Taking some issue with the lore, lack of megacorps

[Gothic_Wizard]

Now in general the lore is fine, it does its purpose to try to show how things went downhill in the world. I also take into consideration this was written in the 80s. A time when... a serious dose of suspension of disbelief shall we say... was required for a lot of RPGs back then. It's a product of it's time thus if you try to drill to far into it the logical holes and such it'll grow wide and collapse the whole thing. Now all that said, my biggest issue is the fact it seems to me this world of Cyberpunk is basically 2 mega corps going after each other and everyone else is in the crossfire or sidelines due to being inconsequential. Sure you got a couple of others like Biotechnia or such but let's be honest they are small time vs Mili and Ara.

One thing I like better about Shadowrun then the lore of this game is in Shadowrun you got almost a dozen megacorps and another dozen corps just below their level and another couple dozen on the lowest tier. They are all jockeying for control and to out do each other. It makes, to me at least, a much more interesting setting. When you have about a dozen megacorps all trying to screw over each other. With cp it seems the stories all revolved mostly around ara and mili as they are the 2 big kids on the block and everyone else just lives in their world. At least that is the impression I am left with from the in game lore/story and reading the hard cover lore book I got off of Amazon.

Perhaps the PnP game 2077 is based on has a much more fleshed out setting corp wise than what the game and books related to 2077 show. If so I do hope for CP2 they show more then just 2 big kids on the block as that would make it far more interesting to me and I'd think others. My 2 coppers.

 

[LeKill3rFou]

Corporations
There are others, but in the NUSA, it's mainly Militech which is present.
In Night City, which is a "free" city and independant of the NUSA, it is an Arasaka's stronghold.
In China you will find mainly Kang Tao, in Japan Arasaka with no rival and so on.

This two are the "most" powerful in America, because Arasaka is the "big one" all over the world and America is Militech territory (and also because these two corpos are the biggest weapon manufacturers in the world)
Some from Cyberpunk Red :

Spoiler

 

[Gothic_Wizard]

Corporations
There are others, but in the NUSA, it's mainly Militech which is present.
In Night City, which is a "free" city and independant of the NUSA, it is an Arasaka's stronghold.
In China you will find mainly Kang Tao, in Japan Arasaka with no rival and so on.

This two are the "most" powerful in America, because Arasaka is the "big one" all over the world and America is Militech territory (and also because these two corpos are the biggest weapon manufacturers in the world)
Some from Cyberpunk Red :

And all of that is fine, but all you did is re-enforce my point about only one or two boys, and everyone else playing 2nd fiddle to them. I am not debating the setup, or the hows, whys they are like the way they are I am questioning from a story and RP perspective the limited options you get when it's the same one or 2 corps over and over. Granted SR came out after CP2020 but I think it would be helpful to take page from them as it would add a lot of flavor and story potential. Honestly I am pretty much over the saka, mili dramafest. I'd like to see several other players and get involved with them.

 

[Drakonaj]

And all of that is fine, but all you did is re-enforce my point about only one or two boys, and everyone else playing 2nd fiddle to them. I am not debating the setup, or the hows, whys they are like the way they are I am questioning from a story and RP perspective the limited options you get when it's the same one or 2 corps over and over. Granted SR came out after CP2020 but I think it would be helpful to take page from them as it would add a lot of flavor and story potential. Honestly I am pretty much over the saka, mili dramafest. I'd like to see several other players and get involved with them.

These other corporations werent centerpiece of the story, se devs didnt include them. As easy as that. You cant just have main story, where you include every gang and corporation in the city. Technically, they exist in the universe, but just not in this game.

 

[LeKill3rFou]

And all of that is fine, but all you did is re-enforce my point about only one or two boys, and everyone else playing 2nd fiddle to them. I am not debating the setup, or the hows, whys they are like the way they are I am questioning from a story and RP perspective the limited options you get when it's the same one or 2 corps over and over. Granted SR came out after CP2020 but I think it would be helpful to take page from them as it would add a lot of flavor and story potential. Honestly I am pretty much over the saka, mili dramafest. I'd like to see several other players and get involved with them.

In Night City, it's pretty much Arasaka vs Militech since ever... Others can't compete nor play the same game. None of the other ones can't "play" against the two corporations which have the biggest private armies in the world, even states or governments can't... (if they're not already "corrupted" by these big two^^).

But it's a little bit like in The Witcher 3, with Redania (Radovid) vs Nilfgaard (Emhyr). There are other realms, but in the part of the world that CDPR chosen to set TW3 story, it's mainly and only them

 

[strangerr3]

I think it was storywise decision to not include too many corporations in a game. Player has a beef with Arasaka so thats why it circles around it. They mention militech, Kang Tao, Biotechnica but I think it would be too many ingredients in one dish to have deep story involving all of them. I do hope for more corporation dynamic plot in a sequel so we dont repeat street kid game again.

Its the same with gangs - there are so many of them and I think each one could get a long storyline except a gigs from fixers, but at the end you need to ask yourself what story do you want to show in a given time.

 

[CS554]

There are also the news corps N54 and WNS very presented in game.

Arasaka and MiliTech are heavily featured as there's this quiet war ongoing between the two. Play the game, go to side content, you find out little bit more about other corporations too.

 

[zzzfrofzzz]

I think it was storywise decision to not include too many corporations in a game. Player has a beef with Arasaka so thats why it circles around it. They mention militech, Kang Tao, Biotechnica but I think it would be too many ingredients in one dish to have deep story involving all of them. I do hope for more corporation dynamic plot in a sequel so we dont repeat street kid game again.

Its the same with gangs - there are so many of them and I think each one could get a long storyline except a gigs from fixers, but at the end you need to ask yourself what story do you want to show in a given time.

to be honest , the game giving all ready a lot information
- some entry with side quest
- some entry with tooltips on items
- some entry on chards
- some entry on the environnements ( ads , and other stuff )
- some entry on the web in game

may be for some few corps / faction there's few info but as i see on this game many lore info was on a set based on a diegetic experience : to resume more the player spend time in game , more he may discover new info about the lore . its not like a "classic " open world with mostly all info given on early stage of the game but info was given on how the player will react on cyberpunk 2077

 

[SpookyFX]

In Night City, it's pretty much Arasaka vs Militech since ever... Others can't compete nor play the same game. None of the other ones can't "play" against the two corporations which have the biggest private armies in the world, even states or governments can't... (if they're not already "corrupted" by these big two^^).

Just like (at least in my country) all the restaurants only have Pepsi or Coke.

You almost never see "Shasta" or "FIZZ".

 

[CS554]

to be honest , the game giving all ready a lot information
- some entry with side quest
- some entry with tooltips on items
- some entry on chards
- some entry on the environnements ( ads , and other stuff )
- some entry on the web in game

may be for some few corps / faction there's few info but as i see on this game many lore info was on a set based on a diegetic experience : to resume more the player spend time in game , more he may discover new info about the lore . its not like a "classic " open world with mostly all info given on early stage of the game but info was given on how the player will react on cyberpunk 2077

I sometimes think that way different elements interconnect with the world, characters and story they create this seamless experience, yet at the same time it's so seamless that it's easy to overlook things because we come to take that experience as granted. I mean even I forgot one really huge global megcorp even when we come to encounter them pretty soon in the game (and there's some side content as well) the Trauma Team.

 

[zzzfrofzzz]

I sometimes think that way different elements interconnect with the world, characters and story they create this seamless experience, yet at the same time it's so seamless that it's easy to overlook things because we come to take that experience as granted. I mean even I forgot one really huge global megcorp even when we come to encounter them pretty soon in the game (and there's some side content as well) the Trauma Team.

time to time i check the "data base " , or chards , to reminds how deeply is the lore on this game .
even walking on the street and listen some random npc , like as on our first buikding , people talking on some cool vendors for gears , cloth ...

 

[CS554]

time to time i check the "data base " , or chards , to reminds how deeply is the lore on this game .
even walking on the street and listen some random npc , like as on our first buikding , people talking on some cool vendors for gears , cloth ...

Very important, yeah there's also one very relevant conversation between two NPC's near ripper doc at Arroyo. Some GIG's there's ton of stuff in those and come to think of it, I really like how much of it's how if players read the shards, it shows corporations influence on people's daily lives. For me it's subtle way, something to figure out and clever way to realize this aspect of cyberpunk.

 

[SpookyFX]

Very important, yeah there's also one very relevant conversation between two NPC's near ripper doc at Arroyo. Some GIG's there's ton of stuff in those and come to think of it, I really like how much of it's how if players read the shards, it shows corporations influence on people's daily lives. For me it's subtle way, something to figure out and clever way to realize this aspect of cyberpunk.

Agreed but I also wish they had mirrored a lot more of that in the news casts. My V Eats, Piss, Sleeps and Showers on the regular at her apartment. Part of that routine is watching the news and other "informational" talk shows. With my Dyslexia videoed media is more practical to consume. And (as in the real world) a minimal Tec character like my V would be the same even with out a reading handicap. Most of the street people would be that way as well as demonstrated by the hundreds of monitors blasting media at them starting from their bathroom to the elevator to the street and into any building (restaurants, police stations, tattoo parlors ) they visit.

I realize writing the text for shards is far more cost effective than hiring voice actors to do this.

But once they start using TEXT to speech in games (something I have been predicting for a few years now) I bet we will see more of what I am after. Todd Howard hinted at this as well in his recent interview.

 

[CS554]

Agreed but I also wish they had mirrored a lot more of that in the news casts. My V Eats, Piss, Sleeps and Showers on the regular at her apartment. Part of that routine is watching the news and other "informational" talk shows. With my Dyslexia videoed media is more practical to consume. And (as in the real world) a minimal Tec character like my V would be the same even with out a reading handicap. Most of the street people would be that way as well as demonstrated by the hundreds of monitors blasting media at them starting from their bathroom to the elevator to the street and into any building (restaurants, police stations, tattoo parlors ) they visit.

I realize writing the text for shards is far more cost effective than hiring voice actors to do this.

But once they start using TEXT to speech in games (something I have been predicting for a few years now) I bet we will see more of what I am after. Todd Howard hinted at this as well in his recent interview.

Yeah, now I think of it news services mostly serve the purpose how deep those corps are in other corps pockets. They have quite interesting spin on things that V knows went down quite differently. Other than that I recall novel written by an AI and how they made breakthrough in treating Multiple sclerosis (MS) which is to demonstrate that corporations aren't investing on research where clients won't become dependent from their cervices (cyberware).

Text to speech approach sounds something that might work as it's not only recording voice for all localizations, say something goes wrong, how do you fix that? I'm not sure if they fixed certain segment in Kerry's dialogue ("ebonite frets" should be ebonite fretboard or fingerboard) that has been there since day 1.

It's also about disc budget. All the shards in game even in compressed format would take a lot of space and text to speech as comfort / accessibility feature is only thing I could imagine as working solution.

 

[SpookyFX]

It's also about disc budget. All the shards in game even in compressed format would take a lot of space and text to speech as comfort / accessibility feature is only thing I could imagine as working solution.

mmmmm, wow THAT I had not thought of! I mean I was talking about text to speech and then recording THAT as you would voice actor *. But the idea that the TXT to speech software is part of the game and the game STREAMS the text to it (the txt to speech code) to play the voice dialogue...

THAT is a cool futuristic idea that we actually have the tec for right now.
Basically a similar process as to the way we use to play midi music in PC games like in the old DOOM games.

However, the voice dialogue for Starfield is claimed to be Double that of their last Fallout game so I think the "budget" is not all that much a problem like it use to be. Especially if they put some of it on a on line server like they do now with Fallout 76. As much as I HATE the idea of #$^*(% #$%^ cloud gaming that is were the DEVs seem to want to take their games.

* My predictions for over a decade had been that once TXT to speech was perfected (it has been around since the before 2006) Dev would license the sound of a voice actor for use in their project then they could write the text when ever they want to that project. Even do last minute edits or DLC later down the road. Basically they could puppeteer the voice the same way they puppeteer the image of the actors in the games. This is now a reality such as with James Earl Jones as Darth Vader for movies and will soon be the case for Games.

This will be wonderous for mod makers as well if an agreement with the actor would include mods. Even if they do not some unethical mod makers would do it anyway such as is used in Deep fakes.

 

[Enkidu98]

Perhaps you need some economics study.

If you encourage an environment where corporations determine their own rules, consolidation is one of the first aims.

There are MANY cops mentioned, but the two most powerful are, f course, the ones that are going to be involved in the most friction and at the focus.

Take modern America and unleash corporations from any anti-trust legislation. How long do you think it would take before everything was Amazon or Wal*Mart?

Post automatically merged: Dec 17, 2022

Perhaps you need some economics study.

If you encourage an environment where corporations determine their own rules, consolidation is one of the first aims.

There are MANY cops mentioned, but the two most powerful are, f course, the ones that are going to be involved in the most friction and at the focus.

Take modern America and unleash corporations from any anti-trust legislation. How long do you think it would take before everything was Amazon or Wal*Mart?

Sorry - working presently as well, just took a small side break to read, so replies aren't involved or with supporting evidence/research.


Just look at Market Cap rankings from 2021.

The Biggest Companies in the World in 2021

Now, unleash them from global rules preventing them from mergers and acquisitions to form true monopolies/monopsonies.

Many smaller companies will exist as shell corps, branding, subsidiaries to give an illusion of choices but all excess value will be brutally extracted to consolidate wealth and power in as few hands as possible.