True human

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I'm fairly certain it's been stated a number of times in a number of places by innumerable people providing sundry links pointing to statements made that cyberware is absolutely required in the game.

On a philosophical note, however, WHAT is "human", or "true human"?

Not Cyberpunk, but, potential far future ...
In a potential post-singularity trans-human, post-human future, and all the more so for those of us that subscribe to Futurism and all it entails with 3D printed replacement bodies that could be entirely organic, synthetic, chimeric with animal DNA/attributes, and/or a composite of all those, in a world where animals themselves could be uplifted to human, superhuman and AI-augmented intelligence, in a world where machine minds, or data-encapsulated animal minds could download into those 3D-printed human replacement bodies and live an entirely "human" organic life, terminology like "human" can get really blurry.
If anything with a mind is basically software that can inhabit any substrate that accommodates a mind, then, what is "human"?
Is a human mind downloaded into a machine body, or an animal body still human? What if they transfer back into an entirely orthodox organic human body?
In a future where form and substrate can be fluid, where anything/anyone that qualifies as a mind can potentially take any form, then "human", or "true human" as narrow categories of definition become a little inadequate.

If we, for instance, ever encounter an alien civilization, then, basically anything originating from, or associated with Earth, then becomes "human", regardless of whether it was ever "human", inanimate, or even capable of housing a mind.
Human food, Human plants, Human vehicles, Human machines, Human rocks, Human solar systems ....

Yeah, I know, it's not really the subject of the thread, but, it's a bit of a peeve of mine that goes in with my personal philosophy for Inclusion over Exclusion. It bothers me because there's still the sort of folks that consider themselves "more" human, or other people less human, or not even human even to this day, so, when it comes to questions regarding the qualification of what is human or "true human", even if we're just talking about a computer video game, it gets me itchy.

... and, that's my soapbox for the day. :)
 
I remember Lilayah mentioning on Discord (I believe) that some cybernetics WILL be required for the game, so there's no true human form to play.
 
I'm fairly certain it's been stated a number of times in a number of places by innumerable people providing sundry links pointing to statements made that cyberware is absolutely required in the game.

On a philosophical note, however, WHAT is "human", or "true human"?

Not Cyberpunk, but, potential far future ...
In a potential post-singularity trans-human, post-human future, and all the more so for those of us that subscribe to Futurism and all it entails with 3D printed replacement bodies that could be entirely organic, synthetic, chimeric with animal DNA/attributes, and/or a composite of all those, in a world where animals themselves could be uplifted to human, superhuman and AI-augmented intelligence, in a world where machine minds, or data-encapsulated animal minds could download into those 3D-printed human replacement bodies and live an entirely "human" organic life, terminology like "human" can get really blurry.
If anything with a mind is basically software that can inhabit any substrate that accommodates a mind, then, what is "human"?
Is a human mind downloaded into a machine body, or an animal body still human? What if they transfer back into an entirely orthodox organic human body?
In a future where form and substrate can be fluid, where anything/anyone that qualifies as a mind can potentially take any form, then "human", or "true human" as narrow categories of definition become a little inadequate.

If we, for instance, ever encounter an alien civilization, then, basically anything originating from, or associated with Earth, then becomes "human", regardless of whether it was ever "human", inanimate, or even capable of housing a mind.
Human food, Human plants, Human vehicles, Human machines, Human rocks, Human solar systems ....

Yeah, I know, it's not really the subject of the thread, but, it's a bit of a peeve of mine that goes in with my personal philosophy for Inclusion over Exclusion. It bothers me because there's still the sort of folks that consider themselves "more" human, or other people less human, or not even human even to this day, so, when it comes to questions regarding the qualification of what is human or "true human", even if we're just talking about a computer video game, it gets me itchy.

... and, that's my soapbox for the day. :)
Any sort of media, be it books, movies, or nowadays games, have always been used to evoke philosophical questions. The cyberpunk genre tackles such questions since (and maybe even before) movies like Metropolis, or Blade Runner to name one that is more known today.
Its basically: When is a human not a human anymore. Since we don't have a solid answer to this, we can only philosophize about it.

But I am certain, Cyberpunk 2077 will evoke the same question.
 
You forgot that mercenaries in real life don't have to deal with cybernetically enhanced enemies, so I don't know what your point is here.

Because you are describing "meatbag" mercenaries as non-professional:
"What if the meat-bag can't pull the trigger, because he shows pity to the target that he is supposed to kill? What if his moral compass makes a 360, causing him to go against the client? What if he has an emotional breakdown in the middle of the mission, and starts crying for his mommy cause he can't handle the action?
Nah man, human meat-bags come with too much emotional baggage and are way to unpredictable. "

And is a abnormal human, who hurts/kills others because he is annoyed, any less human?

Yup. That's why the word "inhuman" is used to describe the most extremes actions.
Mental problems doesn't comes from cyberware only.



To get back to the cyborg example, if he is enhanced so much, that he lost his humanity and human behavior, then he would stop to behave like a human, regardless if in terms of "normal human behavior" or "abnormal human behavior". I mean, what kind of logic is it, to exclude "normal human behavior", but to include "abnormal human behavior", that doesn't make any sense.

Because the cyborg isn't human anymore.
It's more like a feral predator. You can ask feral predator to kill someone, but he might kills you instead.
 
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Because you are describing "meatbag" mercenaries as non-professional:
Never said they were not professionals, but in Cyberpunk, a not enhanced merc might seem like a rookie, you know, most professionals are enhanced, that's all.

Because the cyborg isn't human anymore.
It's more like a feral predator. You can ask feral predator to kill someone, but he might kills you instead.
But doesn't a feral predator acts even more on his emotions then we humans???
You know, FEELING hungry, go hunt. Feeling PAIN caused by an attack, attack back. FEELING aroused, search mate.

If a predator decides to rip anything apart, then it either FEELS threatened, or it FEELS hungry. Hell, even the survival instinct is heavily affected by emotions, like FEAR or death.

I still can't see how a cyborg would ever decide to rip someone apart based on emotions he doesn't have. Sure, I can see him ripping people apart because he was told to and gets paid for it. I can also see him doing it based on some sort of programming, if he was turned him into an AI...

...but not because of negative (or positive) emotions.
 
Never said they were not professionals, but in Cyberpunk, a not enhanced merc might seem like a rookie, you know, most professionals are enhanced, that's all.

You wrote this:
"What if the meat-bag can't pull the trigger, because he shows pity to the target that he is supposed to kill? What if his moral compass makes a 360, causing him to go against the client? What if he has an emotional breakdown in the middle of the mission, and starts crying for his mommy cause he can't handle the action?
Nah man, human meat-bags come with too much emotional baggage and are way to unpredictable. "
Do you think that's how professional mercs behaves?

But doesn't a feral predator acts even more on his emotions then we humans???
You know, FEELING hungry, go hunt. Feeling PAIN caused by an attack, attack back. FEELING aroused, search mate.

If a predator decides to rip anything apart, then it either FEELS threatened, or it FEELS hungry. Hell, even the survival instinct is heavily affected by emotions, like FEAR or death.

I still can't see how a cyborg would ever decide to rip someone apart based on emotions he doesn't have. Sure, I can see him ripping people apart because he was told to and gets paid for it. I can also see him doing it based on some sort of programming, if he was turned him into an AI...

...but not because of negative (or positive) emotions.

Minus they don't lose emotions, they doesn't instinctively react as humans anymore.
For example: My Childhood.
When I was young, I was a very bad kid, hurting other without caring. My father then inscribed me in martial arts when by sparring with older guys I learned pain inflicted by hitting someone, then stopped hurting others.
Cyborgs are the other way around, they forget how it is to feel human (not what it is to feel) and so may act in a totally different way that what you would expect from someone normal.
 
I'm not bothered if you can go 'true human' but given the setting and balancing, I highly doubt it.

Not to be a killjoy but I'm fairly certain the game will have difficulty and optional routes through missions created on the basis the player uses cyber implants so I don't see how it would be feasible.

It'd certainly make the game more difficult and less varied, except in the possible differences in social/dialogue mechanics, that might be interesting based on what some people have written here.
 
I actually have an idea about a PURIST 100% human gameplay with no implants.

There can be another "Hipster-like" purist origin story.
Those people use old purely natural clothing (considered luxurious by many) as starter clothing / style.
Instead of having implants, they have neural readers linked with cyber goggles that act as a HUD. Pretty much they can have the basic interfacing Augs have, without the implants. This will need the introduction of a "Neural Interface Kit" as a type of item that replaces the implant slot in V's inventory and V can only equip these kind of kits in this slot.
The NIK (neural interface kit) also links gun HUD trough a glove V uses.
Almost forgot about it. the cable coming out ot V's arm is also linked, the kit includes it.
Same place, same animations, just the cable is attached on skin-tight clothing he/she always has (part of the neural kit, changes with different items).

The neural readers of the goggles are placed in the back of the head, on the forehead part of the goggles and also on the temples + come with an earpiece, allowing full integration just like an Aug without implants.
This origin sacrifices implant augmentation altogether with all their perks, however comes with the immunity form being hacked.

You have to rely on gunplay, armor and tech and hacking within human limits.

For example the Deep dive video.
Instead of relying on strength to open the door, you will have the option to use a breaching charge or hack it's electronic security. You will be a bit restricted in terms of gameplay and will have to rely on restrictive mechanic, allowing a completely different playstyle /playtrough.
You will also be limited in stats, a Purist cannot have Body and Reflexes above 6 for example.

I've been thinking about this concept for a while and the more I think about it, the more viable it becomes without sacrificing core gameplay mechanics. For example when V is woken up by Johnny Silverhand, instead of seeing him outright, at first he just hears him via the earpiece and puts up the goggles to see him.

I apologize for the long post, however I think this is a viable way CDPR can pull this off without sacrificing core gameplay elements and introducing a purist origin story.

Would be cool I think, hope CDPR actually reads my post and consider it :D
 
I actually have an idea about a PURIST 100% human gameplay with no implants.

There can be another "Hipster-like" purist origin story.
Those people use old purely natural clothing (considered luxurious by many) as starter clothing / style.
Instead of having implants, they have neural readers linked with cyber goggles that act as a HUD. Pretty much they can have the basic interfacing Augs have, without the implants. This will need the introduction of a "Neural Interface Kit" as a type of item that replaces the implant slot in V's inventory and V can only equip these kind of kits in this slot.
The NIK (neural interface kit) also links gun HUD trough a glove V uses.
Almost forgot about it. the cable coming out ot V's arm is also linked, the kit includes it.
Same place, same animations, just the cable is attached on skin-tight clothing he/she always has (part of the neural kit, changes with different items).

The neural readers of the goggles are placed in the back of the head, on the forehead part of the goggles and also on the temples + come with an earpiece, allowing full integration just like an Aug without implants.
This origin sacrifices implant augmentation altogether with all their perks, however comes with the immunity form being hacked.

You have to rely on gunplay, armor and tech and hacking within human limits.

For example the Deep dive video.
Instead of relying on strength to open the door, you will have the option to use a breaching charge or hack it's electronic security. You will be a bit restricted in terms of gameplay and will have to rely on restrictive mechanic, allowing a completely different playstyle /playtrough.
You will also be limited in stats, a Purist cannot have Body and Reflexes above 6 for example.

I've been thinking about this concept for a while and the more I think about it, the more viable it becomes without sacrificing core gameplay mechanics. For example when V is woken up by Johnny Silverhand, instead of seeing him outright, at first he just hears him via the earpiece and puts up the goggles to see him.

I apologize for the long post, however I think this is a viable way CDPR can pull this off without sacrificing core gameplay elements and introducing a purist origin story.

Would be cool I think, hope CDPR actually reads my post and consider it :D

You're description looks like what the Amish lifestyle would be to our eyes. not bad at all, I guess it's more applicable in a pen & paper RPG system than in this game (or wait for modding maybe). I think the cyberpunk genre is more about having a government that pushes you through a lifestyle without your consent ; you can embrace it or fight against it with consequences. But in the beginning you've been enrolled into this lifestyle since you're born and might not even realize its downsides in your early life.

Maybe our children or grandchildren will have mandatory implants like identity chip, credit chip or medical status chip, then later they'll be bait into getting a bigger implant (eye, brain, palm...) if it granted bullcrap advert like "a better social, or gaming experience". Then it would be like everyone can afford cosmetic implants like the skin color, natural-like replacements for arms and legs, chips for enhancing the brain capacity and connexion, and so on. By that time, people will look at your 100% flesh and bones, external-Google glass man holding a smartphone or a Gameboy, and be like "How come he didn't have the mandatory implants like everyone else?". From a p&p rpg that would be hilariously fun.
 
By that time, people will look at your 100% flesh and bones, external-Google glass man holding a smartphone or a Gameboy, and be like "How come he didn't have the mandatory implants like everyone else?". From a p&p rpg that would be hilariously fun.

I would say that's almost exactly the core of what the Cyberpunk 2020 world seems to be. People without implants of some sort, just to be able to get on with daily life more efficiently, would appear either "3rd-world" or extremely unfortunate and underprivileged.

It would be like meeting someone today who doesn't have a phone, a PC, or access to the internet. They don't use microwaves, have never flown in a plane, and have never gotten a driver's license. They have no bank account or credit card, don't shop at grocery stores, don't drink treated, municipal water, and still light fires in a wood-burning stove instead of installing a heater during the winters.

A: Like...how do they live???

B: Despite the fact that people lived with even less for something like 12 million years? I see what you mean, I guess.
 
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Actually no cyber isn't that uncommon in cyberpunk 2020.

I'm guilty, I have pushed too far into the most cynical view of cyberpunk :ROFLMAO: like some people from Twitter say : "opinions are mine alone" ? Too bad that I can't play a full fleshed biologic person... because I wish I could do that too. Now with the game's story line involving some chips in your brain and some implants to have shown the HUD and conversation calls — and I recognize honestly, this is the most minor implants we can get in this world setting — it's hard to re-think the gameplay.
 
I'm guilty, I have pushed too far into the most cynical view of cyberpunk :ROFLMAO: like some people from Twitter say : "opinions are mine alone" ? Too bad that I can't play a full fleshed biologic person... because I wish I could do that too. Now with the game's story line involving some chips in your brain and some implants to have shown the HUD and conversation calls — and I recognize honestly, this is the most minor implants we can get in this world setting — it's hard to re-think the gameplay.

Augmented reality glasses, like in a lot of Cyberpunk/sci-fi setting?
 
Augmented reality glasses, like in a lot of Cyberpunk/sci-fi setting?

Arhhhhhhhg... I guess you mean that quote of mine. Again, I'm sorry for having replied so fast.
[...] your 100% flesh and bones, external-Google glass man holding a smartphone [...]

Anyway, the answer on whether A-R glasses would be a thing in a sci-fi, or cyberpunk-like world in general would be "yeah man, I can totally see that". But if we just stand here saying that sci-fi things could belong to a sci-fi setting, we're going anywhere far :ROFLMAO:

The real issue takes place in the designer's interest in seeing this or that technology in "their view of" today's cyberpunk world : does it contribute to the art and design "of the future" we have in mind, does it suit the topics and philosophy behind the story and gameplay. I think the 80's and 90's cyberpunk worlds had different standards and topics to deal with, their designs were inspired from different elements (for which a part of the designs are outdated techs, today).

About nowadays... let's be honest I'm the first to admit that cyberpunk genre is the one that we don't get rid off easily if we look at our modern society, because it's coming in that direction (and history could have left us with different society standards, but it's coming closer to cyberpunk than "else"). It's kind of every new year we're living closer to what cyberpunk genre predicted... So does it feel like we live in cyberpunk now ? We don't really feel that because we're familiar with our technology.

And as I mentioned before, some of today's techs are even better by a thousand times than many techs in CP2020, like the smartphone that became a multi-tool in the palm of the hand, but if we want to give players the feeling of a dystopian "future", we got to move on with our technologies and provide something that players are not familiar with. So I'd say, IMHO it's a matter of well-thought choice, even for pretty harmless things like A-R glasses. Think about yourself in 50 years. You can keep the A-R glasses and make a story about its presence (maybe it's been a standard like our gamepads or else, it merged with the smartphone and whatnot), or move on with the tech and imagine something else that made the A-R glasses kitsch or outdated.

tl;dr -> It's a matter of world/game design, and I think subjectively that A-R glasses are a tech that isn't going to last long, so it mustn't fit to a modern cyberpunk world.
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And I don't own the truth so tell me what's your opinion on this topic :howdy:
 
I fully understand that some implants will be necessary to not look like an "Amish" in 2077's setting.
Virtual reality interfaces will probably be everywhere and part of daily life, so you'll at least need some eye implant to see them. I also understand that almost everyone will have a few "USB slots" to connect various devices.
I wouldn't feel any less human for having those.

But I really don't want any ugly borg-style loose wiring being forced upon my palms.
Sure, it might be handy in a gunfight, but it's certainly weird to have this wiring around during cooking, showering or "cozy time" with your partner. Just imagine rubbing soap across your skin with those weird hands. Or going climbing in your spare time.
The beautiful thing about our hands is that they can be used for everything - a surgeon can practice martial arts in his spare time. A musician can also form sculptures from clay.

I really hope there will be augments that don't alter our look in any meaningful way.
Stuff like nanomesh woven through our skin making it more resilient while not altering our look.
Or gene-therapy that strengthens our muscles, but doesn't replace them.
 
That depends, human without cyberware can also do good job, he will use different skill and approach to his target.

Except they are inferior to everyone who have cyberware, and in that world cyberware is as common as buying bread from the store.
 
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