The "Best" Ending? [Spoilers]

[Actalo]

Finished PL and now have completed all of the endings. In all of the Main endings V dies before or in Mikoshi. The V that comes back isn't V, it's just an AI recording of V. No matter what the "six month" outcome, V already died.

As screwed up as the PL ending seems with how it treats the relationships as if V never bothered to leave information in case of prolonged treatment, it's the only ending where the V we players created and played for dozens of hours, lives.

In some ways I resent Johnny since Johnny and Alt seem to know that going to Mikoshi means V's death, but we as players are blissfully unaware until that bitter twist. In fact, if you try to get surgery to live, Johnny is angry and bitter with V, despite those moments the player may have had where Johnny claims he'd die for V. In the end, Johnny and Alt killed V as their personal s**cide-bomb against Mikoshi, against Arasaka.

I like the Panam ending, riding over the water, but again, that ain't V. Panam lost the man she loved and is relegated to six months with an AI puppeteering V's animated corpse. The sense of hope and new beginnings is totally overshadowed by this fact. All in all, it's just kinda sad.

So the "best" ending? I think it's the one where the character we players made survives, barely, alone, but still lives on with possibility.

[Blink4aMoment]

You do understand that whatever "V" is has been deteriorating since Dex put a bullet through your head right? If it weren't for the biochip, V would be flatlined there and then. None of your love interest's fall for V alone, they fall for the symbiosis of Johnny and V that we play as during the events of the game. They fall in love with a legend.

I personally think the Sun ending is by far the best, especially if you mix 'n match it with the secret ending. I understand your fear at the Theseus' Ship concept but at the end of the day, we don't have any proof we aren't "Soulkillered" every time we sleep. It is an Engram of V. In a body that Mr. Blue Eyes can most likely save or preserve in similar fashion to the Fed ending. After all, Mr. Blue Eyes has far more human motivations at this point than Alt does. Alt has seemingly no concern with the greater political machinations of mankind beyond ensuring her processing power.

As for Johnny and Alt "misleading" you. I think you should check out the VDB questline again. Alt uses some Sci-Fi babble to explain her plan; and there IS some information the player doesn't know. She does explain that Soulkiller will be used, that you will become an engram; and that she can only disentangle V from Johnny at that point. For any Cyberpunk 2020 player. It was at this point we accepted our terminal diagnosis.

What Johnny and Alt neglect to mention is the 6 month terminal diagnosis if the Engram of V were to keep the body. Whether this is because they didn't know, the biochip progressed in some manner, or they're ambushing you. Is left to you to interpret.

My greatest problem with the PL ending is CDPR's countless insults to the player's efforts to ensure it remains grim. No one cancels V's apartment rental's, no one contact's your friends, someone repoed all your vehicles. Despite V's countless combat experience in the game they're somehow beaten up by street thugs. I have no idea how you can expect V isn't shot and left for dead in a random alley. They could have gone for a more bittersweet angle. Rather than all around grim. I suppose that's what you get for selling your soul to the feds though.

You're left in a place where you have to write headcanon to make it better. Such as the Aldecaldo's taking V's garage of vehicles. Or V becoming a fixer with their great deal of experience. It's a lot easier to write those headcanon's where at least V's Engram survives when he actually has Cyberware and can't be beaten up by random street goons.

[Ishan451]

Originally posted by Actalo:

Finished PL and now have completed all of the endings. In all of the Main endings V dies before or in Mikoshi. The V that comes back isn't V, it's just an AI recording of V. No matter what the "six month" outcome, V already died.

V died in the No Tell Motel. Victor explains all of this. Dexter Deshawn killed V. Bullet to the brain... the only reason the game happen is that Dex didn't use a big enough caliber to splatter all of V's brain out the back of his head, thus allowed the chip's nanites to slowly repair the damage. And in the process they realized that V's original pathways are different from Johnnys and then go about rectifying that.

Either way you slice it.. V died in the Tower Heist. What crawled out of the dump was always a metal brain running on the Soulkiller chip. It was always just a question of removing Johnny and implanting you into the Chip.

You are told in no uncertain terms that the chip could not be removed because the chip is what restored your brain. It is the chips nanites that reconstructed the brain.

V, starting Act 2 and onwards V mentions multiple times how he was dead.

It always surprised me why the game makes it such a big "revelation" at the end for V, given that Victor tells him all of that at the beginning.

So no matter how you slice it.. even in the PL endings you have a metal brain.

Originally posted by Actalo:

As screwed up as the PL ending seems with how it treats the relationships as if V never bothered to leave information in case of prolonged treatment, it's the only ending where the V we players created and played for dozens of hours, lives.

By your definition... nah he does not. He never was more than a metal brain going Act 2 onwards.

Originally posted by Actalo:

In some ways I resent Johnny since Johnny and Alt seem to know that going to Mikoshi means V's death

As does V... it is just terribly written that it comes as surprise to him. After all Vic explains it to him. Then again, V, like most players, probably don't actually pay attention to what Vic is saying, given that it is all "tech mumbo jumbo", and everyone is reeling from the events of the Heist.

Originally posted by Actalo:

we as players are blissfully unaware until that bitter twist.

No we are not. It might not be literally be spelled out for us, but Victor explains it in quite some detail when you talk to him and tell him to give it to you straight. He will explain that you are dead and on borrowed time, because inevitably your brain will be completely overridden by the chip and that the only reason you are even "conscious" is because the chip repaired the damage from the blown out brain.

Act 2 V is in no way shape or form Act 1 and prior V. Not only does Act 2 V miss a good junk of their brain, but also what is missing has been restored with Johnny's "pattern". Act 2 V is not the one you created, but it is the one you played the longest.

Originally posted by Actalo:

I like the Panam ending, riding over the water, but again, that ain't V.

Of course is that V... the problem is that you told in no uncertain ways that you are now having an auto immune disorder and your own body is rejecting your implants. Which leads to V likely ending up riding with them for a week or two, and then basically akin to dying of Aids. If all the diseases he will contract doesn't slowly kill him, then his immune system will. Its a wretched way to go.

Originally posted by Actalo:

Panam lost the man she loved and is relegated to six months with an AI puppeteering V's animated corpse.

The soulkiller does not create AI's. It records neural pathways, to use these as template to simulate a person.

No different from how your brain works. Your consciousness is a bunch of electrical signals guided by chemical processes. (And here is the mindblowing bit... google Split Brain Experiments 1967. You will find out that we have good reason to assume that what you consider "You" is likely a gestalt formed of other sub personalities and if you separate your brain hemispheres there would be two "you").

Doesn't matter how those electrical signals go about their ways. Chemistry or Electronics.

Alt is an AI, because she evolved from a person engram, changed her code and adapted to it. But V is not an AI. At least not any more than V was in Act 2+

Originally posted by Actalo:

So the "best" ending? I think it's the one where the character we players made survives, barely, alone, but still lives on with possibility.

The best ending is V giving their body to Johnny. Because that is the only way anyone gets to live. If you don't give it to Johnny your body is going to reject your implants and you'll be dead in 6 months.

Not only does Johnny going off with V's body seem to reform him, but also is the possibility that V continues to exist beyond the Black Wall.

[piep]

best ending story-wise is executing yourself on the top of that building. Best game play end is the "hidden" one

[Paulie]

There is a possible good ending that CD:PR overlooked, Biotechnica makes clones to butcher for shady processed meat. Biotechnica + Arasaka combined have the tech to save V. Biotechnica (if they got an early sample of V's dna, possible right after Dex shot him would even work) they could clone V from that sample. and Arasaka could use soulkiller on V and install his engram on his clone. V's engram rewrites the Clone's brain to enable him to control the clone's body, instead of it being a worthless meat husk living on biological function alone.

[Kiwichris]

Does V really die after 6 months? We don't really know. In the Nomad ending the voice call from Judy that female V gets implies V is alive and well, cooking her breakfast no less! If V was terminal no way Judy would be so happy.

[Ishan451]

Originally posted by Kiwichris:

Does V really die after 6 months?

According to Alt V has an autoimmune disorder. Akin to Multiple Sclerosis or Aids (yes AIDS is technically autoimmune deficiency sydrome). The body will reject the implant, which makes no sense, and thus Vs brain. The problem here is that technically the chip would just need to do what it has done all along and rerewrite the Johnny rewrite with the new V stuff, but Alt says because the DNA is now Johnny it rejects the implant, but wouldn't if the Implant contained Johnny. Its a contradiction in the Story.

Originally posted by Kiwichris:

We don't really know. In the Nomad ending the voice call from Judy that female V gets implies V is alive and well, cooking her breakfast no less! If V was terminal no way Judy would be so happy.

Based on the above you can choose: Alt lied to V to make V give up the body (and since Johnny goes with Alt you can't say she did it because she wants to be with Johnny, thus she has no real reason to lie) or V doesn't tell Judy and just takes pills until they drop. My money is on the later.

[rock]

I like the Devil the most, where you choose to go back into Mikoshi. Bonus points if you're a corpo, because it's extra ironic. It's the only sort of happy ending for Goro, and no other major character dies. It also ties up the side plot with Yorinobu and Arasaka.

Second place would probably be the one where you rob a space casino. PL's ending is all right. I feel like it shouldn't really be an option, and the way it's presented is a little contrived given that it is an option.

[Balekai]

What Ishan451 just said in spoilers. It's actually hinted at throughout the game in a reoccurring news segment.

For some reason the only disorders that can't be cured by Cybercare or medical advancement are ones such as MS and other auto immune issues. There's something special about them.

Originally posted by rock:

I like the Devil the most, where you choose to go back into Mikoshi. Bonus points if you're a corpo, because it's extra ironic. It's the only sort of happy ending for Goro, and no other major character dies. It also ties up the side plot with Yorinobu and Arasaka.

Second place would probably be the one where you rob a space casino. PL's ending is all right. I feel like it shouldn't really be an option, and the way it's presented is a little contrived given that it is an option.

i like that ending for my corpo V too. Taken back into the fold, even though you may "sit for a while." :p :P

My rankings are:

New Ending/Secret Ending.
Temperance as a choice in endings.
Arasaka ending.

[lauruswolfe]

i wish you could go with johnny and alt and everyone from mikoshi off into the net.

Or alt now having control over arasakas internal systems puts Vs engram on a new relic that johnny in Vs body puts into smashers defeated body.

[Ishan451]

Originally posted by lauruswolfe:

Vs engram on a new relic that johnny in Vs body puts into smashers defeated body.

Never understood the appeal of becoming a toaster.

[Kiwichris]

Originally posted by Ishan451:

Based on the above you can choose: Alt lied to V to make V give up the body (and since Johnny goes with Alt you can't say she did it because she wants to be with Johnny, thus she has no real reason to lie) or V doesn't tell Judy and just takes pills until they drop. My money is on the later.

Exactly as I said. We don't really know. :)

[♠.brT]

The best ending to me has always been, and will always be, the one where V blows their brains out in that balcony.

Both V and Johnny's objectives are utterly selfish. V wishes to escape the consequences of their actions. V should have died that moment that Dex put a bullet on V's skull. It should have ended right there. V tries to escape that fate for the entire game, and V will kill, and get many more people killed all because of that selfish goal.

Johnny's only real goal is revenge, revenge for what Arasaka did to him, his girlfriend, and the fact that corporations even exist. It's a selfish goal that will kill hundreds, and again potentially get your friends killed as well.

So why go through with all of this? why cause more death and destruction in a city already full of it? Why add to the misery of Night City? I choose the gun, it is the only right choice for V and night city, every other choice is simply a refusal to accept that actions have consequences, and V's actions should have resulted in V's death, so let's get this over with it shall we?

I see the PL specific ending as the developers basically throwing a bone at people who were really mad that all the OG endings V's fate was death. It's copout, that won't even make them happy either because it isn't all sunny and sunshine as they wish it to be.

[lauruswolfe]

Originally posted by Ishan451:

Originally posted by lauruswolfe:

Vs engram on a new relic that johnny in Vs body puts into smashers defeated body.

Never understood the appeal of becoming a toaster.

Yeah i guess it would be a pretty old toaster too

[lackesis]

I am wicked person, so I gave my body to Johnny.
PL doesn't have a good ending too, so I chose the anime action movie route "Killing moon".

[NJK]

Hey choom, I have a theory and it's nova. When you kill Reed and take Songbird to the moon, Mr. Blue Eyes will contact you, from there you go on a space heist and probably later, you become an engram but of your own free will and receive access to Mr. Blue Eyes data stream: allowing you to live forever.


This is likely the canon ending since now Cyberpunk Orion has been announced, and where was V last seen? Space ya gonk.