https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qT4DoaMg3U
For those interested. Intro nomad gameplay. Not sure how long it will stay up.
At least they could have put the whole song. I was bummed when it interrupted!
Two short videos - not particularly spoilery. Just a guy driving/walking around town. Looking at civilians and vendors. Going through menus.
I’m just going to put this here for those people who don’t want to be exposed to leak content - so there :).
Part 1: https://siasky.net/CABK5STPmuUmWYXFNWHmnBiTDta9j5BbseHJgb4uMH5KHQ
Part 2: https://siasky.net/CAD33cmB6xBcvKJyFXuqkJBvde8_fbgukbxbT6GvcjXnSw
The 2nd video cuts out halfway through.
So…3 hours to go…
I squinted to the bottom of the thread and discovered that no one has posted any spoilers in the last 4 days. So here’s one just before the title card.
Anyway, I thought they did a good job with Jackie. He seemed like a blowhard in the trailer, but you got to see the “sad clown” up close. It was all very on-the-nose, including his restless leg while talking to Dex before the heist, and of course the foreshadowing beat you over the head with the flat side of a katana. It was still a touching moment inside that armored limo.
I reached Act 2, so time to talk of Act 1 . In Spoilers please.
ACT 1 and start of ACT 2 SPOILERS
I had a few problems with this first act, it felt more rushed than any other thing, which is strange for this epic rpg right? My issues:
-First the corpo background, it felt very rushed. I wasn’t expect a multi-hour adventure for the unique prologues, but it should be long enough to give the player a proper story hook related to your background. Like, you start doing the mission of assassinating your boss’ rival but you are discovered and he puts the blame onto you, using you as a scapegoat. Just 15 minutes would have been enough.
The way they do it, you go to the bar and before you have time to do anything you are fired, no explanation, no nothing, it felt more anti-climatic and wasteful than anything.
-Second, I’m surprised they killed Jackie. Because that means they really spoiled the death and Dexter’s betrayal in the 2019 trailer! I thought the trailers were an obvious red herring because OBVIOUSLY CDPR weren’t so stupid to spoil their own game that way, to waste what it could be an impactful moment… I was wrong.
-Related to that, I understand they had to use the ‘fast cut montage’ technique to save time and explain your partnership with Jackie, but his death isn’t as important at it could be, as at the end of the day you had know it for 2-3 missions only. One more ‘side quest-y’ mission and one more non-combat scene, maybe going to visit her mother or something like that, would have helped in that regard.
-Takemura’s presentation also feel rushed? He first gets you because he believes you are the assassin. Ok. Later he is attacked by Arasaka’s cyber assassins, so at that point I can understand he is surely thinking “maybe the assassin was his son!”. But… I feel like there is a conversation missing, a moment where he asks V to confirm what happened in the hotel, and V tells what he saw. Or at least a moment of dialog where he says he extracted info from your optical system while you were sleeping and recovering.
-Johnny’s presentation makes him feel like he is TOO COOL FOR SCHOOL, so much he is kind of hilarious.
Act 1 results:
I’m pretty much on the same page with all your comments.
I was super surprised they killed off Jackie for the same reasons. Seemed like a red herring - especially in a game about choices - and surprised CDPR spoiled a significant event like that. It’s totally possibly he comes back in some sort of techno magic, which is already established, I suppose. There was also one glaring omission from how the scene in the trailer played out compared to my experience in game so we will see if something comes from that too.
I forgot Jackie was in that gameplay trailer. I remember Dex betraying us but not his death. Good thing I forgot, because I liked how they handled it!
What I’m confused about is watching other trailer segments that I don’t recall seeing in the game. Did anyone go with Jackie to pick out a bunch of weapons? (If I did this and already forgot then I think I’m going to get my head checked.) I know for sure he never introduced me to his mother. Was that another path, or trailer stuff they cut in the game?
Street kid start maybe? That has to be it.
I’m assuming there’s no flashback later. If there is, don’t mention it. I’m okay with being surprised.
The montage between your lifepath choice and the beginning of ACT 1 contains A LOT of the unique trailer footage they used in their marketing.
That includes the weapons buying, meeting Jackie’s mom, the iconic dance scene etc. You can probably risk pulling that scene up somewhere on youtube. I saw it twice by playing different lifepaths.
I saw zero of the pre-release hype, trailers, whatever. So I came into the game cold. I thought Jackie’s death was handled well enough. Yes, there could have been a bit more fleshing out how you went from him holding a gun to your head to being best chooms, but I found his death scene pretty moving.
Takemura, though, that was botched. I agree 100% that there is something missing between the “I am taking you to my boss” part and the “we are now allies against Arasaka” part. There’s even one point where he talks about the murder in a way that clearly shows you and he have discussed what happened, only we never see that convo.
The origin stories do feel a bit trimmed, though I think part of it may be an artistic choice to have the montage stuff “fill in” and avoid a bunch of on-rails sequences. Dunno.
Oh yeah, the montage. Duh.
I haven’t actually gone to talk to Takemura yet so maybe there’s a better justification? Eh, don’t really care.
I saw some gamerz complaining about Keanu’s voiceover delivery and my first interaction with him didn’t seem too promising. We’ll see.
Silverhand grows on you. At least, he did for me. After all, remember, he’s sort of being born again like you are. Last thing he remembers is that scene in Arasaka’s labs, and then, poof! He’s in some bozo’s head. He gradually adjusts to the brave new world (fifty years later) that he’s in, and his dialog gets better.
I think Silverhand also changes over time, as you influence each other.
Silverhand abruptly goes from literally wanting to kill you, making you bash your head into the window, to the exact opposite, wanting to save your life, and all they say to explain that is “I took some time to think it over”. This was not well-done.
Takemura on the other hand didn’t need to spell out why he knows you aren’t the assassin. We’re just used to games going to incredible lengths to explain everything that we see it odd, that they didn’t do that, but the reasoning is extremely obvious that you didn’t send elite Arasaka assassins to kill Takamura and yourself after being left for dead in extremely poor shape.
Eh, I think it was more abrupt than the Silverhand transition, but that’s a personal perspective I suppose. I’m ok with both arcs, really, as it’s clear where they have to go eventually.
I’m not OK with the Silverhand reversal, because it doesn’t make sense at all. Perhaps later on you learn more about the character and it falls in place. If not, that was a real mistake.
Okay, I just finished the game. Twice, actually, since I inadvertently stumbled onto one of the endings and was all, like, uh, that’s not what I meant to do. So I backed up and went through to the other ending. And I have a question that I thought would be answered, but as near as I can tell, it either wasn’t answered or the answer was such nonsense that I immediately forgot it.
But can anyone tell me why Johnny Silverhand got emgrammed onto the Relic? So here’s this bleeding edge corporate technology for digitizing human consciousness in the year 2027 or whatever, and they decide to use it on the terrorist who 9/11’ed their corporate HQ? Huh? Why?
Can someone answer me that very simple question? Because I thought it was going to be a big reveal and since it wasn’t, I think I must have missed the earlier explanation.
-Tom
I just assumed it was a magical explosion like Tom Cruise’s character getting the alien’s powers in Edge of Tomorrow.
I figured it was because the tech was experimental, and they wanted a guinea pig that was expendable? But then, there is no shortage of corporate slaves, er, drones they could have used, so, hmm. But the head dude does make some flowery speech about how easy it is to talk to the dead. I suspect that the whole emgram thing was so that they could interrogate the construct, and get the info they wanted (about anti-Arasaka activities, maybe?) or whatever.
Yes, he refused to tell them his co-conspirators’ names and where he found the fissile material. They wanted to interrogate him.
That said Rogue is still fine 50 years later so I guess that didn’t work.