Yeah me too, I never had any problem with that and never will (above all in open worlds...)
I have more trouble with "real" time-based stuff that you can miss or fail because you just spent too much time to explore or to do your own things... It was already debated to the death, but I always have KCD in mind, which have quite a few "time-based" quests/contents. So the first time, when I encountered a new quest giver, I was always shared between :
- Either finish my active quest to not fail it and possibly fail/miss the one that I left.
- Either activate the new quest but possibly failling the previous one.
Hell of a dilemma... Annoying for me, at least
So I prefer when you don't have time limit, even if the "main quest" push you to do thing as fast as possible, which is often the case
It's a tricky balance no matter how you slice it. Any RPG needs to balance its gameplay against its storytelling. Not only will the experience be entirely subjective to the audience, but every game will wind up working out differently. I think Cyberpunk did really well with its decision to leave the fatalist arc in the narrative and simply let the player play the game. Every ending achieves the sense that V is either dead or on the last few miles. It's a tragic closure to a tragic tale set in a dark and unforgiving world. I think it's absolutely perfect for Pondsmith's universe, and I feel it does the concept of "Where's Johnny?" proud. We flesh out and explore the nuance of one of the most iconic Cyberpunk 2020 personas...and it still leaves him a mystery in the end. We also, have the concept of "V" moving forward. The legend that overturned the greatest empire on the planet...but who were they really? (For storytelling purposes, this is gold for the future.)
The thing to keep in mind is that playing a character in a narrative video game requires players to sort of "play that role" in the story. An actor's job is to qualify the character they're playing in a script as it's written. (That's necessary for any sort of strong storytelling. It's also why casting is so important.) So, when a player picks up a game and they, "don't like the script" so to speak, that can be a real challenge. Coming from a huge performance background, I think it's just far easier for me to hop into a role and simply have things fall into place. In that way, I can thoroughly enjoy good storytelling and excellent writing, even if I'm not a big fan of the content.
And also, it's totally invalid to judge a piece negatively simply because I'm not, personally, a fan of the style. If I prefer happy endings to tragic ones, that does not in any way invalidate wonderfully crafted tragedies. My love of Disney endings to movies does not make that particular style "superior" or "correct" and everything else "terrible" or "broken". It just means I'm not a fan of that style. (Personally, I can dig both.)
V's life is cut short and Jackie's is ended, simply because a megacorp was hell-bent on dominating life on Earth by continuing a tradition of artificial immortality, something that has and will continue to destroy countless lives along the way. V is instead forced into a position to change the world, either for the better or for the worse, and they won't really be around to see how it turns out. We also learn through Johnny that there may not be a way to fix it...that mass destruction may actually be the more merciful course.
Your life is now a burning fuse in a world that may continue to degenerate no matter what you choose. So...what do you do? You'll never live to see the results.
That's pretty dang dark and tragic. (And excellent. I like the story here equally as much as Blade Runner...even if Blade Runner was better executed.)
_______________
On the other side of this coin, I will fist-bump your personal take on it. Exactly. Yes. I think about these things the same way. If life absolutely unloads pain on us like this, we should say exactly that. Those are the cards, and here is our play. Dark? Tragic? Fatal? So be it. We rise to meet it and do everything we can. I'm certainly not going to spend my life differently simply because of bad fortune.
Vs life was cut short and Jackies was ended because they were stupid. A megacorp didn't make them do any of the things that lead to their death. v and jackie were just two small time crooks that became a victim of their own folly and greed.
I want to keep lit the fire of the vision that V makes it happen. That is the point of never giving up, especially in the world where human immortality is starting to become available.
Jackie's death is an unfortunate event. Saburo's arrival and murder are the push that throws the entire actually working plan off balance. V's death is a panic attack of a small-time fixer who thought it should help clean up the mess that spilled all over NC. And, it's kind of a part of the story that stinks. See, by then, some Vs can easily overpower Dex and his lil guard. It would be way more realistic to fall down to an overwhelming army of Arasaka fighters. Or, to even make it out, and then slip, hit the head, and die, with more or less drama. That would have been magnitudes of order more epic gameplay than this one path to small-time fixer's gunlet without the option to show him yours. It's insulting.
The rest is here, in my previous post. In short, Johnny is the willing underdog, and V becomes basically a god of NC. Adam Smasher is reduced to a pile of junk, Arasaka is downed, all gangs and corps, including the police, have all the reasons to feel positively harassed and bullied whenever V passes by. V is making plans to violate the Crystal Palace, by chance capture Hanako, to have the option of exchanging her body for Jackie's. My V mourns Jackie before all, that's the baseline. Given enough time, she'll also launch an army of drones to cut down the Arasaka building into a half-a-kilometer-tall statue of Jackie Welles. "There you go, Mama Welles. They took him and I can't find him yet, but he won't be forgotten in the meantime."
And also, it's totally invalid to judge a piece negatively simply because I'm not, personally, a fan of the style. If I prefer happy endings to tragic ones, that does not in any way invalidate wonderfully crafted tragedies. My love of Disney endings to movies does not make that particular style "superior" or "correct" and everything else "terrible" or "broken". It just means I'm not a fan of that style. (Personally, I can dig both.)
This! I've been saying this for years now.
Just because a game, like Fallout 3 back then before BS, uses a self-sacrifice or be doomed scenario, which many may not like since its not a happy ending, doesn't make it a bad ending storywise.
I will defend Fallout 3's original ending to the death, despite that you COULD have characters there that would have done the job without a downside. Also with Mass Effect 3. I took "Control" and Shepard gave up her life in order to gain command of the biggest universe-killers out there and change around the cyclic nature of the harbingers of death coming every 50k years.
Both sadd endings, but they work and they are wellmade endings.
Someone who's pouting their lips on account of them not being happy endings and therefore saying the endings are bad(ly written) Or as a stretch and call the game bad.
Sorry, you don't get simpathy from me.
I want to keep lit the fire of the vision that V makes it happen. That is the point of never giving up, especially in the world where human immortality is starting to become available.
Jackie's death is an unfortunate event. Saburo's arrival and murder are the push that throws the entire actually working plan off balance. V's death is a panic attack of a small-time fixer who thought it should help clean up the mess that spilled all over NC. And, it's kind of a part of the story that stinks. See, by then, some Vs can easily overpower Dex and his lil guard. It would be way more realistic to fall down to an overwhelming army of Arasaka fighters. Or, to even make it out, and then slip, hit the head, and die, with more or less drama. That would have been magnitudes of order more epic gameplay than this one path to small-time fixer's gunlet without the option to show him yours. It's insulting.
I can see where you're coming from, becuase during my "The Run" of redhead V I cleared out all of Watson and so have gained myself a good set of weapons, money and cars that would easily make me more capable then Dex himself.
What I would've liked (and might become a lengty pot as a result) Is that this could indeed play a part. And for the purpose of this reaction, lets go the the part where Dex is gonna betray you. Because naïve V was not my V by then. I had with me a selection of murdertools and gadgets that could deflected that bodyguard slap in the face. (imagine if you had Mantis blades installed by then...)
I would've liked if V was/could be cunning enough to see the attack coming and react to it by killing that bodyguard herself (QTE??) and then point the gun at Dex for a final convo/confrontation and make a statement of how affairs would turn out from there. (give dialog options where you can simply kill Dex, settle on splitting up and laying low or something. Narratively Dex would want to tie up loose ends anyway so the chance to have him killed (by anyone) is plentyful. I see roughly 3 scenario's as a start
- Fail QTE, game plays out as it does now.
- Win the struggle with bodyguard, then shoot Dex right then and there. --> V will have to clean up the scene so she has to get her own car (which ever one at that point) to dispose of Dex and the Bodyguard. Dumping it at the trash-site where she's caught by Takemura who traced/followed V there.
- Win the struggle with the bodyguard but not kill Dex. Narratively He would doublecross V as soon as she turned her back and we are basically back in a potential QTE moment --> anticipate Dex's betrayal or fall victim. Wichever it was it all culminates at the trash-site where Takemura finds you.
From there on out there's can be 2 situations, Dex disposes of you, or you dispose of Dex. In both instances its plausible to assume you're not yet a match for Takemura, Eitehr you're almost dead, which Takemura will want to prevent since he needs info from you, or you'll be in a mexican standoff with him. again, here you can converge on one path for that moment --> going with Takemura when the 'twist' gets revealed that both of you are hunted people. --> take the car chase scene from there. Wether you're nearly dead or or not should not make a real difference because you can make it so you end up near death when the car eventually crashes.
From there the game can go on with the Relic stuff and Victor trying to save you.
Just a short imagining where you could have a very capable V who ultimately is forced to take on more than she can chew, specifically when it's all happened in close succession, and end up at one culminating point: her (near)Death and the Relic starting to release its poison.
But this is only one excerpt, I could do this for the entirety of the Heist where I would liked to have multple ways and options available to you.
The rest is here, in my previous post. In short, Johnny is the willing underdog, and V becomes basically a god of NC. Adam Smasher is reduced to a pile of junk, Arasaka is downed, all gangs and corps, including the police, have all the reasons to feel positively harassed and bullied whenever V passes by. V is making plans to violate the Crystal Palace, by chance capture Hanako, to have the option of exchanging her body for Jackie's. My V mourns Jackie before all, that's the baseline. Given enough time, she'll also launch an army of drones to cut down the Arasaka building into a half-a-kilometer-tall statue of Jackie Welles. "There you go, Mama Welles. They took him and I can't find him yet, but he won't be forgotten in the meantime."
All good and well, but you take it only from one of the several "paths" you have. (this sounds like temperance/Sun, or whatever it was called again) (after checking, yes that was your viewpoint).
I agree with you that V will have made a mark on Night City, Arasaka and even the wastelands in close proximity. However I see a bit of troubles because even after she done such thing (which is only accounted for in 2 of 3 endgame scenario's) there's other players that would eagerly fill the void. Militech for one, Night Corp could be another. but the other thing: my V went with the Nomads, so while my V made her mark, she's done so from an outside perspective. Night City in that case would speak of the 'great Nomad Assault'... "apparently spearheaded by some crook that lives/lived in NC." Potentially they would even refer to you as "that one who nearly died from a failed robbery at Konpeki"
But furthermore, following the Nomad ending (Star) to its conclusion: you leave. Try to find a way to survive out there in the wastes. Or at least cope with your mortality until you die anyway.
Opposed to Sun-V, Star-V has said her goodbyes to whatever legends and puts Night City in the "part of my past" bucket.
Now, if we want to string speculations of what could happen after the endings we got, then I'm fully behind the option where Nomad V learns of potential help in Crystal Palace and so finds that she has to thread back into her past and find a way up there. Perhaps using Night City again as a staging area, use some old (or new) contacts. But the defining one I'd say is: will Mr. Blue Eyes be involved, and in what capacity?
I will not speculate any further here because we're close to writing our own subsequent game at this point.
But, to go back to the original point. We should take into account basically 5 or 6 endings, composed of A) Who came back from Mikoshi: V/Johnny? And B) Where is V/Johnny and in what capacity?
And then there's a third component, what if you choose Devil?
I was both glad and disappointed they went with they way of Keanu. Glad to have Mr. Woah as sidekick and disappointed because I think, because they wanted starpower, it took away from more player tailored rpg story they could have went with.
Still good to see Mr, Anderson / Wick Mnemonic lending his voice and likeness.
1) The "You are dying" thing is a horrible gameplay element. Because it applies urgency to the story. Which ruins pacing completely. The game is masterfully written. All characters come across as real people in the world setting. Conversations feel natural.
So I can only assume the fault here lies with upper management ruining the game with the mindset that we "have to use Keanu more" mindset. The writers are not at fault. Because the writing of CP is excellent. I'd say even masterful. But the entire "you are dying" thing is an absolutely disaster to narrative pacing and general enjoyment of the game's narrative and world.
2) That none of the endings cure V is really bad for replay value and for player agency. Because no matter what you do nothing matters. At the very least, the Arasaka ending should have cured V. It would make sense that "selling your soul to Arasaka to save yourself" would be the bitter sweet resolution. Where you can cure V - but it requires you to sell out to the corp. Unless you were already roleplaying loyalty to Arasaka - in which it just becomes a sweet ending. At least the Arasaka ending, and one more none-corp ending, should lead to explicitly curing V.
3) Silverhand if you hate him and just want to get rid of him is way too intrusive to the story. Even if you don't want to converse with him at ALL - V often talks and replies to him. They botched the game heavily by forcing Silverhand on the player. Again, the writing of Silverhand and Silverhand as a character is excellent in terms of writing. However - as a narrative tool it is horrendous and makes the experience worse not better.
4) "Meet Hanako at Ember". Placing a point of no return at this point in the main story really messes up stuff even more.
Ultimately. It is the perfect storm of bad decision making to force Silverhand on the player to such extent, to have V dying, and to have not a single ending which saves you. Meaning no player agency / nothing matters. The writers and the devs did an absolutely fantastic job. There is no proof (that I know of). But it seems to me that management wanting to use Keanu more was an absolutely disaster of a choice which ruined so much of the enjoyment of the game due to their meddling.
5) There is still hope. The CP DLC could fix the endings when the DLC is integrated. By fixing the dying aspect to be over years and not weeks or months. Taking pressure off V and the player. Add options to ignore Silverhand more and no automated replies. Have endings with a cure and a playable world stage after completion. CDPR can still fix it. However - there is only so much they can do with the horrible decision making done in the narrative already.
All in all the writers and the devs making the game did an absolutely amazing job imo. However the person or persons, whoever they are, who made the call to have the protagonist dying, with no cure, and with not 1 ending to fix it, and to a lesser degree forcing Silverhand on the player so hard. That person or those people which made these decisions should find a different job. Because it is a complete and utter failure in understanding the most basic and fundamental aspects of narrative design in an immersive and interactive setting using gaming as a medium.
Dont get what means "fun" here... Geralt / Shepard, lets say, are key characters in their world.
Here V is not a "choose one" and should not save world / galaxy / universe. And it is totally fine with me not to be a world saver, like in many other games.
It is a story about an ordinary person who felt into an unordinary situation...
In the beginning of the game - we are literally nothing, the world doesnt know V and doesnt care about V. Actually like in real live for most of the people.
In the end - well, it is a point of discussion, a new coctail can be called in honour of you / some people will called you "a friend" / love of all life will find you. But at global level - wheels of the world keep on turning without changes...
Will be story better without Johnny? - I think no, here a lot of symbolism... Johnny sympholizes internal uncontrolled rage / fears against the system. He want to destroy it but dont propose something instead. He was made in this way, may be intentionaly, with a lot of cliche in his character (rockstar, almost everybody dont like / hate him, too errogant and so on).
V is not a supporting character - throughh Johnny he must to decided: to gave up and be swallowed by this rage against system (Johnny) or to continue a fight for himself till his last brief.
P.S. that all reminded me everybody well known movie / book "Fight Club" .
1) The "You are dying" thing is a horrible gameplay element. Because it applies urgency to the story. Which ruins pacing completely. The game is masterfully written. All characters come across as real people in the world setting. Conversations feel natural.
2) That none of the endings cure V is really bad for replay value and for player agency. Because no matter what you do nothing matters. At the very least, the Arasaka ending should have cured V. It would make sense that "selling your soul to Arasaka to save yourself" would be the bitter sweet resolution. Where you can cure V - but it requires you to sell out to the corp. Unless you were already roleplaying loyalty to Arasaka - in which it just becomes a sweet ending. At least the Arasaka ending, and one more none-corp ending, should lead to explicitly curing V.
5) There is still hope. The CP DLC could fix the endings when the DLC is integrated. By fixing the dying aspect to be over years and not weeks or months. Taking pressure off V and the player. Add options to ignore Silverhand more and no automated replies. Have endings with a cure and a playable world stage after completion. CDPR can still fix it. However - there is only so much they can do with the horrible decision making done in the narrative already.
1) Agree dying is horrible gameplay element especially in a game that's trying to sell itself as an open world adventure.
However, i don't agree with idea that the game is masterfully written. Elements are done well others done not very well.
2) Agree i'm not a fan of cheap gotcha endings like Arasaka, (so devil cure at a steep price would have been better). To be honest 'lack of cure' is buried beneath the much bigger issue of the endings not really providing any player agency.( Using a totally unsuitable rooftop mission choice to define the character of V)
5) Until the expansion lands i guess there's still hope. By this point i'm rather jaded & think things won't be addressed.
