Plot holes the game.

[rman88]

after playing it for a while, i was going to make a review for this game after i finished it. but i just cant help but voice my opinion on this. as it has been bugging me the entire time i was playing it. and that is the many plot holes and inconsistency that i been finding.

you see homeworld had a very interesting theme. the idea was a race of people who found a wreck and a map. they thought this was a map to their "homeworld" and created a mother ship in order to find it.

but after they tested the hyper drive they broke a long forgotten treaty which killed their current world. a treaty they had long forgotten about. and they left to find this homeworld of theirs. and in turn it was a road trip game. where you explored and meet new people and races. but the key ideas was that no one knew anything about what was going on outside of the main planetary space.

now in game it is clear that the main bad guy fraction. which looks to close to the vagers from home world 2. they knew about this treaty. and they knew that if they did not follow it they would be wiped out. which apparently everyone just wrote out as an evil cult that was trying to stop progress instead of you know saving everyone.

let me be honest hear. they should not even exist. as even if their warnings were ignored. their should have been some record of this in the original homeworld. someone to go i told you so. that they knew this was going to happen. but it was never addressed. as it did not exist until this prequel was made.

but thats not even the worst thing i seen. the tidan makes a cameo appearance in this game. why in gods name would they be in this game? it makes no sense as they were sent off alone to this exile. and add into that the fact that no one knew they existed until they burned the planet to the ground. only adds to the plot holes in this game.

they should have went with the original shipbreakers idea. where you were some sort of mercenary trying to break up ships for profit. fighting pirates, other ship breakers, drones, and anything else they could think up. until your crew finds the hyper drive and the map.

as it should have been like homeworld 1. where your trying to establish a world by doing a road trip game. not like homeworld 2 where you have a set goal in mind as you set off to do it. as this world was never really established. i still know very little about the clans or anything else. and their are very little interaction between groups. mainly just go around killing everything until you win the mission. hell i think the first game told me more about this ripoff of dune then this game.

[Caelestus]

Edit: GIANT SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!

No, they were forced to exile in Kharak. Tiiadan most likely wanted to keep watch on the Kushans because they feared their return. Gaalsian did not know about the treaty, they just claimed it the "Wrath of Sajuuk". They may have an inkling about it, but definitely not clearly. In addition, don't you think they would've known about Khar Toba if they knew about the treaty? They only found the location due to intelligence extraction.

[rman88]

ya not going to lie. they clearly undestood that their was some great threat by entering into space. also they already had people watching kharak. why did you think the Turanic Raiders were in the vicinity? they were the ones who were actively watching over the area. or else why would they even be their? their is no major trade routes or planets in the vicinity. so i doute pirates would stay.

that said the entire war between the gaalsian and collation was because they started to explore space. aka bringing the wraith of sajuk upon kharak. aka the tidan empire.

also they knew about the first city or khar toba by the satellite data. it is a giant wreck on the surface that can be clearly seen. so its not something that is hard to find. as their is little ot nothing obscuring the view.

that said the gallasions did not know about it due to having no satellites. as they viewed that as bringing the warith of sajuk. which they understood that exploration of space would lead to something murdering them all.

[Mistfox]

You want a plothole? Thousands of years ago, they were using "modern" Hiigarian ship designs. And for someone who has been keeping an eye on the Kushans, they certainly missed seeing a huge shipyard and mothership being built for 100 years. This is beyond sleeping on the job, more like in stasis on the job.

"Hey, where did this huge shipyard and mothership come from? And those 6x100,00 man cryopalettes?"

"Where did we come from?"
"Duh, idiot, look at the few hundred wrecked spaceships in the desert and get a clue?"

"Oh wow wee, we found the Khar Thoba!(A transport ship)"
".... You keep the Khar Thoba, I'll keep the perfectly preserved battlecruiser stored in the cliff."

I found the Gaalsien designs more reminiscent of the Bentusi TBH, the Vaayger had more angular looks while the Bentusi were more rounded, especially the Gaalsien armour, which was something like the Bentusi mothership backwards.

[DA_Kimika]

Originally posted by Mistfox:

You want a plothole? Thousands of years ago, they were using "modern" Hiigarian ship designs. And for someone who has been keeping an eye on the Kushans, they certainly missed seeing a huge shipyard and mothership being built for 100 years. This is beyond sleeping on the job, more like in stasis on the job.

"Hey, where did this huge shipyard and mothership come from? And those 6x100,00 man cryopalettes?"

"Where did we come from?"
"Duh, idiot, look at the few hundred wrecked spaceships in the desert and get a clue?"

"Oh wow wee, we found the Khar Thoba!(A transport ship)"
".... You keep the Khar Thoba, I'll keep the perfectly preserved battlecruiser stored in the cliff."

I found the Gaalsien designs more reminiscent of the Bentusi TBH, the Vaayger had more angular looks while the Bentusi were more rounded, especially the Gaalsien armour, which was something like the Bentusi mothership backwards.

I could be wrong... I would have to go back into game to figure out which cutscene.. But as far as I can tell... S'jet theorized that there was some kind of Hyperspace jump inhibitor, or gravity well that literally drew ships into the planet. That is hwy there are ship wrecks across the planet ( I'm assuming this was caused by the hyperspace core.) The Taidan Most likely originally wanted to keep an eye on the place, but the loose of the carrier would honestly label the place as a bad place to try to get too via Hyperspace.. and standard travel to the planet would take forever. So they waited. The Turanic Raiders are that far out into space because of their Planitoid home(A mission cut from the homeworld game), as well as space that far out isn't policed. its a safe space. That is why they are out there. They venture from there into 'civilized space' to do their raids

Secondly. The Treaty was only broken WHEN the kushan used a hyperspace travel... When they did. a Fleet was IMMEDIATELY dispatched to destroy the planet.

The Gaal knew there was a threat. But they didn't know exactly. Chances are it was all bogged down through the generations into religious retoric. Probably a kiith that used religious zeal out of fear to do what they considered was 'right.'

Also on a side note... "prestine' does not mean function. Rachel was basically stating, for being in their desert waste land. They were hardly damaged from sandstorms and regular errosion. They suffered no effects from the atmosphere because they... well.. Hyperspaced RIGHT INTO THE PLANET. Only useful thing you could probably get form them is designs and materials, but no function parts due to Phasing into the planet.

[rman88]

to be fair i dont think thats the case. i think that was what was left of the fleet. least the ones that did not splinter off into that nebula. like wise i dont feel like anyone would go into that area of space. as far as we know their is nothing their. wich to be honest could make the raiders think it was a nice place to stay. but i feel like that was stretching it.

to me the tidan just made a deal with the raiders to watch over the space in that area. so they would more or less ignore their activities. thou their was clearly a sensor net in the area that would detect any hyperspace signature. as it did not even take a day before the response fleet arrived and blew up the planet.

that said the tidan carrier was a bit out of place. and should have been a warning that their is something out their. hell they put a super weapon into orbit in order to prevent people from heading to the first city. you cant tell me that they should have ignored this? their is a clear threat in space.

another thing was that the tidan ship was clearly the modern design. even thou it should have been quite ancient. so i think that was a wee bit lazy to reuse the model instead of making something new.

also i know this is off topic. but on the original game both higgarins and tidan could have been played in the main story. something that the remake missed because they wanted to cut content. i feel like that was a miss opportunity as the war could have ended the other way. where higgarins were the victors and the tidan were sent on the long voyage. anyone else wished they went with this story line as well? creating not one but 2 campaigns.

[DA_Kimika]

Originally posted by rman88:

to be fair i dont think thats the case. i think that was what was left of the fleet. least the ones that did not splinter off into that nebula. like wise i dont feel like anyone would go into that area of space. as far as we know their is nothing their. wich to be honest could make the raiders think it was a nice place to stay. but i feel like that was stretching it.

to me the tidan just made a deal with the raiders to watch over the space in that area. so they would more or less ignore their activities. thou their was clearly a sensor net in the area that would detect any hyperspace signature. as it did not even take a day before the response fleet arrived and blew up the planet.

that said the tidan carrier was a bit out of place. and should have been a warning that their is something out their. hell they put a super weapon into orbit in order to prevent people from heading to the first city. you cant tell me that they should have ignored this? their is a clear threat in space.

another thing was that the tidan ship was clearly the modern design. even thou it should have been quite ancient. so i think that was a wee bit lazy to reuse the model instead of making something new.

also i know this is off topic. but on the original game both higgarins and tidan could have been played in the main story. something that the remake missed because they wanted to cut content. i feel like that was a miss opportunity as the war could have ended the other way. where higgarins were the victors and the tidan were sent on the long voyage. anyone else wished they went with this story line as well? creating not one but 2 campaigns.

Taidan Carrier design would hardly be changed especially in a stagnating empire. Secondly the carrier crashing wasn't a 'recent occurance' I don't remember if it stated when the crash happened, but I beleive it was before the Gaal got most of their tech. I would assume it was before space travel was even achieved on Kharak. And it can't be a warning.. if no one knew it existed.. Since Rachel's brother was the first person to discover it.
As for the fleet in the ground that was 'prestine' It was the .. 5th fleet? I think it was the last military fleet of the Hiigaren Empire... and I beleive they were originall searching for the exiles, but as I said, were cought in a gravity well that dragged them right into planet itself. They were not part of the Exile Fleet.
You can believe what you wish about the Taidan and the Raiders. If the Taidan had a sensor network out that far, Why would there even be a deal with the Raiders?
As for switching the Taidan around instead of Higs? It would be the exact same story, only the homeworld would have been moved. The Hiigaren lore and their Kiith system made them about as corruptable as the Taiidan. Thats mostly the reason they were exiled. Secondly, the Taidan had to still awnser to the 'Council'. The ability to play as the taidin in the first game was mostly so people could play both faction/s units since Multiplayer back then wasn't as big and easy achieved as it is today.

[johncage]

the insurgent hiigaran fleet who were lured to their burial became the khaaneph

[DA_Kimika]

Originally posted by johncage:

the insurgent hiigaran fleet who were lured to their burial became the khaaneph

Considering.... They hyperspaced INTO THE PLANET. I don't think you are right. Besides.. The Guide suggests otherwise.

[Antisymmetric]

Originally posted by rman88:

1) but after they tested the hyper drive they broke a long forgotten treaty which killed their current world. a treaty they had long forgotten about. but the key ideas was that no one knew anything about what was going on outside of the main planetary space.

2) they knew about this treaty. and they knew that if they did not follow it they would be wiped out. which apparently everyone just wrote out as an evil cult that was trying to stop progress instead of you know saving everyone.

3) let me be honest hear. they should not even exist. as even if their warnings were ignored. their should have been some record of this in the original homeworld. someone to go i told you so. that they knew this was going to happen. but it was never addressed. as it did not exist until this prequel was made.

4) but thats not even the worst thing i seen. the tidan makes a cameo appearance in this game. why in gods name would they be in this game? it makes no sense as they were sent off alone to this exile. and add into that the fact that no one knew they existed until they burned the planet to the ground. only adds to the plot holes in this game.

another thing was that the tidan ship was clearly the modern design. even thou it should have been quite ancient. so i think that was a wee bit lazy to reuse the model instead of making something new.

I’d like to point out that this is quite literally a game about a road trip.
1) The Kushan don’t know anything about what is going on outside of the main planetary space. All they know is there is a bunch of space garbage on and around thier planet.

2) They do not know about the treaty, they have long forgotten it. I’d like to point out from the expedition guide that when the Hersey wars started they were at a preindustrial technology level. Basically all knowledge was lost to them. The religious banter is most likely the little bit that survived of their knowledge of that treaty. No one would have any reason to think of it as anything else as no actual record was evidently found. The religious zealots were just that nothing more.

3) Lol because an IP has never expanded its lore before! Stories are allowed to expand beyond the initial vision. It’s not a crime.

4) Again they don’t know the Taiidan exist, in the games cutscene they think it’s the name of the ship. The body of the Carrier is visually the same but that does not mean it’s the same where it counts. When you make a spacecraft that’s 503.2m long weights 121000 tons and is capable of hyperspace its more like an investment in infrastructure than buying a car. Do you scrap something like that and start over? No you replace the guts with updated equipment. Technology is always built upon previously existing technology.

Finally, I can get to my theory. Why was the Taiidan carrier on planet? In fact the only ship that made it to Kharak from exile was the Khar-Toba. So why is Kharak littered with what appears to be hundreds of spacecraft?

My theory is that as alluded to in the expedition guide and Homeworld 1 Kharak was once not only a fertile planet but a lush one worth fighting over. During the first hiigaran-taiidan war there was a large battle over Kharak in which lead to an Atmosphere Deprivation Weapon being used. This desert wasteland which is capable of supporting some life at the poles is the aftermath of that. Additionally, at the end, perhaps as a last stand sort of deal a massive gravty well was deployed which prohibited hyperspace and sucked all remaining ships in orbit to the surface where they crashed and everybody died because the air wasn’t breathable!

[vicheron]

The Gaalsiens were mentioned quite a bit in the Homeworld 1 manual. This is from the Homeworld 1 manual:

Early history on Kharak is marked by conflicts between various clans based on territorial considerations and religious dogma. This came to a head in 520 when the two largest clans in the north, the Siiddim and Gaalsien went to war over the issue of what had caused the Gods to place us on such a world. The Siiddim believed that we had once been a great race living in paradise but had been punished by the Gods for our hubris and cast down to this world. The Gaalsien believed this idea to be heretical arrogance in the light of their belief that we had been created to suffer from the beginning and Kharak was all we could hope for.

As for the Taiidan, they were always monitoring the Hiigarans. How do you think they were able to attack Kharak so fast?

[Mistfox]

Kiith, my point was that they went ga-ga over a transport ship when a battlecruiser was passed by without a comment. As for phasing, that would make the ship even more likely to be functional as it literally appeared inside a rock tomb, unless for some strange reason the phase jump removed all the rock around the ship but decided to leave the rock inside the ship.

I mean, look at it this way, would you be more impressed with a navy frigate from any current navy or a container ship? The Khar Toba would have made sense if it was the only ship excavated on the planet, that would be the missing link to a starfaring past, but when they started throwing in wreck after wreck, the only way the Khar Toba would have been a missing link is if everyone was blind.

The Khar Toba was special. Until they made so many "Khar Toba"s that it lost a lot of the significance. I saw a Hiigarian Battlecruiser, a Destroyer and a Taidan Carrier. If someone doesn't know that their species originated from space after all that, they got a few screws loose.

[Mistfox]

Originally posted by Antisymmetric:

My theory is that as alluded to in the expedition guide and Homeworld 1 Kharak was once not only a fertile planet but a lush one worth fighting over. During the first hiigaran-taiidan war there was a large battle over Kharak in which lead to an Atmosphere Deprivation Weapon being used. This desert wasteland which is capable of supporting some life at the poles is the aftermath of that. Additionally, at the end, perhaps as a last stand sort of deal a massive gravty well was deployed which prohibited hyperspace and sucked all remaining ships in orbit to the surface where they crashed and everybody died because the air wasn’t breathable!

Problem is that Kharak is in the middle of nowhere and basically a refuge camp where the Kushan were exiled after losing the war. They are so far off the beaten path that a lot of transport ships didn't even make it. To make it worth a battle in the war, it needs to be close enough to desire, not be so far that you need a Progenitor Core to get there in a reasonable amount of time.

My guess was that it was "survivable" as a planet, but hardly anyone's idea of a retirement home.

[Antisymmetric]

Originally posted by Mistfox:

Kiith, my point was that they went ga-ga over a transport ship when a battlecruiser was passed by without a comment. As for phasing, that would make the ship even more likely to be functional as it literally appeared inside a rock tomb, unless for some strange reason the phase jump removed all the rock around the ship but decided to leave the rock inside the ship.

I mean, look at it this way, would you be more impressed with a navy frigate from any current navy or a container ship? The Khar Toba would have made sense if it was the only ship excavated on the planet, that would be the missing link to a starfaring past, but when they started throwing in wreck after wreck, the only way the Khar Toba would have been a missing link is if everyone was blind.

The Khar Toba was special. Until they made so many "Khar Toba"s that it lost a lot of the significance. I saw a Hiigarian Battlecruiser, a Destroyer and a Taidan Carrier. If someone doesn't know that their species originated from space after all that, they got a few screws loose.

The Khar-Toba was the only ship that had a long jump hyperspace drive, the battlecruisers and what not only have short jump capabilities. They are after a planet saving technology not improved conventional systems. They were going for the massive radiation readings the other ships weren’t giving off.

Originally posted by Mistfox:

Originally posted by Antisymmetric:

My theory is that as alluded to in the expedition guide and Homeworld 1 Kharak was once not only a fertile planet but a lush one worth fighting over. During the first hiigaran-taiidan war there was a large battle over Kharak in which lead to an Atmosphere Deprivation Weapon being used. This desert wasteland which is capable of supporting some life at the poles is the aftermath of that. Additionally, at the end, perhaps as a last stand sort of deal a massive gravty well was deployed which prohibited hyperspace and sucked all remaining ships in orbit to the surface where they crashed and everybody died because the air wasn’t breathable!

Problem is that Kharak is in the middle of nowhere and basically a refuge camp where the Kushan were exiled after losing the war. They are so far off the beaten path that a lot of transport ships didn't even make it. To make it worth a battle in the war, it needs to be close enough to desire, not be so far that you need a Progenitor Core to get there in a reasonable amount of time.

My guess was that it was "survivable" as a planet, but hardly anyone's idea of a retirement home.

The Hiigaran's were not exiled to Kharak, they were just exiled period. The exiles went in all directions. Kharak wasn't a refugee camp either they found it whilst drifting through space. Also, this is space middle of nowhere doesn't mean anything with hyperspace travel, I'd argue the irrelevance of the area (which I do agree Kharak is irrelevant to the empire) would be because it is no longer an area with any habitable worlds. You don't need a Progenitor Core you just need a long jump drive like the Khar-Toba. The Taiidan got there in a day afterall.

[Purple Goose Regent]

Let's admit it - the game started as Hardware: Shipbreakers, a game about a ship graveyard planet where different corporations were cutting and scrapping derelict ships for valuable supplies. Obviously coprorations used mercenaries and military action as a mean of rough competition. Many of the game assets and mechanics were already done at the time Homeworld IP was allocated to the game. Baserunners, LAVs, aircraft, the whole derelict shipbreaking theme and probably maps as well and Divine knows what else. They obviously decided to reuse as much assets as possible and the end result is a bit goofy. It doesn't make much sense to me why so many wrecks are on this planet in the context of HW lore. I hope the devs will release some smooth retcons to integrate this reused Hardware: Shipbreakers stuff organically into HW.

[DarthHammer]

One thing that I think could rectify the whole 'isolated planet' thing as well as the number of wrecks on/in the surface is in one of the cutscenes, where a graphic shows the courses of various ships/fleets approaching Kharak and then being lost. In that graphic it shows a very sizable number of ships/fleets being lost to the hyperspace anomaly (which I'm assuming is the Second Core.)

Its possible that the area around Kharak was once a well traveled area of space, but once the Khar-Toba and the Second Core arrived ships started to go missing in that area. After ship after ship was lost that area could have built up a 'Bermuda Triangle' type reputation and ships stopped passing through that area.

Alternatively, after the Taiidan lost a carrier in the area, they may have declared the system off limits themselves to prevent anything to valuable from being brought down on Kharak (not knowing, of course, that a Hyperspace Core was already there.) This is extra plausible since it seems the Taiidan deployed their orbital railgun to stop anyone from approaching the wreck of the Khar-Toba. (Though I doubt they knew a Hyperspace Core was there. If they did, they'd undoubtedly have tried to retrieve it, so they probably just found the same energy readings as the Coalition but didn't know exactly what was causing them.)

And since we know that the desert in the center of Kharak is so inhospitable, the wrecks not being noticed is well within the realm of plausibility. As for the expeditions to cross the core, they may have happened before the wrecks started to come down, since we don't know exactly when ships being drawn in by the core started or stopped.