to with life paths, Jackie or some even suggested a DLC following the Casino heist ending but the truth is: It won't work. It's just too late for this. Even if I have a DLC with Jackie It won't make me go back in time to feel sad about his death. I'd even say I'm scared they will do DLC's with missing content like this. I don't want to support a developer taking things away from a game to release them after in a DLC. Feel free to change my mind on this subject but I don't really see how a DLC like this could work and be interesting since it won't have an impact on the story that already happened. The only thing I'm hoping right now is a patch where they change their mind on the Panam romance so I can at least finish my playthrough with a "satisfying" ending for me.
Now what I would like to know, do you guys think it is possible for them to save this story without a complete overhaul like No man's sky or Destiny 2?