Clearly, I’m not ready to say goodbye to Cyberpunk 2077 and Night City just yet. So I’m jumping back in the game tonight to further unpack how I feel about the game, the ending that I got, and to do some side missions, gigs and maybe even explore some alternate ending with this version of V.
Suicide Ending Timestamp
Arasaka Help Ending Timestamp
Johnny/Rogue Help Ending Timestamp
Panam Help Ending Timestamp
I probably should have started my stream with exploring the alternate endings of Cyberpunk 2077, instead of waiting until the end, because streaming for 9 hours was definitely not my original plan. Fortunately, I enjoy Cyberpunk enough to put in a little bit of overtime to process the various game endings.
At first, I felt like we clearly got the definitive “good” ending working with Panam to save V, but after thinking about playing as a street kid or corpo associate, I feel like the “good” is relative to our narrative as a former Nomad. Unless street kids and corpo associates have a completely different alternative to working with Panam, it just might make more sense for a street kid to become a legend through Johnny, or a corpo associate to become immortal via Arasaka.
Originally, I thought that there was a “right” way to play through the Arasaka narrative, or with giving Johnny control. But after seeing how things play out, these options don’t make sense for a former Nomad. Then again, my disillusionment with the alternate endings could just be a symptom of my commitment to developing my version of V.
The ultimate moral of Cyberpunk 2077 stories seems to be that there are no “happy endings” in this dystopian future, especially in Night City. Thus, our ending of leaving Night City with Panam and returning to Nomad life seems like the best possible path for V, even on borrowed time. Meanwhile, this ending may seem lame to a street kid with dreams of glory, or a corpo associate with ambitions for money and power. So in the end, I believe that while other versions of V may justifiably exist through other playthroughs to different endings, the perspective on whether they are good or bad is subjective to the player’s world view and sense of purpose.
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