The Story is Deeper Than Originally Thought - SPOILERS

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You need multiple angles to form an informed answer.
A good example would be the nature of cyberspace in this story. It's simply shown as a hellish place. The digital afterlife in hell. This point of view is never questioned and the player has no chance to look at it with the own... Cortex.
Yeah. The cyberspace is not really explained. But it has to function just like everything else. There's a good and bad side. From my personal take. V going with Alt, and Johnny taking the body. Is the best outcome over all the endings. Nothing directly denies that what the Relic chip is doing. V 2.0 of the chip is 100% taking your mind of the brain, and moving it. So ALT has V. V through the ENTIRE game. Fought Johnny to the end. V will do the same to ALT.

Having a 100% working body. With someone you can trust. And mind ready to recombined later. Is a lot better than the body being in the messed up state in the other endings. Or the dumbest ending of going into Mikoshi. Falling for Arasaka's BS. It's all nice and happy to have money, or be with Panam. But you're dying. You're not dying in ALT. You're trapped. While you have people who can fight to bring you back, in another story.

There's other things that give hints to the truth. When you have characters endlessly try to drill in the fact that ALT is gone. The AI contruct destroyed her. That usually is the writer trying to tell you to NOT think about the potential outs they have in their head. If this AI construct can become all powerful. V could become the same. And take over the AI body.
 
It would be even worse it was intended to insert plot holes.

Some of the themes mentioned are great but they are only scratched on the surface in addition, cyberspace and being an engram is portraied as being pretty much hell.

The themes are scratched but the game also already makes it clear what's what.

The endings are a special kind of insult to the player in this medium and it would not even work in a book that tries to get at least 3.5 stars on Amazon.

no offense though but do you really expect CDPR delivering answers to questions that need an answer ever since man came up with, like 'what is the soul?'.
CP 2077 is a game and quite entertaining if you let it happen and don't get off on a rant about lacking content. It can only scratch surfaces on this and that especially when there's a lack of answers or someone's personal opinion is the major part to an answer.
There's at least as many definitions of SOUL as there is languages on this planet and even though some definitions are pretty much identical the rest differs to quite an extent.

A 3.5 rating on Amazon actually means ****.
Open ended stories are one way to get your brain working and in the case of CP2077 it inspired quite a bunch of people to speculate how V might end up or how a DLC might pick up the loose ends.
Yes, CDPR want to sell their product and therefore it ain't too bad an idea to have an open ending as it might lure players into buying a sequel / extension / dlc. a smart move
 
What did you do with Delamain?
What did you do in the Sinnerman Quest?
What fate did you decide for V?
What did you decide after the 4 races with Rachel?
How did you handle the Monk quest, and did you talk to both later in the game?
Did you betray Panam?

The game dose ask questions.. a lot
Delamain is just personal flavor, because you don't have enough information to make an informed choice.
It boils down to: do I destroy artifical life or do I endanger the people of night city with highly unstable AIs. Merge was off course an option but you need higher intelligence and does not restore Delamain.
It boils down to a coin toss

Sinner an failed in my playthrough.

Vs fate is decided by the writer and not the player, because in all endings, V is either sent to cyberhell or ends up like milk, forgotten in a broken fridge.

Rachel? Driving in this game? Good one

Why should I betray a person that is trying to help me? This is actively sabotaging my own chances to survive.
 
The game is asking you to make a decision, and you are now asking what decision that person made. This has nothing to do with a good story that makes you question your system of beliefs.

A decision is an answer to a question. To help you out.

Definition of decisions:
"the act or process of deciding; determination, as of a question or doubt, by making a judgment "

Since it's a judgement that already means you questioned yourself and beliefs to come to that decision.
 
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no offense though but do you really expect CDPR delivering answers to questions that need an answer ever since man came up with, like 'what is the soul?'.
CP 2077 is a game and quite entertaining if you let it happen and don't get off on a rant about lacking content. It can only scratch surfaces on this and that especially when there's a lack of answers or someone's personal opinion is the major part to an answer.
There's at least as many definitions of SOUL as there is languages on this planet and even though some definitions are pretty much identical the rest differs to quite an extent.

A 3.5 rating on Amazon actually means ****.
Open ended stories are one way to get your brain working and in the case of CP2077 it inspired quite a bunch of people to speculate how V might end up or how a DLC might pick up the loose ends.
Yes, CDPR want to sell their product and therefore it ain't too bad an idea to have an open ending as it might lure players into buying a sequel / extension / dlc. a smart move
No. I don't expect them to give me answers to deep philosophical questions but they could at least challenge my answers from more directions.

The 3.5 stars on Amazon are were more or less a rhetorical tool than an actual comparison.
Fact is that the epilogue would not have been published l, because the editors (test readers) would have pointed out this glaring issue.
 
And how many choices in real life give you enough information? Few.
Exactly.
And that's the reason the decision boils down to a cointoss

But to elaborate.
I off course met all the AIs and had a chat with delamain. I read all the emails in the office complex.
Delamain was a reasonable and friendly personality that asked for my help.
Some of the AOs were mental, tried to threaten me, kill me, wanted to kill themselves or wanted me to kill plastic flamingos.
They were all mentally unstable. In addition, they wanted to kill me during the last phase of the mission, instead of talking to me.

Freeing them does certainly not look like a great idea from that perspective, so resetting the core looks like the obvious option..

The game values out friendship with delamain and helping out our friend by deleting the rogue AIs AND delamain by resetting him to 0.

Merging does not bring the expected result either. Delamains rogue AIs are portrayed as part of him that went rogue. You could thing that a merge would result in the best option of restoring Delamains current consciousness. That also backfires.

Freeing the AIs leads to some very interesting discussions later on, where one of the Delamains asked me, if it should spare people's lifes. Not really great, because you unleashed a dangerous, potentially homicidal AI.

This mission is better not played at all, because all outcomes are equally bad.
 
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What questions did you find the game asked?

What is soul?
What will soul be in the future?
How much of myself would I be ready to give up in exchange for immortality?
With immortality being one of the biggest dreams and goals of humanity - is the cost worth it?
How much of myself am I giving away to tech corps?
What is the cost of becoming one with technology?
Is it worth it to rebel against the system? Would I be capable of it?
What would I choose - saving myself or saving others? Am I capable of altruism?
What is family?
What is friendship?
How far will media & corps go to sell controversy?
What is faith?
Can you go too far with escapism and detach yourself from reality? What are the consequences?
What would I do if I found out I'm gonna die soon? Would I change anything about my life?
What are the ethical consequences of technological advancement in fields of Artificial Intelligence and brain-computer interfacing?
What does it mean to be human and when do we stop being one?
Do I need real love if I can just buy it?

That's just a quick list from the top of my head.
 

bign

Forum regular
A decision is an answer to a question. To help you out.

Definition of decisions:
"the act or process of deciding; determination, as of a question or doubt, by making a judgment "

Since it's a judgement that already means you questioned yourself and beliefs to come to that decision.

Ah yes, the age old question of answering "should I help this stranger with her revenge killing" by being presented with the full set of options of {yes, no} really makes my answer to the question really seem worth it.
 
What did you do with Delamain?
What did you do in the Sinnerman Quest?
What fate did you decide for V?
What did you decide after the 4 races with Rachel?
How did you handle the Monk quest, and did you talk to both later in the game?
Did you betray Panam?

The game dose ask questions.. a lot
Most are one stand side/minor quests minus Delamain. Ok, Delamein can stay but only if he will be letter connected with the AIs behind the Blackwall. So that's that, no where near the TW3, nowhere near advertised branching story.
And fate of the V in current main quest is one in every ending, and what will bring expansions is up to expansions.
Even world stage is not a question since it was never asked. Game for the whole time was about survival, out of nowhere ends up about commercialization of space or trade agreement.
 
What is soul?
What will soul be in the future?
How much of myself would I be ready to give up in exchange for immortality?
With immortality being one of the biggest dreams and goals of humanity - is the cost worth it?
How much of myself am I giving away to tech corps?
What is the cost of becoming one with technology?
Is it worth it to rebel against the system? Would I be capable of it?
What would I choose - saving myself or saving others? Am I capable of altruism?
What is family?
What is friendship?
How far will media & corps go to sell controversy?
What is faith?
Can you go too far with escapism and detach yourself from reality? What are the consequences?
What would I do if I found out I'm gonna die soon? Would I change anything about my life?
What are the ethical consequences of technological advancement in fields of Artificial Intelligence and brain-computer interfacing?
What does it mean to be human and when do we stop being one?
Do I need real love if I can just buy it?

That's just a quick list from the top of my head.
Some of your questions are really good ones.

My take on some of the questions:
The soul part however, heavily depends on the question if you are religious.
The question about rebelling against the system, is answered by the endings. The answer the game provides is pretty much clear.
Faith, again depends on your religious points of view or if you in general are an optimistic person.
Family are the persons you chose to have around, not something you are born into but I realise that years ago.
Self preservation is a primal instinct and you can't really answer the question, if you are not in a position for fight for your life.
The Beatles already answered the question of love. "can't buy me love."
Media already goes very far to sell controversy. The Gladbeck hostage crisis and how the media covered it in 1988 showed how far they will go.
 
There's is also the whole thing how much player is willing to challenge him/herself.

We can take all the background information as just something that set the stage, or we can wonder how the heck did this dystopia happened to begin with? How came that these people chose this?

We go through different periods in history, different value systems and sometimes the most important thing may be, just to sometimes remember to ask where are we heading really and why.
 
There's is also the whole thing how much player is willing to challenge him/herself.

We can take all the background information as just something that set the stage, or we can wonder how the heck did this dystopia happened to begin with? How came that these people chose this?

We go through different periods in history, different value systems and sometimes the most important thing may be, just to sometimes remember to ask where are we heading really and why.
Well. That's pretty much explained in the lore and time-line.

Basically: oil crisis, unchecked corporate greed, USA being secretly controlled by the big government agencies, massive climate change.

Greed on one side and survival instincts on the other.
 
Well. That's pretty much explained in the lore and time-line.

Basically: oil crisis, unchecked corporate greed, USA being secretly controlled by the big government agencies, massive climate change.

Greed on one side and survival instincts on the other.
What led to oil crisis? Why was corporate greed running unchecked?

I wrote, if we are willing to challenge ourselves.
 
What led to oil crisis? Why was corporate greed running unchecked?

I wrote, if we are willing to challenge ourselves.
The oil crisis was pretty much decided by having depleted all oil reserves. In the cyberpunk universe, the reseeves were lower as in ours.

Corporate greed is like fire consuming material. It's a given fact. When society does not decide to challenge greed, greed will flourish. Even if society tries to challenge greed, it does not really work. Remember occupy Wallstreet?
 
The oil crisis was pretty much decided by having depleted all oil reserves. In the cyberpunk universe, the reseeves were lower as in ours.

Corporate greed is like fire consuming material. It's a given fact. When society does not decide to challenge greed, greed will flourish. Even if society tries to challenge greed, it does not really work. Remember occupy Wallstreet?
They found alternative solution when they had to. We are becoming less and less dependent from oil IRL, because perhaps someone thought, that in the end, there's no real long term strategy available by means of war. We can fight, we can occupy but that doesn't increase available natural resources in the world.

Some things work, some don't always work out, but then there are other consequences, and singular events are deciding factor only if you are fatalistic to begin with.

I don't want to make this IRL events discussion, but there's value in asking certain things, by itself. Game gives us food for thought.
 
They found alternative solution when they had to. We are becoming less and less dependent from oil IRL, because perhaps someone thought, that in the end, there's no real long term strategy available by means of war. We can fight, we can occupy but that doesn't increase available natural resources in the world.

Some things work, some don't always work out, but then there are other consequences, and singular events are deciding factor only if you are fatalistic to begin with.

I don't want to make this IRL events discussion, but there's value in asking certain things, by itself. Game gives us food for thought.
To an extent yes.
The game also told us that fighting leads nowhere.
 
Accidently, PC Gamer published this piece today: https://www.pcgamer.com/yes-cyberpunk-2077-has-something-to-say/

Good read. And I like this quote:

In other words, Cyberpunk's world does not permit a person an internal life. Everywhere you look, Night City wants to reach inside you and pull whatever's in there out for everyone to see. In an environment where your memories can be edited and your personality digitised, who you are becomes a vital question.
 
Do you know everything from the first Game of Thrones book? Did the follow up book about Harry potter fill in things just briefly touched on in the first book?

I wouldn't have read through 6 books of Frank Herbert's masterpiece if the first one didn't catch me with its intrigue and story. If I couldn't connect to characters or get interested by the action or by the goals of the protagonists.

I will repeat what I've said. Exposition isn't a way to get a player's attention. Not in a game. Not when it's done via that mess of a shards collection. That doesn't catch. Also, let players choose stuff, instead of giving them the bland "Yes", "Mhm", "Okay" dialogue options. Or, like in Thompson's case, have the option to punch the media guy or just see the game punch him for you. It breaks immersion. It gives less reason to read through the conversations. The fact that you can pick 3 lines of dialogue designed to have 3 different... tones and then just use the only other dialogue to move the convo forwards is also weird.

I could hardly wait to see Saul's deal with Biotechnica go haywire. It didn't. Saul went out with a bang though. Buried plot.
I was curious of what happened between Rogue and Adam. Something-something, she regrets, out with a bang. Plot buried.
How come no one touched the VDBs? So stronk and yet... out with the bang without doing anything to stop it. The gang that made NC pull its PD out of that district. Story threads left to rot. Of course, by the end, I ended up caring a lot less.

In the first playthrough, I played a woman, had Judy ask me at every step of the main story about my progress, so to speak. Sure, didn't get much interaction after the diving session, but it was something. Played a man on 2nd round. Radio silence from Panam through and through. Sure, her absence, along with the absence of anyone else, did help more in passing the wheel to Johnny - even more so when the (Don't Fear) arc offered what was probably the dumbest ending for me. 'Cause, you know, money, rep, blah-blah. I wasn't planning on going against Jefferson in the next elections.

No time to chew the bigger questions, because they didn't have enough time to form... kind of. And the consequences of any choice are wiped clean by "One more gig". Not really the way to make the player give it another round, to take different paths. Dig deeper.

This. The game asked so many questions, leaving answers to players themselves. That's how it should be done, at least in my book.

Yeah, so does the ME trilogy. But friendship there meant something. You had a lot of time to build on any relationship and serious side effects of not doing it. You had big questions about AIs and their soul, about the fate of the quarians and of the krogans. Of what's right or wrong to do to a species... But all of them were kept in your scope long enough to care. Be it through multiple quests, dialogues, cutscenes, backstory...

CP2077 doesn't keep anything in your scope for long enough to care. You have to... force yourself to do it. Like was the case with Jackie. One mission. together, 1 conversation - and not even that about us, just about the gig... That's not how you make people care.


What is soul?
What will soul be in the future?
How much of myself would I be ready to give up in exchange for immortality?
With immortality being one of the biggest dreams and goals of humanity - is the cost worth it?
How much of myself am I giving away to tech corps?
What is the cost of becoming one with technology?
Is it worth it to rebel against the system? Would I be capable of it?
What would I choose - saving myself or saving others? Am I capable of altruism?
What is family?
What is friendship?
How far will media & corps go to sell controversy?
What is faith?
Can you go too far with escapism and detach yourself from reality? What are the consequences?
What would I do if I found out I'm gonna die soon? Would I change anything about my life?
What are the ethical consequences of technological advancement in fields of Artificial Intelligence and brain-computer interfacing?
What does it mean to be human and when do we stop being one?
Do I need real love if I can just buy it?

Altered carbon makes you ask the first few questions too. Falconchrist is essential in pushing those questions to you.

Corps? Do they even exist in CP? I mean, sure, I keep hearing about them... But I don't see them do stuff. Good or bad. They're background noise.

Family? Friendship? Love? Those questions could be asked, if I had a family to care about. But you see... the Nomad lifepath is no different than the Corpo one ;) Panam's story arc is good. up to the point where important decisions about their future is left in the air, with the passing of Saul. Could've been a moment where Corps would show how evil they are. Wasted. Friendship? I sure hope you talk, again, about either Panam's family or about Johnny. Cause you have no other friends, not really. And my gf pretty much disliked Panam's arc, even more so when quests overlapped each other (Mitch's call with Panam's train heist).

However you did hit the nail on its head with a few topics. Sinnerman is a great example of a wonderfully made quest/story bit. So is the Peralez arc with questions galore. River's arc also makes you ponder a bit. All in all, it's not the main story that asks questions - that one's on rails. And it's a pity, 'cus it could've been deep. Also, the delivery was pretty bad, of all quests. All popping up on the map at the same time - some triggering at the same time over the holo: I never had 1 task for either Goro, Judy or Panam that wasn't interrupted by another one of these guys'. Would've been nice to have you choose whom to help, so there would be consequences of prioritizing one over the other... But as it were, their urgency, my own race against the clock... ugh!

All I'm saying, all I keep saying is that CP2077 has... had immense potential. But... time is a cruel mistress. Or the management is...
 

Guest 4375874

Guest
I originally gave the story a 7/10 but after my second play through, and on my third where I've paid closer attention to shards and other things I have to give the story a 9/10 now. Remember this is for the story, not the overall game.

There is some real deep shit going on. Mr. Blue Eyes is one example. He actually appears in the background of other quests. And that whole part about changing your memories is scary. then we have the whole AI possibly taking over human bodies. At some point are we dealing with a human or an AI in a body.

The endings also can get very philosophical. Is there a soul? Are we still the original V? What is consciousness and does the process change us?

There are other things that the game left open. The whole Black Wall and rogue AI's. Alt living behind the Black Wall. Is she a type of god there?

And of course how and why was Johnny Silverhand's engram placed on the relic. Most likely IMO it was Yorinobu in his deal with Netwatch as they are after Alt like the Voodoo Boys but for different goals.

And finally of course what will happen to V.

I know many will say that's it's a poor story and these are just plot holes or lazy writing that it wasn't explained. But I think it's exactly what CDPR intended. If their goal was to make many DLC's and future games then all of these must be left open for future expansions. They have to leave questions for us to ponder that are much deeper than if Panam is a good relationship or not. For those looking for a shallow story and didn't spend time getting deep into the game and actually listening to all the dialogue then the game's not for you. But if you put time into it the game is surprisingly deep.
That's been the case from day 1. Most of the players jumped on for a futuristic sandbox game but this a story focused game first and foremost. If you rush through the game just to have bragging rights then that option is open to you, maybe the devs shouldn't have done that but they said before that they went that direction because many ppl felt the Witcher 3 missions were too long. They attempted to cast a wider net for casual fans just interested in gameplay and that was the mistake. Stay true to the fans for the sequel and future expansions. The ppl just joining for the hype some of the most toxic out there and if their suggestions are taken seriously we'll end up with a dating sim sandbox game
 
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