What are they saying during the intro cutscene?

[Larry the Cacodemon]

It's obvious there is dialog but it's hard to tell what it's supposed to be. Anybody knows what exactly they're saying?

[Revolver Rez]

It's a series of news reports on the war with the Strogg.
It starts out with a SETI confirmation of an alien civilization
Then confirmation these aliens are heading our way
Then that colonies on Mars have stopped responding and this is weird but probably not evil aliens
Then that space stations are blowing up
Then that various cities are being destroyed by the Strogg
Finally that marines are being sent to the Strogg homeworld to prevent further invasions and get revenge for the first invasion.

[Larry the Cacodemon]

Originally posted by Revolver Rez:

It's a series of news reports on the war with the Strogg.
It starts out with a SETI confirmation of an alien civilization
Then confirmation these aliens are heading our way
Then that colonies on Mars have stopped responding and this is weird but probably not evil aliens
Then that space stations are blowing up
Then that various cities are being destroyed by the Strogg
Finally that marines are being sent to the Strogg homeworld to prevent further invasions and get revenge for the first invasion.

Anybody know the exact dialog?

[DogMeat]

You can turn on subtitles to see most of the dialogue. Note that some of the dialogue is intentionally garbled at points, where multiple news reporters are talking over each other.

I'm assuming to represent the panic caused by a hostile alien invasion.

[48 YEARS OLD VIRGIN]

After all these years, I still can't tell what the PDA says when an objective is updated. All I hear is "Boot geezer updated" lol

[FixbotWill]

Originally posted by Ulysse:

After all these years, I still can't tell what the PDA says when an objective is updated. All I hear is "Boot geezer updated" lol

Computer updated?

[Karl Pilkington]

Was this cutscene in the original game?

[NowhereNarrative]

Originally posted by Karl Pilkington:

Was this cutscene in the original game?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miHAh2Q-U94&ab_channel=Quake2Connoisseur

[Pony Princess]

is it too late to add to this thread? I hate to be a necromancer....

So every now and then I try to piece this together, and I have basically 3 sources that I've combined into as complete of a script as you're going to get. One comes from a groups.google assessment which is almost right on the money. The other comes from quake.fandom, and the last I can't locate using Google anymore, mostly that taught me (and a couple of things make more sense when you consider this) "freaky" is actually "freq," short for "frequency." It's used once in the opening movie and at least once during the game as radio chatter, Anyway, here's the combination:

News broadcasts: The head of SETI will give a full press conference today in the wake of the verified and authentic non-terrestrial transmission coming from just beyond the asteriod belt in our solar system
Contact with the colony on Mars will be re-established and has nothing to do with the pending arrival of the mysterious aliens
The McCullen space station has just been destroyed!
massive casualties
[unintelligible]
resistance soldiers
[unintelligible]
gravitational flux [unintelligible]. This may be indicative of [unintelligible] black hole (a source I can't find anymore has this "black hole" report complete, basically saying that the Strogg entered the solar system through a black hole they made on the other side of the asteroid belt)
Paris, Peking, Reykjavik, and Tokyo head the list of recently devastated cities
after the recall from what was once known as Europe
and the UE President gave the uplifting farewell speech as these brave soldiers took the fight to the Strogg's home planet. We and the rest of humanity wish them luck and godspeed as well.

Red leader: Mother goose, mother goose, this is red leader alpha charlie four one seven.

Mother goose: Got you on the scope, red leader. See that big bad dustball up ahead?

Red leader: Copy that, mother goose. Target is acquired. Heading towards nav point x-ray lima seven.

Radio chatter: Deployment is green for alpha, bravo, and tango ... there's no [unintelligible] surface, LZ still looks clean ... [unintelligible] ... [unintelligible] check confirmed ... hurry and finish your ♥♥♥♥, marines ... [unintelligible] ... [unintelligible], wake his ass up!

Command: Alright Bitterman, you are in the green and ready to go.

Radio chatter: YEEEHAAA!!!

Bitterman: ♥♥♥♥! What was that? Command, I got a problem here. Some cowboy clipped me on the way in and thrusters are at fifty percent and dropping.

Command: Copy, Bitterman. Your stats are nominal but proceed to designated target LZ. We'll see what we can--♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥!

Radio chatter: They're all over me! I need some help over here!

Command: Bitterman! What in the hell's going on? We just lost a third of the platoon just as they crossed sector niner x-ray. You got a visual on any AA discharge?

Bitterman: Negative, command. I'm approaching niner x-ray right now and there's no heat from the ground.

Radio chatter: They're coming at me from all angles!

Bitterman: It was across the board around ten seconds ago.

Command: Damn it! They've got a low-freq EMP down there. Getting clipped just saved your ass, marine. I just lost all readings from the rest of the platoon. Try and get to the primary LZ and rendezvous with any other squad leaders you can find.

Bitterman: ♥♥♥♥! Just overshot LZ, command. Command, you copy? Cripes, this thing is a brick! I have no flight control, repeat, no flight control. I am south of LZ heading for southern structure. Prepping for crash landing. [unintelligible] Copy? Command, come in, I have no flight control--AAAHHH!!!

A couple of addendums: "Prepping for crash landing." Sources say this is "Ready for crash landing." I've always heard "prepping," which makes more sense. Also, "the UE president" refers to United Earth, the government that existed in the quakeverse during the Strogg War. This is a part of the Terran Coalition of Man (TCM), the larger alliance of human organizations both including and beyond earth. Finally, it's important to note that Q2 development involved a bit of the right hand not knowing what the left was up to. This leads to inconsistencies in the setting and plot. Not all developers saw these as important depending on the game and the state of the industry when it was made.