[SPOILERS] Johnny and the Relic

[MugenShiki]

I don't really see the issue with Saburo keeping Johnys consciousness. It is mentioned multiple times that Mikoshi is a prison of souls.

i do have a question about the ending. Can't alt just rewrite V's engram into the relic? That way he can still survive as he is part of the relic which makes Johny compatible with the body. Alt even said that she used soulkiller on V, meaning that the vessel and relic is practically empty right now. Now lets say the reason Alt did not propose this is because the relic has malfunctioned and is not able to accept an engram, then how would Johny survive in V's body? It's just gonna be the same right?

 

[low_klass_intelekt]

thread topic is a huge spoiler.... why even bother to pretend that you give a damn? games been out what a week? lots of us work 40 hours a week and a social life, not all of us have beaten the game yet

 

[Rawls]

Edited thread title to be less spoilery for users just passing over thread titles.

 

[Silariell]

Edited thread title to be less spoilery for users just passing over thread titles.

Well done, I struggled to think of how to entitle it to bring the point across without spoiling -too- much. This title is much better.

 

[Aetrion]

The game explains why they kept him alive. The researcher remarks "There are fates worse than death", indicating that trapping Johnny in a digital prison where he can't even take his own life is considered a particularly cruel punishment for him. Saburo also points out that digital ghosts can't lie, so it's an effective way of interrogating someone as well. They just never expected anyone to slot the chip and then get shot in the head. I think it's also a symbolic victory for Arasaka. The one thing Johnny Silverhand hated was the idea of being a slave to corporations, but they were able to turn him into a literal piece of property.

 

[Silariell]

The game explains why they kept him alive. The researcher remarks "There are fates worse than death", indicating that trapping Johnny in a digital prison where he can't even take his own life is considered a particularly cruel punishment for him. Saburo also points out that digital ghosts can't lie, so it's an effective way of interrogating someone as well. They just never expected anyone to slot the chip and then get shot in the head.

Him being alive somewhere in a database checks out; What doesn't check out is using him, of all people, to test this 'consciousness overwrite' tech instead of someone less likely to play Rock, Paper, Nuke with them again.

I mean they must have known his old personality has three emotions: "Hate Arasaka", "Be a Dick" and "Hey wanna get wasted and fuck shit up?", not exactly a prime candidate for rebirth.

 

[Aetrion]

Him being alive somewhere in a database checks out; What doesn't check out is using him, of all people, to test this 'consciousness overwrite' tech instead of someone less likely to play Rock, Paper, Nuke with them again.

I mean they must have known his old personality has three emotions: "Hate Arasaka", "Be a Dick" and "Hey wanna get wasted and fuck shit up?", not exactly a prime candidate for rebirth.

I think that can be explained two ways.

Either it's because this happened 50 years ago, so they had only just begun developing the technology and didn't have a "consumer version" yet. They had to use the "executive version" as a soul prison and simply never intended to use any of its other capabilities. So this is a really old prototype relic where they simply hadn't put limiters on it yet.

The other possibility is that Johnny wasn't always stored in that Relic. Maybe the resurrection enabled version was brand new and Yorinobu put him in it when he stole it because he needed a digitized soul on it to be able to prove that it works, and since he hated his father he figured he'd steal one of his prize possessions and potentially unleash one of his biggest enemies.

 

[BluehighwayACE]

I kinda felt like The Arasaka clan kept Johnny's engram pretty much as a trophy. A digital Han in Carbonite if you will.

 

[Szormokpicsaneni]

My question is more from the in-universe perspective. Why did Arasaka copy Johnny into the chip? Why was this chip taken out 'to be sold' to someone?

You're probably right about the whole thing just being railroaded to get Keanu into the player's head as fast as possible... Which, if that's the case with no in-universe explanation, doesn't make this giant plot hole any better.

To fuck with him, Ara used him as a labrat.

 

[Felaeris]

To fuck with him, Ara used him as a labrat.

No. Absolutely not. And I can explain why.

Johnny was selected, specifically, by Yorinobu for reasons covered in "The Devil" ending.

Fifty years ago, terrorists blew this building to smoke. What did it give us? ... Nothing! But I learn lesson! If planting bombs not enough, what can you do?

You become bomb.

Johnny didn't end up on the engram by accident. There's no way Brigitte, Alt, or any third party could have retrieved Johnny's engram from Mikoshi. That leaves only the Arasakas.

• Saburo
  • Absolutely, ran Johnny through Soulkiller to fuck with him and for 'advanced' interrogation
  • This also serves the purpose of learning how Johnny thinks so that future imitators might be stopped (Know your enemy)
  • He made his living putting fear into everyone he met.
    • Knowing how to make "Johnny" and similar rebels afraid is a survival strategy
• Hanako
  • Is a bystander with no desire to do harm to her family or the Arasaka legacy
• Yorinobu
  • Fears his father
  • Wants to overcome that fear
  • Wants to shatter his father's legacy
    • Seems to be deliberately making 'bad' decisions for the company to further that discordance.
  • May be 'dosing' himself with Johnny Juice
  • May be seriously considering using the Johnny engram on himself to 'become the bomb'
    • Or at the very least using the engram to dismantle the company without putting himself at risk
    • IE: he may have been waiting for a compatible donor to come along.

Any bum off the street, dignitary, or otherwise could have been used to test a prototype. The interrogation with Hellman reveals that the biochip had been in development for a very long time already. As others have mentioned, it would make no sense for Saburo to put Johnny on a 'Rewrite' chip.

In summary, only the Arasaka's could have put Johnny on a 'Rewrite' chip. Yorinobu is the only candidate. He, while foolish, isn't insane. He picked Johnny on purpose--to be a weapon or to become a weapon against Saburo.

 

[hndzm501]

The reason they kept johnny "Alive" is the same reason they wanted to Keep Alt alive 50 years ago. Saburo Arasaka wants to control humanity, If he could have figured out a way to control Johnny Silverhand, he would have achieved a massive milestone toward this endeavor.

The only question that I think is left un-answered is why Yorinobu Stole Johnny Silverhand in the first place?Yorinobu had.

I agree completely. Saburo had plans to mold and create a personality with the charisma and extremist attitude of Johnny, that he could use to control the populace discreetly. It's almost a mirror of the idea shown with the Peralez memory replacement brainwashing storyline. Instead of replacing a living persons memories and changing their personality, you mold a dead persons memories and personality to implant in a living host.

It's an added bonus that he has him suffering for eternity, of course. I don't think Saburo was necessarily correct that the digital ghost can't lie, but more that with access to the physical chip, all the memories (from perspective of the Soulkilled victim are accessible. Johnny's engram personality is clearly able to lie to V.

Yorinobu, like Felaeris mentions, hates his father, and wants to destroy him. I don't know if it was just me, but the way Johnny asks V, "And you? Who're you?", at first seemed to me that Johnny had "met" Jackie in some way, as he was dying before giving the Relic to V. But after learning more about Yorinobu, it makes sense that he would be using the chip himself to sabotage Arasaka. Maybe even to create copies of the rewrite chip, and use them on the rich who wanted to enroll in the Relic program. Hopefully this is detailed further in DLC, or some other medium.

 

[2ndSnake]

Well, being forced to remain in a biochip for (what Arasaka believed) eternity, reliving your memories with no idea of what's going on in the real world or even the passage of time does sound like a "fate worse than death", but what I want to know is why can't V just find a way to put their psyche onto a different biochip (might involve adding a second slot for it), let Johnny take full control of their body, and either: 1.) Slot V's biochip back into their own body, putting Johnny's psyche into a different biochip and finding him a different body or have him coexist with V as before, or 2.) if V's body couldn't survive a second "psyche overwrite", find V a new "host" to take over. Either way, both V and Johnny would have a second chance at life. V actually has the blueprints for the Relic, so if V were to find someone who could recreate the Relic (or even recreate his/herself), this would be possible.

 

[Moxy3]

My question is more from the in-universe perspective. Why did Arasaka copy Johnny into the chip? Why was this chip taken out 'to be sold' to someone?

You're probably right about the whole thing just being railroaded to get Keanu into the player's head as fast as possible... Which, if that's the case with no in-universe explanation, doesn't make this giant plot hole any better.

Because the chip more than just eternal life. The chip or better said mikoshi is a way to imprison the souls/minds of people, so that they are even controlled after their biological death.
I would call it a fate worse than death.

I still dont like how they put Johnny into our face. i just dont like the story.. everythings about johnny and V is just a sideshow.

 

[StarkHelsing]

Johnny wasn't originally stored on the newer version of the relic, he was just stored in Mikoshi. The newer version of the chip is rather recent in development by the looks of it, an in-house development that happened after the whole situation with the Arasaka - where there became multiple 'groups' within Arasaka. These factions were an issue, and something Saburo has been trying to stomp out - and has him refusing to give up control - this includes his own daughter.

Anyway, the chip. Hellmen is a pure bioengineer who doesn't believe that SoulKiller actually takes a soul. But just copies information. It's why he refers to Johnny as being dead and just being 'data', just like he would refer to V as also being dead and property if they also used SoulKiller to become an Engram.

When Hellmen created the relic, the new relic, he put Johnny's Silverhand engram on it for one reason - he expected it to fail. Hellmen may be a lot of things, but he's not going to A) Use SoulKiller randomly on people to have tester engrams B) Use the stored Engrams of individuals who are under the protection of Arasaka contract who joined up to the program. With only a small pool of engrams he can test with, he picked Johnny's fully expecting the engram to just be fully destroyed, thus ridding the world of a terrorist. What he didn't expect was for Yorinobu to steal the chip while it still had the Rockerboys information on it. The chip was still under development and going through tests when Hellmen left.

If anything, perhaps it's a good thing considering the other side of the whole Arasaka fractions regarding SoulKiller is what Hanako is doing with said Engrams. For those who don't know, Hanako is an extremely intelligent woman who is a bioengineer. Not only is she the one who has full understanding of SoulKiller, but is the leader of the branch of Arasaka into the cloning of bodies for the engrams to be downloaded onto.

 

[Gerila]

Anyone who gets the chip inserted into his system gets his mind rewritten with that of the person who proved to be the most dangerous to the company.

This is false. The purpose of the relic is to write the engram into a new, empty body. The reason it starts "working" in V is because he got shot by Dex and supposedly flatlined. Only then, the relic started doing its job and preparing the body for the engram (in this case Johnny Silverhand).
It had the undesired side effect of bringing V back and it was a fluke.
In the Arasaka ending Takemura/Hellman explain that unlike Saburo where his sons body was genetically compatible, V has no offspring to "migrate" his engram into a fresh body since his has already been changed.

 

[Moxy3]

This is false. The purpose of the relic is to write the engram into a new, empty body. The reason it starts "working" in V is because he got shot by Dex and supposedly flatlined. Only then, the relic started doing its job and preparing the body for the engram (in this case Johnny Silverhand).
It had the undesired side effet of bringing V back and it was a fluke.
In the Arasaka ending Takemura/Hellman explain that unlike Saburo where his sons body was genetically compatible, V has no offspring to "migrate" his engram into a fresh body since his has already been changed.

Agreed. That and the fact that the chip V had was a prototype. The one Saburo used was different.

 

[r4zm]

They give even your copy just 6 months left to live

I don't think that's correct. I presume that your theory is solely based around Hanako's message sequence in the devil ending. With that in mind, I think she was, actually, talking to V, the original one.

After going through Lizzy's questline, you might've noticed her partner discussing Secure Your Soul program in its current state, implying that the person you try "to copy" doesn't really need to die, while being influenced by the soulkiller v0.3 or whatever. Of course there's a chance that Lizzy was already AI-ed by this point in the story, but I highly doubt it, considering a high amount of spooky premonitions about the blackwall (and either johny or V always leaving for cyberspace; in our case mb both, but i kind of suspect that living through your last days, kicking johnny and copying ourselves won't be as cheap as it seems)

 

[PepeSmug]

Simple. The story needed to happen. No one said it would be good or make sense.

 

[PhishPhosh]

THIS ENTIRE THREAD IS GOING TO SPOIL THINGS, DO NOT READ IF YOU DO NOT WISH TO BE SPOILED

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Okay. I have a question about the story; Why exactly did Arasaka create an engram with Silverhand's character in it? Why did they keep it so it could be activated and let him live again? I don't get it. In his flashback, the lady says to him 'there are fates worse than death', but... Uhm... All they're doing is inviting the possibility for him to finish what he started.

Can someone explain to me why that plot device even exists? Why did they decide to make an engram of a rocker boy who hates them with every fiber of their being and not some rando soldier / other loyalist? As I understand it, the tech costs so much money only their dear leader can even afford to fully use it, and even then it takes a horrible betrayal from his son to make it work. Why did they decide to use it on a <literal who>, who'd murder them all if he got his way?

Was this ever explained in the game? Because if not, that's a -massive- plot hole...

Hello, I've been reading everyone's response. Before giving an answer.
I thought, it was more than anything a pride thing. That Saburo Arasaka was doing it to punish Johnny. Like a fate worst than death, kinda thing. That killing the dude was letting him off easy. He gets to not only defeat Johnny but now they both know that at the time Arasaka, for sure won the war, kinda lol

I know its still a weak reasoning. But it explains why Saburo meets with his son at Konpeki plaza in the first place. Yorinobu, did not understand what he was messing with. He stole the engram of the MOFO who came closest to destroying the company. Unfortunately for the emperor, his own pride became his biggest downfall.

That's what I think. I agree regardless though. Whether or not I am right. It's a pretty weak area in the story. In my perspective though it isn't a plot hole. Maybe just too many Mangas and animes come to mind, with the evil over lord ruler pulls something like this

 

[rippercityransom]

I thought it had something to do with a few throwaway lines on a news report where they were answering FAQs. I can’t remember it word for word but the reporter was reassuring everyone “no, they won’t be able to fiddle with your personality after you’re uploaded.“

I assumed this meant they absolutely will be trying to mess with your personality after you’re uploaded. Like someone mentioned earlier Johnny has three moods, one of which is “fuck Corps,” if they could change Johnny “Let’s Start a Riot” Silverhands into the next Adam Smasher lapdog, they could kidnap and reprogram whoever they wanted with whatever personality they had on hand, maybe that has something to do with the Peralez quest line? It also puts an even darker spin on the Devil ending where you choose to save your soul. He’s such a severe case, where some random off the street would be pretty mild you couldn’t measure the effect as much. Also add in the “haha you tried to blow me up and now I can make you lick my boots.”

I feel like the Saburo at the end in Devil ending isn’t the genuine Saburo and Hanako messed around with this digital version of himself, Yorinobu knows his sister is trying to reprogram him with a version of their father that defaults to whatever she says, which could be why she dies in some endings of “mysterious circumstances.”

I like the idea that Yorinobu put Johnny on the “rewrite“ chip out of their digital hell as a last ditch effort to save himself or even just because he wanted a profit/something to hold over his family so he could leave without them fighting back. It’s been awhile since I was at the start of the game so it’s possible I’m missing something that ruins my whole theory, but It’s what’s dancing in my head for now. Could be that there’s multiple versions of Johnny around now, one that’s already been reprogrammed and Yorinobu downloaded the “original“ Johnny with no editing for safe-keeping.

Or maybe all the Arasaka’s are big dummies who do dumb things due to moving-the-plot-itis.