The V is in in the afterlife or something along the lines like that where Dex did kill them. The whole 2nd act and forward is just V finding their way through hell or it’s a dream where V is in a never awaking coma and any ending of the game is them finally passing.
DrNomblecronch
Listen; if Pondsmith decides the events of the game need to be noncanon in order to progress the story he wants to tell? I am A-OK with that. The man is *incredible*, his writing is nuclear fire, and I will happily sacrifice my already beyond-canon playthrough to let him work.
I just also don’t think he’d write himself into a corner like that. Every indication in the game is that V is recognized as *absurdly, impossibly* OP in-universe. They are a powerhouse of unprecedented scope for no easily-explainable reason. And I don’t think someone who hits on the Pondsmith level would *waste* that.
My guess is that either there’s a reason for it that comes out in further writing and development, or the reason is never explained and “what the fuck was *that*” becomes one of the compelling unknowns the setting has quite a few of. The negative space left by the absence of an explanation for V becoming, effectively, a human-shaped version of the 2023 nuke has a lot of storytelling potential, up to and including people in-universe trying and failing to figure it out.
I have had the pleasure of meeting the man in person. I have been playing 2020 for over a decade. Trust me on this: *Maximum Mike knows what he’s doing.* He doesn’t leave loose ends he’s not gonna thread in later.
(P.S.: I am not trying to discredit the work of the other writers, either at R. Talsorian or at CDPR. This is a communal effort and everyone involved brought their absolute A-game. So I’m kind of suggesting the contrary; if *Mike* would not leave something that doesn’t fit like this, the rest of a fantastic writing team *certainly* wouldn’t.)
Everyone else: thinks deeply into meaning behind game, doing tons of research into lore and tries to rationalize what’s going on.
Me: haha,his head came off!
Son0fgrim
i’m mostly mad that they use the 2077 map for the TTRPG when CDPR themselves admit they wanted the city to be BIGGER.
the fan made maps for 2045 and 2077 are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better
Famous-Professor5522
Jokes on y’all. We’re all engrams in a simulated world.
villainized
source: I was high on that good stuff when I thought this up.
I couldn’t care less if the whole verse wasn’t canon, doesn’t change the fact that the story is peak & the gameplay is just as fun. Still a 10/10 game.
sprocter77
Its a damn game, its all imaginary anyway
No_Tamanegi
This is my take as a fan of the Cyberpunk TTRPG since the 90’s. Take it for what you will.
I’ve been waiting for this game for around 30 years. I always knew it could make an incredible video game in the right hands, and I believe CDPR handled it very well. I’m so glad that they were the ones to translate this narrative universe to a mass audience, and I think they mostly handled it well.
That said, this is a universe where a happy ending is generally described as “You still have both your hands, so you get to hold your own guts in while still going down fighting”
So I’m still a little bemused by the game that allows you to handily take down Adam Smasher and Arasaka in the same stroke (though the latter is very much helped by one Alt Cunningham) but as a game product, I understand it. this is going to be a lot of people’s introduction to not only Mike Pondsmith’s cyberpunk universe, but the genre in general, and it’s a bleak one. Gamers are used to power fantasies.
So ok, they get to take down Smasher, and Arasaka, depending on their choices. it’ll be interesting to see what’s next.
ZLPERSON
Based take and cyberpunk:RED pilled.
Percussion17
> buggy Adam engram copy
Cool story bro but that aint canon either
FilthyHoon
I’m praying it’s correct. Not the first part, but the Adam smasher part. Fight really didn’t do him justice, but finding out it was barely even Smasher, just a corpses brain with a copy of the man doing a crude imitation of the level of danger he COULD pose, that would be perfection
What is L about this take?? id say it makes alot of sense
_BigJuicy
The last paragraph is clearly horseshit, but I tend to agree with the rest. The general 2077 setting being canonical I can buy, but V’s story feels like a campaign. V is both lore-breakingly god-tier and has no real identity or past. That doesn’t sound like a canonical character to me, it sounds like a player stand-in.
And the thing is: that’s all fine for me. I’m perfectly OK with playing an electronic campaign. I can appreciate the story for what it is and what I get out of it without it being a playable source book entry. Being just a campaign doesn’t diminish the experience for me.
BlackTestament7
I mean I did see someone on the r/SaintsRow reddit tell me that the Saints Row 2022 reboot was good. That’s just infinitely dumber and an objectively worse take.
NoIndependence1740
While yes they make points the exact way things went down and the exact weapons V use aren’t specified it’s still is Canon that a merc named V kills Adam smasher in arasaka tower.
If we are to guess by cutscenes likely with a pistol since it’s the weapon we see V use in the cutsceens but it could also be argued they use Johnny’s pistol.
Most arguably Canon idea for an ending is the siding with hanako ending since it’s the only ending (aside from game ending yourself) that doesn’t require any side quests but obviously that’s just speculation and I feel like if any ending would be made Canon it would probably be don’t fear the reaper since it’s the most finale of the endings in my opinion.
GoBoomYay
Dude who cares if a game is *canon*, that doesn’t change the fact that it’s *good*. Canon doesn’t automatically mean *good*, there are plenty of things that are considered canon that are stupid and plenty of things that are lore-inaccurate or whatever that fucking rock.
rye_domaine
It’s Mike Pondsmith’s world, and we’re just living in it
Jeremy_Melton
I saw a short mentioning that betraying Panam was a “smart move” because of the Quarts Bandit (which is worth 5/6 gigs worth of Eddies and makes you miss out on Widowmaker).
UnhandMeException
Op all “is this vague collection of black op stories that are never retold absolute truth?”
Splendid_Fellow
Is this really the worst take? Lol this is the low of low takes?
TheDaemonair
Oop’s version is all about balancing lore so that it’s “realistic” and stays in line with tradition.
Mike Pondsmith’s version is all about being a badass.
26 Comments
Eh, probably something -phobic
source: i made it the fuck up
The V is in in the afterlife or something along the lines like that where Dex did kill them. The whole 2nd act and forward is just V finding their way through hell or it’s a dream where V is in a never awaking coma and any ending of the game is them finally passing.
Listen; if Pondsmith decides the events of the game need to be noncanon in order to progress the story he wants to tell? I am A-OK with that. The man is *incredible*, his writing is nuclear fire, and I will happily sacrifice my already beyond-canon playthrough to let him work.
I just also don’t think he’d write himself into a corner like that. Every indication in the game is that V is recognized as *absurdly, impossibly* OP in-universe. They are a powerhouse of unprecedented scope for no easily-explainable reason. And I don’t think someone who hits on the Pondsmith level would *waste* that.
My guess is that either there’s a reason for it that comes out in further writing and development, or the reason is never explained and “what the fuck was *that*” becomes one of the compelling unknowns the setting has quite a few of. The negative space left by the absence of an explanation for V becoming, effectively, a human-shaped version of the 2023 nuke has a lot of storytelling potential, up to and including people in-universe trying and failing to figure it out.
I have had the pleasure of meeting the man in person. I have been playing 2020 for over a decade. Trust me on this: *Maximum Mike knows what he’s doing.* He doesn’t leave loose ends he’s not gonna thread in later.
(P.S.: I am not trying to discredit the work of the other writers, either at R. Talsorian or at CDPR. This is a communal effort and everyone involved brought their absolute A-game. So I’m kind of suggesting the contrary; if *Mike* would not leave something that doesn’t fit like this, the rest of a fantastic writing team *certainly* wouldn’t.)
edit: I’m sorry, I’m genuinely not trying to go “hey look at some other stuff I said” here, but I will take any opportunity to point to [my accounting of the time I met Mike Pondsmith.](https://www.reddit.com/r/cyberpunkgame/comments/1j6s5wz/comment/mgskxhk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button) Mainly because I think it is a little hard to take my borderline reverence for the man seriously without some context for exactly how *good* he is at making games.
Everyone else: thinks deeply into meaning behind game, doing tons of research into lore and tries to rationalize what’s going on.
Me: haha,his head came off!
i’m mostly mad that they use the 2077 map for the TTRPG when CDPR themselves admit they wanted the city to be BIGGER.
the fan made maps for 2045 and 2077 are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better
Jokes on y’all. We’re all engrams in a simulated world.
source: I was high on that good stuff when I thought this up.
I couldn’t care less if the whole verse wasn’t canon, doesn’t change the fact that the story is peak & the gameplay is just as fun. Still a 10/10 game.
Its a damn game, its all imaginary anyway
This is my take as a fan of the Cyberpunk TTRPG since the 90’s. Take it for what you will.
I’ve been waiting for this game for around 30 years. I always knew it could make an incredible video game in the right hands, and I believe CDPR handled it very well. I’m so glad that they were the ones to translate this narrative universe to a mass audience, and I think they mostly handled it well.
That said, this is a universe where a happy ending is generally described as “You still have both your hands, so you get to hold your own guts in while still going down fighting”
So I’m still a little bemused by the game that allows you to handily take down Adam Smasher and Arasaka in the same stroke (though the latter is very much helped by one Alt Cunningham) but as a game product, I understand it. this is going to be a lot of people’s introduction to not only Mike Pondsmith’s cyberpunk universe, but the genre in general, and it’s a bleak one. Gamers are used to power fantasies.
So ok, they get to take down Smasher, and Arasaka, depending on their choices. it’ll be interesting to see what’s next.
Based take and cyberpunk:RED pilled.
> buggy Adam engram copy
Cool story bro but that aint canon either
I’m praying it’s correct. Not the first part, but the Adam smasher part. Fight really didn’t do him justice, but finding out it was barely even Smasher, just a corpses brain with a copy of the man doing a crude imitation of the level of danger he COULD pose, that would be perfection
https://i.redd.it/f3q6nq271bve1.gif
Yeah ok Arasaka
It’s a…take.
What is L about this take?? id say it makes alot of sense
The last paragraph is clearly horseshit, but I tend to agree with the rest. The general 2077 setting being canonical I can buy, but V’s story feels like a campaign. V is both lore-breakingly god-tier and has no real identity or past. That doesn’t sound like a canonical character to me, it sounds like a player stand-in.
And the thing is: that’s all fine for me. I’m perfectly OK with playing an electronic campaign. I can appreciate the story for what it is and what I get out of it without it being a playable source book entry. Being just a campaign doesn’t diminish the experience for me.
I mean I did see someone on the r/SaintsRow reddit tell me that the Saints Row 2022 reboot was good. That’s just infinitely dumber and an objectively worse take.
While yes they make points the exact way things went down and the exact weapons V use aren’t specified it’s still is Canon that a merc named V kills Adam smasher in arasaka tower.
If we are to guess by cutscenes likely with a pistol since it’s the weapon we see V use in the cutsceens but it could also be argued they use Johnny’s pistol.
Most arguably Canon idea for an ending is the siding with hanako ending since it’s the only ending (aside from game ending yourself) that doesn’t require any side quests but obviously that’s just speculation and I feel like if any ending would be made Canon it would probably be don’t fear the reaper since it’s the most finale of the endings in my opinion.
Dude who cares if a game is *canon*, that doesn’t change the fact that it’s *good*. Canon doesn’t automatically mean *good*, there are plenty of things that are considered canon that are stupid and plenty of things that are lore-inaccurate or whatever that fucking rock.
It’s Mike Pondsmith’s world, and we’re just living in it
I saw a short mentioning that betraying Panam was a “smart move” because of the Quarts Bandit (which is worth 5/6 gigs worth of Eddies and makes you miss out on Widowmaker).
Op all “is this vague collection of black op stories that are never retold absolute truth?”
Is this really the worst take? Lol this is the low of low takes?
Oop’s version is all about balancing lore so that it’s “realistic” and stays in line with tradition.
Mike Pondsmith’s version is all about being a badass.