I want to preface this by saying I'm not writing this to say that NC shouldn't be immersive. If this is the story they wanted to tell, the game should've been entirely linear; if they wanted an immersive NC, the plot should've been different.
Watson before Act II was actually very cool, I thought. While it didn't have the random events or recreational activities I was hoping for, it still felt pretty dense and the missions, namely with the Maelstrom, felt like they had some dynamism. I thought it set the stage pretty well and was fun to run around in.
And then you get the chip. Before you can even get back to free roam, you are told something that you will be told several times throughout the main story: V is actively dying, and fast, and the nature of the death means the longer you wait, the worse the odds look. The best ripperdocs can do nothing for you, and you need something special. After this point, you can still take side gigs from fixers and raise your street cred, buy cars, and engage in what little recreation managed to make it into the final product. But there's always the background notion that everything I'm doing that isn't the main plot is allowing V to die, a little bit at a time. This urgency is going to compel a lot of people to complete the main story as quickly as possible, where you will be hit with an anti-twist: nobody can save you. V will ultimately die, whether at her own hand, to Johnny's control, or when Soulkiller fries her to make a copy that also goes on to die.
The game wants to have the fantasy of being an Edgerunner AND the drama of fighting for your life at the same time. The problem is, you aren't really in a position to take random jobs plot-wise, and with V dying in every ending meaning no post-game, you never will be.
Not really sure what I'm hoping to accomplish with this. Guess I just wanted to actualize what was bothering me so much about just hopping back into the game to do some more side content, and why any added features to NC will ring hollow in the end.
Watson before Act II was actually very cool, I thought. While it didn't have the random events or recreational activities I was hoping for, it still felt pretty dense and the missions, namely with the Maelstrom, felt like they had some dynamism. I thought it set the stage pretty well and was fun to run around in.
And then you get the chip. Before you can even get back to free roam, you are told something that you will be told several times throughout the main story: V is actively dying, and fast, and the nature of the death means the longer you wait, the worse the odds look. The best ripperdocs can do nothing for you, and you need something special. After this point, you can still take side gigs from fixers and raise your street cred, buy cars, and engage in what little recreation managed to make it into the final product. But there's always the background notion that everything I'm doing that isn't the main plot is allowing V to die, a little bit at a time. This urgency is going to compel a lot of people to complete the main story as quickly as possible, where you will be hit with an anti-twist: nobody can save you. V will ultimately die, whether at her own hand, to Johnny's control, or when Soulkiller fries her to make a copy that also goes on to die.
The game wants to have the fantasy of being an Edgerunner AND the drama of fighting for your life at the same time. The problem is, you aren't really in a position to take random jobs plot-wise, and with V dying in every ending meaning no post-game, you never will be.
Not really sure what I'm hoping to accomplish with this. Guess I just wanted to actualize what was bothering me so much about just hopping back into the game to do some more side content, and why any added features to NC will ring hollow in the end.
