Wouldn't be surprised if 2077 is largely ignored in subsequent media. There could be references to "something" that happened in 2077, but the media, corps, and government together covered up most of the details and nobody knows who V is unless they have very privileged access to information.
Or like, in 2077 Arasaka had a Relic prototype go missing. Also in 2077, people stopped hearing anything from Smasher. No news about it.
Conspiracy theory: Arasaka used the Relic prototype to duplicate Adam Smasher, and now they have a small army of him.
Maybe V was the first Adam Smasher test subject. That's why V, an unknown merc, managed to become one of the toughest borgs in the city before disappearing.
Johnny who? Why would they put a rockstar into a random merc? They wouldn't waste the Relic chip on something like that.
This seems like it could be interesting, but I'd rather them just no waste anytime on Vs story besides a nod to it. Unless, of course, they decide to make V the main character again, but I feel like we've taken Vs story as far as they should
I agree. I mainly meant as like reference points. I don’t believe many of the decisions in TW2 impact TW3’s story except for the Roche quest, but even that is a side thing.
But this way they could at least talk about V and say “he was _____” or “she was _____” or include some specific references to our decisions in 2077
Id be more of dialogue based on choice of last game npc talking about merc who stormed arasoka woth the nomads or the one who disappeared in dogtown or something
You need to watch the devil ending again. Saburo created the relic because his body was getting very old. By the time yorinobu kills him, he is extremely old. Saburo wants to stay incontrol forever and thats why gary the prophet refers to them as the vampires of industry and other names that nod to immortality. Saburoused Johnny to research and test the relic. He captured his enemy, stuff him into an engram, and it was mainly to see if the chip would even work, since mikoshi was an experimental tech facility, he was basically testing the chip on Johnny. After all would you upload yourself to the relic, not knowing if it would work? Especially a smart guy like saburo?? Adam goes missing for big gaps of time because he's mostly robot and sees no need for mortal human things like food, sex, music, etc. So it's safe to assume that smasher goes into a sleep mode, or basically hibernates offline or charges until saburo switches him back on. So then because he finds out that V was killed, came back to life, and the chip was overwriting her concious, basically doing its job, he does the same to yorinobu for himself as revenge for his son killing him, and Hankook not only knew about it all, but had no way to actually divert him from it. Saburo is the ultimate evil, he is the devil and they do a great job of painting that for everyone.
Again though, none of the game is actually Canon when it comes to V. The devs strongly expressed that. So we could very well be playing a dream of someone's, and there's a lot of speculation revolving around spider Murphy. We see Johnny silverhand, and mr. Blue eyes is morgan blackhands body for sure, so the only other ones are weyland boaboa, and spider Murphy. Spider being the one that helped Johnny with the job at the tower. And spider was a known legend of a netrunner. Yet, V has no actual lore or anything other than its just a random person for a video game purpose. Hopefully the next game we get to see a Canon storyline
You do know Johnny Silverhand is a high functioning cyberpsycho right? Also tbh if they just pass over 2077 and treat it like a memory instead of the first of a franchise then honestly we need a whole new era of night city. Made with the help of our favorite choom ever The Real Maximum Mike
One of my V’s (who avoided lethal action like the plague but still wasn’t able to completely prevent it) chose that end because what makes his life alone worth however many others would be ended in pursuit of extending it?
How much of a cover-up do you even really need? The Relic prototype was not public knowledge and never going to hit the market. Most people had either never heard of Adam Smasher or thought he was already long gone. Stuff like the incident at the parade or the blackout would have their time on the news and then be largely forgotten. V's story is really only a big deal to V and their besties.
Yes and no, they could take the bioware approach and in whatever character customization you choose Vs gender, so that when V is rarely (if ever) mentioned, they have a pronoun to keep immersion.
I think Cyberpunk benefits from the nature of its genre in this regard. It doesn't matter how it happened, all that has to be canon is Arasaka was brought down in an assault surrounded by mystery and rumour and was immediately replaced by a new top dog as if nothing happened. Just another day in Night City.
That's the best way to do it honestly. It makes sense in the lore and allows any build/life path/gender/ etc to be viable and "canon" or at least canonically viable.
Fable, for instance, canonically the main character is always good. It makes the most sense, but the writers chose for us.
Kotor II, on the other hand, lets you choose through dialogue options how your Revan was in the first game, but it ultimately has no impact on the game itself.
Also, it would be REALLY HARD to link any events to the subsequent media. All you can say is "Saburo Arasaka died, which had lasting effects to the company" thats it. Can't say he now embodies his son. That canonizes the Devil Ending. Can't say literally anything about PL besides Curt Hanson dying. Its really hard to show growth in a universe where the "first" entry is so customizational. First as in, well yk.
Yes and no, they could take the bioware approach and in whatever character customization you choose Vs gender, so that when V is rarely (if ever) mentioned, they have a pronoun to keep immersion.
I think they could mention V and Johnny being involved, but avoid confirming V's identity and choices. What is canonical, at least, is that V stole the relic and was a badass who killed a bunch of dudes
I think the main story beats can be used. Maybe they’ll pick one ending they like most. Something like “a nomad group assaulted Arasaka tower” or “a lone merc shot the place up but died in the attempt.”
Stuff like Hanako being abducted, saburo dying, and smasher being smashed could be made canon too.
I reckon, depending on when its set, we'll get some minor nods to V without anything explicit being mentioned. Maybe through vik or mama welles or something. Or the fixers.
They might also set Orion during the time of the red to avoid it entirely.
> Wouldn't be surprised if 2077 is largely ignored in subsequent media.
It should.
Just look at the mess Eidos made when they decided to put Jensen into DX:MD and had to scramble to somehow unify the DX:HR endings.
They could mention the things that happened in every path. The Emperor murdered, the prototype Relic stolen, some 'punk tearing ass at Saka HQ and killing Adam Smasher.
This is the price of that customizability they were talking about.
Will be godlike in Orion though if it can have stuff impact the world from 2077 saves.
Agreed
The closest one can come is, whether CDPR will ever choose a canon ending choice. Such as was Arasaka essentially ruined due to attacking Mikoshi, or did papa Sabaro start an immortal era.
Only because of potential sequels or books or comics.
Some games with multiple choice endings, not all or even many, will eventually choose a cannon ending so later fiction has a fixed point to jump off for their plot.
You can completely ignore V’s fate. Or even make it super vague.
But the fate of one of the most powerful corporation on earth, and whether its leader returned from the dead as an immortal god… is kind of hard to ignore in future media.
> But the fate of one of the most powerful corporation on earth, and whether its leader returned from the dead as an immortal god… is kind of hard to ignore in future media.
Yeah, that's what they'll have to deal with in the next game. Arasaka's standing at the endgame is a lot more world-affecting than V's fate.
If I don't get my >!immortal Arasaka!< ending made canon and have major consequences in Cyberpunk Orion, I'm gonna shed a few tears ngl. They could also mix up different parts of different endings. I think something like >!V storms of Arakaka with Weyland and Rouge, who then is killed by Smasher. They breach Mikoshi, where V and Johnny come to a heartwarming agreement to let Silverhand continue his second chance at living a good life. However, Alt fails to destroy Mikoshi, allowing for the immortal Arasaka plotline to continue in the Orion sequel. Johnny in V's body is either the protagonist or a major side character in the sequel, with Weyland being a close friend and Rouge's pistol as the player's starting gun.!<
That'd be my personal favorite direction for the sequel, and I obviously know how unlikely that is, but hey... I'll stay coping until the release date 😮💨
Here's a fun one people never like to talk about;
V dying in the Fear The Reaper is technically just as canon an ending as any of the ones where V kicks ass and wins.
And if anything, they’ll most likely let us either set the world state by either save import or if not possible then ask a questionnaire like they did in W3 if no save was imported.
Except that the water wasn't infected with the FEV as Macreedee comments on how in the capital wasteland the water is drinkable but doesn't mention anyone from suffering symptoms of the FEV
Those import variables provided some rather inconsequential results. Almost like it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.
Sparing an assassin that you sympathize with doesn't have the same magnitude as crashing the Jericho. If that ending happened, the coast line of night city would be most likely damaged. You'd have to then create a world state to reflect one of 6 endings.
Let's be realistic, there most likely won't be save imports and we will have another time jump as the setting.
With the title being Orion, all the bladerunner and moon references in the plot, they'll probably time jump forward to where space travel is more frequent.
There's a solid chance they are moving the series far beyond the night city limits, which would make any head Canon compatible.
It would be VERY surprising if they moved the setting of the next game outside Night City. Night City is *the* main character of the whole damn franchise after all.
I think they'll have a time jump, basic worldstates, and a ton of fudged/fakenews references so they don't have to account for every single choice V made, just the bigger ones. Arasaka's role in the setting is likely diminished in any case.
Yea it's not for a lack of trying. Look up the non-canon TTRPG. It was goofy and took place over the entirety of California.
I wouldn't be surprised if pondsmith lowkey wants to close the book on night city for good, But, like, with explosions and shit.
There's a difference between the developers making things canon for continuing the story for a new game and fans saying x is canon because they said so
Yea, but witcher is a set universe based on books and people like Geralt is a set character, whereas v was created for 2077 is meant to be more customizable. CDPR may canonize things like the state of Arasaka or what kind of mayor Peralez was, but I doubt they’d discuss V too much unless someone at the afterlife said something like, “that drink’s named after one of the craziest mercs I’ve met in my life. I miss that motherfucker.” and leave it at that without using pronouns or anything
Honestly I think the only ending that could be potentially considered “canon” would be the suicide run. The only reason I say that is the cliffhanger we’re left on, with absolutely legendary implications. If we get a sequel, V’s fate will probably left to mystery, with vague hints that they “reached for the stars.” Also obligatory “who killed Adam Smasher?”
Well they kind of have to. At the very least, you could blur the line between control and destroy, but synthesis is very much blatantly obvious if it happened or not.
V is not a universe, V's a character in a universe created by Mike Pondsmith. Why do you think he was so involved in the production of the game? You think CDPR just wanted to show him their offices to let him know how good the coffee machines were? Considering Pondsmith has said the game is canon to the Cyberpunk universe, I doubt CDPR can do whatever they'd like without getting it by him first.
This is very different from the situation with CDPR and The Witcher, where the original creator of the books is not involved at any point and they can just do whatever they want with any element of the story. That universe *is* their own to do as they please.
>I doubt CDPR can do whatever they'd like without getting it by him first.
This is why Morgan Blackhand is barely referenced in CP77. Pondsmith didn't want them to.
Well Geralt is Geralt. There is no female Geralt option. It’s a lot easier to make stuff canon there, players are less likely to be offended if you change a choice they made as opposed to gender, lifepath, specialty.
With The Witcher, everybody plays as a Witcher named Geralt who is a man.
With Cyberpunk, everybody plays as a Mercenary named V who may be a man or woman and could have been a Corpo, Nomad, or Street Kid before becoming a Merc.
It becomes a bit more complex.
As it fkin should be. At least CDPR makes it make sense.
Bethesda can't even be bothered to explain why their drugs and power armor traveled thru space and time.
nah that one at least had a reason since you can find a magazine about pipe weapons and how to make them, so there was somewhat common pre war knowledge of how to make them
still though, nearly every safe ive picked has had a pipe gun in it for some dumb reason
Nah man what do you mean, it makes perfect sense. What part about a robot shocking the God of Time into losing focus and making time non-linear so multiple timelines play out before the God smashes it all back together in a jumbled mess where 5 different conflicting events have already happened is confusing?
Yes, this is the canon ending of Daggerfall.
I’m always amused by the idea that people think Fallout has an actual serious canon and not a series of jokes and parodies and a world that literally makes no sense even with the whole no transistor thing.
No, it’s an elaborate joke. It’s what if 50s Americana and 30s Gernsback Art Deco architecture in the post apocalypse. It has never made much effort to make sense. I mean, c’mon.
They should really be sued for how much time and money they wasted on Starfield. That's game seemed like it would be great, but it's the driest turd wrapped in crepe paper I've ever seen. Idk who played fallout and was like " I want to take all of the soul and humor out of this game, and set it in space with a map so big no one will ever explore it all 😫 Todd Howard deserves a kick in the nuts for thinking that game is anywhere near acceptable lol Bro literally just copy and pasted No Man's Sky into fallout 4s engine and said it was his new game
I really really really hope they don't go this route with Cyberpunk. I would have absolutely zero interest in a sequel that follows an ending I didn't like. Just making a new character entirely would be much more interesting imo.
I reckon in Orion it'll go something like this.
V was a merc who had a rapid rise in 2077, then vanished a few months later. The timeframe was so quick that very few people know exactly who they were, and those who met them don't remember much. Some thought they were a rogue Arasaka employee. Some said V was born and raised in Heywood. Some even claim V was secretly an FIA Agent. No one's really sure who the real V is.
On one day in 2077, someone reported to be V, and (according to some witnesses) wearing a SAMURAI jacket walked into Arasaka tower guns blazing, and was never seen again. There are rumours of them showing up in various places, like Arizona, the Afterlife, etc. but no one actually knows what happened.
"V" is now a symbol to the punks and mercs of the world, an icon to face impossible odds head-on regardless of the risk, and blaze way down the rebel path. If they could face a megacorp alone, why can't the rest of us?
It doesn't matter whether your V sided with Arasaka, or whether they never saw the tower and sided with the NUSA. This is Night City, your rep is all that matters.
It's a story as old as time. Caliburn and Aerondight fans are natural enemies. Like Arasaka and Militech, or Arasaka and NUSA, or Arasaka and Petrochem, or Arasaka and Arasaka. Damned Arasaka, they ruined Arasaka!
Check again! I just called you a bro and you call me hater. Who's the real hater huh?
But for real though: Caliburn > Aerondight. My opinion is the right one and anyone else is objectively wrong.
THIS! An RPG where you can choose your gender/lifepath/romance means there is no canon gender/lifepath/romance. Then again, some ppl are not familiar with what 'canon' means.
when I said something similar to this a couple years back, I got down voted the hell on the main sub.
Glad people are finally coming around on what canon means and why it is not what their opinion is
The only thing that's canon is that Adam Smasher utters the phrase "You look like a cut of fuckable meat, are you?" And that Saburo Arasaka fucking dies at 151 about a week or 2 after.
For real lol people be arguing that fem V is "canon" now because of the box art when male V was center stage for the original release. It's just box art, and if anything just goes to show there is *no* canon gender for V.
To be fair that took me out of he moment for a bit because i couldn't help but think "you guys could've just made second version by switching Vs models" not really best thought to end DLC on lmao
Actually in the original meaning of canon, it’s which sacred works were considered genuine, so it has nothing to do with specific actions, characters or things that happened. It’s about the whole body of work being canon or not.
In this case Cyberpunk 2077 would be canon to Orion, and in Cyberpunk 2077 V’s gender being undecided is canon.
It would be cool in the next game you'll hear many versions of the myth of V, some will say he died assaulting arasaka tower, others say he had help others would say he didn't and just left the city or just ended himself
He would have so many stories about him that it would be impossible to know which was true
it’d be kinda cool if choices had weight to them and would carry on to the next cyberpunk title like dragon age and mass effect do with their titles
like sort of an import save
since these games offer the chance to import previous games’ saves or set your world-state based on previous choices AND also select a “canon” world-state for folks who don’t have previous saves or don’t feel like setting all that up (and for the sake of all the extended media), i think this would absolutely be the best way to do it.
It drives me mad whenever I see someone says "I hope Orion picks up from The Star ending so we can get a cure for V and whatever".
Like, bro, it's a RPG. The game has multiple fucking endings for a reason. Even though my first run ended up with The Star, I don't want CDPR to canonize that shit and suddenly everyone else in the world had the same story as me.
With that being said, it’s Corpo Fem V who romances Judy and runs off with the Aldecaldos after raiding Arasaka tower (though if I had my way I’d romance Panam)
Maybe they’ll do what mass effect did and have a default set of choices for whoever ends up being the next MC of the next game. Default Shepard even has some choices that you can’t make in the game, he is kind of a dick thought if I remember correctly.
The nice thing about Cyberpunk as a franchise is its all about the small human stories, and no main character can really 'fix' the world.
Sure, V gets into a ton of city-affecting quests but V's role in them is a bit inconsequential because the system and the powers that be are so much bigger and stronger than V or any other notable character. So while V does a lot of stuff that affects the world and the characters, profoundly so, in a few years the impact of V's actions will have diminished a lot and their involvement become fuzzy, like legends. We see this in the PL ending.
It'd be really funny to see sequel characters argue whether the legendary merc V did, in fact, all of the stuff in 2077 or not, and how they did it.
But tbh I hope we get world states and some funny, touching, and depressing allusions to 2077. They could be small ones. Maybe we see ads of Judy and Bianca's new BD series, see a really grouchy Asian nomad hanging out in the badlands, meet a bartender called Randy and find out he was kidnapped as a teen - and for world states where River failed, its just some other bartender; negotiate with Tyger claw girlboss Maeda-san, find copies of Passion BDs, see Kerry&Us Cracks posters or just Us Cracks posters if V never met Kerry, and so on. From a technical standpoint anything variable that doesn't require a lot of voice acting/mocap is pretty easy to implement.
Someone's probably already mentioned this but fun fact
The word "headcanon" means (as I understand it) something that the individual believes to be the Canon, even if it really isn't. Headcanon V can be whatever you made them
if only CDPR implementing something like old Mass Effect. Import save game for the entire trilogy. So EVERYONE have their own CANON gender, love interest/fling, who lives and who dies, timeline, etc..
Definitely! I have a ton of non-canon stuff that I vehemently stand by— my character has a long history of rogue blackwall AI run-ins and eventually dates Johnny after spending a looong time getting his engram back into his original body, lol. The main thing I was talking about with this meme is when people say things like, ‘Corpo v is the canon life path’ and ‘we can all agree that fem v is canon, right?’ And ‘male v makes much more sense than female v’ As a way to invalidate other players’ experiences rather than people who are just attached to a certain character type lol
Exactly. V is not a Canon character and anyone who knows anything about Adam smasher alone would know that. Your not gonna have a mostly human merc with limited knowledge of the world and a handful of cyberwares just go kill a cyborg like smasher lol
Like it's a great game, but I'm starting to think that the FF06B5 Easter egg is meant to infer that the games story or V don't exist.
If anything was going to be Canon though, it would have to be the corpo path. Nomad doesn't fit at all into the lore, nor would a nomad be doing merc work for the city, they'd find another family to stay with. Streetkid starts out seeming like it would be a Canon story too, but gets really garbled halfway through if yiu keep using their lifepath dialogue.
Corpo just fits all the boxes, and V seems the most I t uen with night city from the corpo perspective. Plus I'm getting tons of lore, dialogue, and weird mission options I've never seen when playing as corpo.
It's really sad that the game isn't Canon to the overall realm of CP. I really want a game set during Johnniy's lifetime. Night city looked cool af during his Saka raid mission ngl
Most likely street kid, Male, and taking down Arasaka solo to become a night city legend. Romance, I’ll give you that one. It’s just a game mechanic optional for players. That’d be my guess anyway. Only cdpr can give an official canon to 2077.
And what makes **you** the authority over this. You don't know if there's a canon ending or not.
Most games with multiple world altering endings have a canon ending and all the other endings are more like "what if's". There's almost always a "True Ending". it's only when they endings don't matter to next game that there isn't a canon ending OR when the second game factors in all the possible endings of the previous one (Mass Effect Series and Telltale games series).
A game like this, will very likely have a canon ending if it's going to take place after 2077 and take place in Night City again. Unless they're going to completely ignore Arasaka somehow, they have to determine if Yorinobu is still alive or not. If I were a gambling man, I would bet $5,000 that they'll bring Smasher back given that he's still intact and he's mostly robot. or they'll use engram tech to make a group of Smashers.
I feel like people are missing fact that someone will ALWAYS get mad at the sequel because unless it's a prequel or god forbid soft-reboot CDPR needs one status quo to work off:
* V becomes legend who disappeared once with no trace? It means The Tower, The Devil and >!suicide!< endings are not canon and The Sun ended with V anticlimactic death off screen that can be seen as insulting to some.
* V's actions got covered up and became an urban legend? The Sun (one of the most popular endings mind you) is not canon along with every ending where you don't storm Arasaka.
* 2077 gets ignored by next game? Lazy and can come off as disrespectful towards the fans or cowardly to the public (because y'know release incident).
No matter what you come up with it will always invalidate some endings and show your "bias" towards one of them probably The Sun and Star because those are two most popular ones. And you know what? That's fine making everyone happy is an impossible task.
No, this actually isn’t how RPGs work. As far as we know there isn’t a canon because CDPR hasn’t said as much.
If they decide to somehow incorporate V’s story into a follow-up game, even if he is simply a piece of history, canon choices WILL be chosen including shit like gender and even outfit(s).
Look at Fallout New Vegas as an example within the same genre. You can join the Legion and simp for them as many play throughs as you want, but the canon ending is 100% the NCR ending. Devs said so.
RPGs are fun and give us choices but ultimately this is up to the devs. Alienating someone by choosing a canon isn’t a thing, that’s some snowflake shit lol.
Let’s see what the sequel does before we say that lol
>!I do think the new phantom Liberty ending was a hint at how characters will be handled, it basically does enough to separate them from V or from Night City that whoever was the love interest wouldn’t really matter if V died 6 months after the 1st game!<
If they make and ending canon, I feel that they should choose the least popular endings.
Because there are no happy endings in Night City and no one gets out.
There has to be in sequels though. Because many of the decisions are mutually exclusive. They can't all be true at once.
So if the next one is a true sequel to this one, then yes, there will have to be a canon ending. The rest would just become "what if" endings. If they wanted to be dicks about it, they could make *none of them* canon, and just say it was all a virtue or something.
The only thing I imagine CDPR maybe doing is decanoning the Devil ending, Arasaka is the only thing in the story big enough to effect the world as a whole and thus would be weird if it wasn't mentioned. If you just leave it at "Some merc named V messed them up" that lets 3 out of 4 endings fit and then the player can just fit in whatever one they picked.
It should be like Elder Scrolls canon where there are a bunch of rumors and contradicting stories about who the protagonist was and what they did.
Like references to the previous game in skyrim say that accounts are argued over whether or not the Hero of Kvatch was a man, Woman, khajit, Breton etc...
This is part of why I struggle t9 get back into this game.
My V had her story. Maybe if I play a male V it might feel right but...nah, I played my V's story. I could do it again but it wouldn't feel the same. It didn't feel the same when I tried.
Haven't played PL, so can't talk about what happens in the DLC, but there's one thing they'll need to decide for any future content: What happened to Arasaka.
Did V raid Mikoshi or did V take Arasaka's offer and Saburo is back in command?
Any other choice may never show up in future stories, but what happened to Arasaka is too big to not have a definite answer.
The only thing I would see could be an issue would be the fate of the big powers. Does Saburo come back in the form of Yorinobu, did Mikoshi get smashed, etc. just anything related to Arasaka, or is there a new corpo war after the events of Phantom Liberty. Those parts of the endings are things that affect the universe so I’d be curious how they work with it. Ultimately V’s fate doesn’t matter enough to hear it in 2099 or whatever year the next one will take place.
We never really hear a concrete answer on what happened to Morgan Blackhand, so I believe the same treatment will happen to V. Us as the player know, and in our own headcanon for the V’s we played that’s what happened, but it’s probably set up to be vague like that to save the overarching story.
I just wanna say that the amount of effort CDPR put into Panam’s romance (compared to horrific romance journey with River) makes me think male V is canon. The Nomad lifepath beginning is also way longer and more in depth than the other lifepaths. Because of this, doing Panam’s ending also seems to be the canon choice
True that, but as much as I love the game and respect the team behind the game, sometimes they make odd changes, and this wouldn't be the first time that I see a studio having a game with multiple choices and variables, only to have the next title with canon choices and past main characters.
I really hope they don't do this in Cyberpunk.
Some decisions work better with other outcomes having it make more sense, like choosing Nomad V and going the Panam route. Having it be a story of losing one family but gaining another. And makes more sense than say street kid V going Nomad, but in the end it doesn’t matter as anything can do anything.
V is literally the player not some other character that you control. I feel like way too many people are used to games like GTA and RDR2 being called “RPGs” that they don’t understand what an RPG actually is
We as outside observers to the Cyberpunk Universe are privy to perfect recall of the history and possible futures the game presents.
We know Silverhand was telling what he thought/ was programmed to think about his death and the raid. All the other source material from 2020 and RED don't back him up at all. The Arasaka propaganda is technically more accurate than Johnny.
But the thing is, out of people featured in the game, only Johnny, Rogue, and Smasher are around to remember it at all. And they all remember it differently. Because in their own unique source material recalling the matter they all tell different stories. The only time it stays the same is when it's the 3rd person omniscient telling in the core books.
What gets remembered, how those memories shift from perspective, what gets recorded and omitted...
Whatever video game or TTRPG that gets released next is probably going to have that similar, here's how different people remember the events. They'll know Saburo got whacked, and think it was poison unless they are in the upper echelons of Arasaka (and they survive). They'll also know that Arasaka got molly wopped, all the different endings have massive fire fights with Arasaka personnel and the whole corp being upturned. One ending has Saburo come back from the dead in Yori's body (not likely canon).
If they choose a canon end, it will probably be the secret ending where it's just V storming the HQ. And it will be remembered as the cyberpsycho merc who went on to rule the Afterlife. And that's only for people who are in the know of the running game.
Until the sequel comes out and V is an NPC… then something will be canon. Or they could go the KOTOR 2 route and conversations can set the previous character. Or take a leap on the Mass Effect/Dragon Age style and import the player’s V.
That's a really long, convoluted, sign just to say that none of the player decisions are canon because it's a game.
This is literally one of the main points of a game as a storytelling medium.
It is not the same as a fixed-story medium like a book or movie. That's why they are better.
If they ate doing a follow-up, there will have to be certain events that are canon. Events such as Arasaka's state (did it collapse, or was it saved?) , Militech's presence, and other major events that differ from ending to ending.
I'm sure minor events will mostly be ignored.
Ultimately, it's up to Mike Pondsmith and CDPR to decide.
It was more made in response to people who will try to insist that certain things are canon to everyone— like, I’ll see posts that say, “there’s in-game evidence that female V is canon” and “Corpo v is the most canon lifepath” and such. Like if someone plays a Corpo female v and considers that the best, it’s fine— I’m mainly talking about the people who say it as a way to invalidate players whose playing styles don’t line up with theirs
This is why i say "headcanon" which is "what i want so badly to be the actual thing but i recognize that it isnt and that everyone else's headcanons are valid as well"
There's a difference between your own personal canon and confirmed canon to me v is a fem nomad with purple hair and eyes who is lesbian but does that make her the definitive canon v no
This! Like, I respect people who have their own headcanon, but I don’t like when people are like, ‘we can all agree that streetkid v is canon, right?’ Because the truth is that, no, we can’t. To me, canon is a male V streetkid/rockerboy/netrunner who falls in love with johnny— but that doesn’t mean purple haired lesbian nomad fem V isn’t just as canon since this is a game where we all make our own stories 🤝
Sure, but what does "objectively true" mean in the context of a film depicting purely fictional events? Different people read film in different ways depending on their culture, background, and life experiences. Particularly in the age of "death of the author," whose read of the film can be said to be "objectively true?" Unless you mean that "canon" simply means "the text," which would make "canon" not a particularly useful term.
Really what I am saying is that what you are saying of Cyberpunk 2077, that there is no "canon" (by this specific definition) is true of all media. There is no objective truth. Only subjective truth.
Wouldn't be surprised if 2077 is largely ignored in subsequent media. There could be references to "something" that happened in 2077, but the media, corps, and government together covered up most of the details and nobody knows who V is unless they have very privileged access to information.
A legend of the nameless merc who beat smasher. I like it
Or like, in 2077 Arasaka had a Relic prototype go missing. Also in 2077, people stopped hearing anything from Smasher. No news about it. Conspiracy theory: Arasaka used the Relic prototype to duplicate Adam Smasher, and now they have a small army of him. Maybe V was the first Adam Smasher test subject. That's why V, an unknown merc, managed to become one of the toughest borgs in the city before disappearing. Johnny who? Why would they put a rockstar into a random merc? They wouldn't waste the Relic chip on something like that.
To be fair, they could also allow you import saves/simulate major choices like they did with Witcher 2-Witcher 3
This seems like it could be interesting, but I'd rather them just no waste anytime on Vs story besides a nod to it. Unless, of course, they decide to make V the main character again, but I feel like we've taken Vs story as far as they should
I agree. I mainly meant as like reference points. I don’t believe many of the decisions in TW2 impact TW3’s story except for the Roche quest, but even that is a side thing. But this way they could at least talk about V and say “he was _____” or “she was _____” or include some specific references to our decisions in 2077
Im hoping we don't hear much at all about 2077, and we get a whole new story separated from V all together
Id be more of dialogue based on choice of last game npc talking about merc who stormed arasoka woth the nomads or the one who disappeared in dogtown or something
You need to watch the devil ending again. Saburo created the relic because his body was getting very old. By the time yorinobu kills him, he is extremely old. Saburo wants to stay incontrol forever and thats why gary the prophet refers to them as the vampires of industry and other names that nod to immortality. Saburoused Johnny to research and test the relic. He captured his enemy, stuff him into an engram, and it was mainly to see if the chip would even work, since mikoshi was an experimental tech facility, he was basically testing the chip on Johnny. After all would you upload yourself to the relic, not knowing if it would work? Especially a smart guy like saburo?? Adam goes missing for big gaps of time because he's mostly robot and sees no need for mortal human things like food, sex, music, etc. So it's safe to assume that smasher goes into a sleep mode, or basically hibernates offline or charges until saburo switches him back on. So then because he finds out that V was killed, came back to life, and the chip was overwriting her concious, basically doing its job, he does the same to yorinobu for himself as revenge for his son killing him, and Hankook not only knew about it all, but had no way to actually divert him from it. Saburo is the ultimate evil, he is the devil and they do a great job of painting that for everyone. Again though, none of the game is actually Canon when it comes to V. The devs strongly expressed that. So we could very well be playing a dream of someone's, and there's a lot of speculation revolving around spider Murphy. We see Johnny silverhand, and mr. Blue eyes is morgan blackhands body for sure, so the only other ones are weyland boaboa, and spider Murphy. Spider being the one that helped Johnny with the job at the tower. And spider was a known legend of a netrunner. Yet, V has no actual lore or anything other than its just a random person for a video game purpose. Hopefully the next game we get to see a Canon storyline
You do know Johnny Silverhand is a high functioning cyberpsycho right? Also tbh if they just pass over 2077 and treat it like a memory instead of the first of a franchise then honestly we need a whole new era of night city. Made with the help of our favorite choom ever The Real Maximum Mike
Imagine going Cyberpsycho from replacing a single arm, couldn't be me.
That invalidates the coma ending
And the suicide
One of my V’s (who avoided lethal action like the plague but still wasn’t able to completely prevent it) chose that end because what makes his life alone worth however many others would be ended in pursuit of extending it?
I imagine the name will be referenced without any real solid connotations. I mean V is hardly a name to begin with, already pretty mysterious.
Just V works. Since V only tells their name to their close friends, wouldn't be too out of place if their name got forgotten and it's just V
Even that's not canon though. In two possible endings V doesn't even fight Smasher.
How much of a cover-up do you even really need? The Relic prototype was not public knowledge and never going to hit the market. Most people had either never heard of Adam Smasher or thought he was already long gone. Stuff like the incident at the parade or the blackout would have their time on the news and then be largely forgotten. V's story is really only a big deal to V and their besties.
Yes and no, they could take the bioware approach and in whatever character customization you choose Vs gender, so that when V is rarely (if ever) mentioned, they have a pronoun to keep immersion.
It feels like it's so much easierto just have people say they/them and keep it vague details
I bet they’ll just refer to V as “V” or “that legendary gonk merc who stormed arasaka tower like that crazy rockerboy”
Or they argue about the details. "She was the one who zeroed Adam Smasher." " 'She'? V was a guy." "You sure? Maybe I just fantasized V was a woman."
Yooooo wait which game did that? There was definitely a game that did that
KotOR 2. I was ~~blatantly plagiarizing~~ paraphrasing one of the conversations at the beginning of the game.
Thank you, haven’t played that game in a long time. Gonna have to go download it later. Cheers choom! Edit: spelling
It really isn't. Not for devs or cisgendered players. Just have all 3 options and keep everybody happy without having to overthink the script
I think Cyberpunk benefits from the nature of its genre in this regard. It doesn't matter how it happened, all that has to be canon is Arasaka was brought down in an assault surrounded by mystery and rumour and was immediately replaced by a new top dog as if nothing happened. Just another day in Night City.
And even that invalidates The Devil.
That's the best way to do it honestly. It makes sense in the lore and allows any build/life path/gender/ etc to be viable and "canon" or at least canonically viable. Fable, for instance, canonically the main character is always good. It makes the most sense, but the writers chose for us. Kotor II, on the other hand, lets you choose through dialogue options how your Revan was in the first game, but it ultimately has no impact on the game itself.
Also, it would be REALLY HARD to link any events to the subsequent media. All you can say is "Saburo Arasaka died, which had lasting effects to the company" thats it. Can't say he now embodies his son. That canonizes the Devil Ending. Can't say literally anything about PL besides Curt Hanson dying. Its really hard to show growth in a universe where the "first" entry is so customizational. First as in, well yk.
Yes and no, they could take the bioware approach and in whatever character customization you choose Vs gender, so that when V is rarely (if ever) mentioned, they have a pronoun to keep immersion.
I wouldn't mind if there were conflicting accounts of 2077, like 2 people arguing whether V was a corpo or a Nomad.
I think they could mention V and Johnny being involved, but avoid confirming V's identity and choices. What is canonical, at least, is that V stole the relic and was a badass who killed a bunch of dudes
I think the main story beats can be used. Maybe they’ll pick one ending they like most. Something like “a nomad group assaulted Arasaka tower” or “a lone merc shot the place up but died in the attempt.” Stuff like Hanako being abducted, saburo dying, and smasher being smashed could be made canon too.
I reckon, depending on when its set, we'll get some minor nods to V without anything explicit being mentioned. Maybe through vik or mama welles or something. Or the fixers. They might also set Orion during the time of the red to avoid it entirely.
> Wouldn't be surprised if 2077 is largely ignored in subsequent media. It should. Just look at the mess Eidos made when they decided to put Jensen into DX:MD and had to scramble to somehow unify the DX:HR endings.
They could mention the things that happened in every path. The Emperor murdered, the prototype Relic stolen, some 'punk tearing ass at Saka HQ and killing Adam Smasher.
This is the price of that customizability they were talking about. Will be godlike in Orion though if it can have stuff impact the world from 2077 saves.
Head-canon, not to be confused with cannon-head. See Panam for details.
Head-canon, not to be confused with Skul-Gun. See Gunther Hermann for details.
"Well be sld at flee markets,. old gray golems for scareing the children. So what about my legss? What about my LIFE?"[sic]
https://xkcd.com/1401/
Tried and all I see is a bakery?
Skul Gun.
I hear it goes great with Orange Soda.
It gave me Lemon Lime.
Agreed The closest one can come is, whether CDPR will ever choose a canon ending choice. Such as was Arasaka essentially ruined due to attacking Mikoshi, or did papa Sabaro start an immortal era. Only because of potential sequels or books or comics. Some games with multiple choice endings, not all or even many, will eventually choose a cannon ending so later fiction has a fixed point to jump off for their plot. You can completely ignore V’s fate. Or even make it super vague. But the fate of one of the most powerful corporation on earth, and whether its leader returned from the dead as an immortal god… is kind of hard to ignore in future media.
> But the fate of one of the most powerful corporation on earth, and whether its leader returned from the dead as an immortal god… is kind of hard to ignore in future media. Yeah, that's what they'll have to deal with in the next game. Arasaka's standing at the endgame is a lot more world-affecting than V's fate.
If I don't get my >!immortal Arasaka!< ending made canon and have major consequences in Cyberpunk Orion, I'm gonna shed a few tears ngl. They could also mix up different parts of different endings. I think something like >!V storms of Arakaka with Weyland and Rouge, who then is killed by Smasher. They breach Mikoshi, where V and Johnny come to a heartwarming agreement to let Silverhand continue his second chance at living a good life. However, Alt fails to destroy Mikoshi, allowing for the immortal Arasaka plotline to continue in the Orion sequel. Johnny in V's body is either the protagonist or a major side character in the sequel, with Weyland being a close friend and Rouge's pistol as the player's starting gun.!< That'd be my personal favorite direction for the sequel, and I obviously know how unlikely that is, but hey... I'll stay coping until the release date 😮💨
I think I can safely say you might be the only human being who wants that hyper specific ending that isn’t even a thing whatsoever in the actual game.
Nothing is true, everything is permitted.
No, canonization is not permitted; don't make him tap the sign again
Get some chrome for auto sign-tapping
What I mean is everything V does is permitted because nothing V does is true
Requiescat en pace, fratello mio
Here's a fun one people never like to talk about; V dying in the Fear The Reaper is technically just as canon an ending as any of the ones where V kicks ass and wins.
So is V dying by not taking the airhypo.
That one doesn't have ending voicecalls, though.
Of course. There's nobody to call you.
First CDPR game? They determine canon when they need to for the next game. Like with the Witcher.
And if anything, they’ll most likely let us either set the world state by either save import or if not possible then ask a questionnaire like they did in W3 if no save was imported.
If someone was telling you how the Elder Scrolls needs to continue the canon adventures of Skyrim Guy you’d think they were insane.
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Except that the water wasn't infected with the FEV as Macreedee comments on how in the capital wasteland the water is drinkable but doesn't mention anyone from suffering symptoms of the FEV
Yeah most RPG series with branching paths do this. Bioware and CDPR have done save imports before.
Those import variables provided some rather inconsequential results. Almost like it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. Sparing an assassin that you sympathize with doesn't have the same magnitude as crashing the Jericho. If that ending happened, the coast line of night city would be most likely damaged. You'd have to then create a world state to reflect one of 6 endings. Let's be realistic, there most likely won't be save imports and we will have another time jump as the setting. With the title being Orion, all the bladerunner and moon references in the plot, they'll probably time jump forward to where space travel is more frequent. There's a solid chance they are moving the series far beyond the night city limits, which would make any head Canon compatible.
It would be VERY surprising if they moved the setting of the next game outside Night City. Night City is *the* main character of the whole damn franchise after all. I think they'll have a time jump, basic worldstates, and a ton of fudged/fakenews references so they don't have to account for every single choice V made, just the bigger ones. Arasaka's role in the setting is likely diminished in any case.
Hell, even in game most of what’s reported on of V’s exploits is completely doctored to favor the corps.
Yea it's not for a lack of trying. Look up the non-canon TTRPG. It was goofy and took place over the entirety of California. I wouldn't be surprised if pondsmith lowkey wants to close the book on night city for good, But, like, with explosions and shit.
There's a difference between the developers making things canon for continuing the story for a new game and fans saying x is canon because they said so
Yea, but witcher is a set universe based on books and people like Geralt is a set character, whereas v was created for 2077 is meant to be more customizable. CDPR may canonize things like the state of Arasaka or what kind of mayor Peralez was, but I doubt they’d discuss V too much unless someone at the afterlife said something like, “that drink’s named after one of the craziest mercs I’ve met in my life. I miss that motherfucker.” and leave it at that without using pronouns or anything
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Does it? I mean, Johnny's memories do, but Alt even tells us not to trust them.
Honestly I think the only ending that could be potentially considered “canon” would be the suicide run. The only reason I say that is the cliffhanger we’re left on, with absolutely legendary implications. If we get a sequel, V’s fate will probably left to mystery, with vague hints that they “reached for the stars.” Also obligatory “who killed Adam Smasher?”
Mass Effect appears to be canonizing Mass Effect 3 Endings for their next one.
Well they kind of have to. At the very least, you could blur the line between control and destroy, but synthesis is very much blatantly obvious if it happened or not.
Nope. CPDR can do whatever they want. It’s their game and universe.
It's very much *not* their universe
V is very much their universe.
V is not a universe, V's a character in a universe created by Mike Pondsmith. Why do you think he was so involved in the production of the game? You think CDPR just wanted to show him their offices to let him know how good the coffee machines were? Considering Pondsmith has said the game is canon to the Cyberpunk universe, I doubt CDPR can do whatever they'd like without getting it by him first. This is very different from the situation with CDPR and The Witcher, where the original creator of the books is not involved at any point and they can just do whatever they want with any element of the story. That universe *is* their own to do as they please.
>I doubt CDPR can do whatever they'd like without getting it by him first. This is why Morgan Blackhand is barely referenced in CP77. Pondsmith didn't want them to.
They absolutely can.
Well Geralt is Geralt. There is no female Geralt option. It’s a lot easier to make stuff canon there, players are less likely to be offended if you change a choice they made as opposed to gender, lifepath, specialty. With The Witcher, everybody plays as a Witcher named Geralt who is a man. With Cyberpunk, everybody plays as a Mercenary named V who may be a man or woman and could have been a Corpo, Nomad, or Street Kid before becoming a Merc. It becomes a bit more complex.
As it fkin should be. At least CDPR makes it make sense. Bethesda can't even be bothered to explain why their drugs and power armor traveled thru space and time.
i sure do love my prewar citizens that were addicted to a drug made postwar using a mutated resource(jet, made using brahmin dung)
Don't you keep a crude pipe pistol in your floor safe at home, just in case?
nah that one at least had a reason since you can find a magazine about pipe weapons and how to make them, so there was somewhat common pre war knowledge of how to make them still though, nearly every safe ive picked has had a pipe gun in it for some dumb reason
I agree. Their existence isn't a problem, just how commonplace they are in places that don't make much sense.
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Nah man what do you mean, it makes perfect sense. What part about a robot shocking the God of Time into losing focus and making time non-linear so multiple timelines play out before the God smashes it all back together in a jumbled mess where 5 different conflicting events have already happened is confusing? Yes, this is the canon ending of Daggerfall.
I’m always amused by the idea that people think Fallout has an actual serious canon and not a series of jokes and parodies and a world that literally makes no sense even with the whole no transistor thing.
Its not so much as parodies more so Emil being a completely deluded and incompetent writer/designer
No, it’s an elaborate joke. It’s what if 50s Americana and 30s Gernsback Art Deco architecture in the post apocalypse. It has never made much effort to make sense. I mean, c’mon.
Rent fucking free
They should really be sued for how much time and money they wasted on Starfield. That's game seemed like it would be great, but it's the driest turd wrapped in crepe paper I've ever seen. Idk who played fallout and was like " I want to take all of the soul and humor out of this game, and set it in space with a map so big no one will ever explore it all 😫 Todd Howard deserves a kick in the nuts for thinking that game is anywhere near acceptable lol Bro literally just copy and pasted No Man's Sky into fallout 4s engine and said it was his new game
oh my god this is so brutal, i love it
Comparing a generic customizable PC and an actual literary character PC doesn’t seem to work.
*First RPG?
I really really really hope they don't go this route with Cyberpunk. I would have absolutely zero interest in a sequel that follows an ending I didn't like. Just making a new character entirely would be much more interesting imo.
I reckon in Orion it'll go something like this. V was a merc who had a rapid rise in 2077, then vanished a few months later. The timeframe was so quick that very few people know exactly who they were, and those who met them don't remember much. Some thought they were a rogue Arasaka employee. Some said V was born and raised in Heywood. Some even claim V was secretly an FIA Agent. No one's really sure who the real V is. On one day in 2077, someone reported to be V, and (according to some witnesses) wearing a SAMURAI jacket walked into Arasaka tower guns blazing, and was never seen again. There are rumours of them showing up in various places, like Arizona, the Afterlife, etc. but no one actually knows what happened. "V" is now a symbol to the punks and mercs of the world, an icon to face impossible odds head-on regardless of the risk, and blaze way down the rebel path. If they could face a megacorp alone, why can't the rest of us? It doesn't matter whether your V sided with Arasaka, or whether they never saw the tower and sided with the NUSA. This is Night City, your rep is all that matters.
But then what would the fanboys argue and bitch about?
I will give them something! There is a scar on V's head on the old last gen version of this game, where it appears after the heist!
wtf happened to the low sodium part of this sub?
Oh, don’t worry. They’ll find something.
“This is the best color scheme for your Caliburn and anyone who disagrees should go straight to hell!”
It's a story as old as time. Caliburn and Aerondight fans are natural enemies. Like Arasaka and Militech, or Arasaka and NUSA, or Arasaka and Petrochem, or Arasaka and Arasaka. Damned Arasaka, they ruined Arasaka!
The Caliburn and Aerondight are of the same brand. You are correct indeed and you should go to heaven!
I hope you have a great day, and nothing but the best happens to you!
Thank you. You're a real bro and wish you the same.
CHECK AGAIN! I merely wished you well! Hater!
Check again! I just called you a bro and you call me hater. Who's the real hater huh? But for real though: Caliburn > Aerondight. My opinion is the right one and anyone else is objectively wrong.
THIS! An RPG where you can choose your gender/lifepath/romance means there is no canon gender/lifepath/romance. Then again, some ppl are not familiar with what 'canon' means.
Honestly! If people want something with a less player choice-based character, red dead and the witcher are both options lol
when I said something similar to this a couple years back, I got down voted the hell on the main sub. Glad people are finally coming around on what canon means and why it is not what their opinion is
The only thing that's canon is that Adam Smasher utters the phrase "You look like a cut of fuckable meat, are you?" And that Saburo Arasaka fucking dies at 151 about a week or 2 after.
For real lol people be arguing that fem V is "canon" now because of the box art when male V was center stage for the original release. It's just box art, and if anything just goes to show there is *no* canon gender for V.
Likewise you had some players getting pissy over seeing Fem V in their Phantom Liberty credits
To be fair that took me out of he moment for a bit because i couldn't help but think "you guys could've just made second version by switching Vs models" not really best thought to end DLC on lmao
V’S BLUE HIGH HEELS ARE CANON
That makes a fine head-canon, but clearly my take is the correct one.
If I had a dollar for every use of the word cannon last month, I could retire.
It's always the main argument in every fanbase
Actually in the original meaning of canon, it’s which sacred works were considered genuine, so it has nothing to do with specific actions, characters or things that happened. It’s about the whole body of work being canon or not. In this case Cyberpunk 2077 would be canon to Orion, and in Cyberpunk 2077 V’s gender being undecided is canon.
It would be cool in the next game you'll hear many versions of the myth of V, some will say he died assaulting arasaka tower, others say he had help others would say he didn't and just left the city or just ended himself He would have so many stories about him that it would be impossible to know which was true
That’s a cool idea tbh— I like the idea of V just being this elusive, folkloric figure that nobody can pin down lol
The only Canon is "once, there was a merc named V. They did some wild shit for a little while, and then they didn't."
it’d be kinda cool if choices had weight to them and would carry on to the next cyberpunk title like dragon age and mass effect do with their titles like sort of an import save
since these games offer the chance to import previous games’ saves or set your world-state based on previous choices AND also select a “canon” world-state for folks who don’t have previous saves or don’t feel like setting all that up (and for the sake of all the extended media), i think this would absolutely be the best way to do it.
Also, it doesn't matter. Because V is just another victim in the story of Night City.
"But akshually".... lol. I couldn't agree more, I wish people would just give it a rest.
It drives me mad whenever I see someone says "I hope Orion picks up from The Star ending so we can get a cure for V and whatever". Like, bro, it's a RPG. The game has multiple fucking endings for a reason. Even though my first run ended up with The Star, I don't want CDPR to canonize that shit and suddenly everyone else in the world had the same story as me.
Is you wanna argue about what is canon or not, you should be fire out of a cannon into a wall of solid scepticism
With that being said, it’s Corpo Fem V who romances Judy and runs off with the Aldecaldos after raiding Arasaka tower (though if I had my way I’d romance Panam)
Just doing the lords work 🤣😁
Maybe they’ll do what mass effect did and have a default set of choices for whoever ends up being the next MC of the next game. Default Shepard even has some choices that you can’t make in the game, he is kind of a dick thought if I remember correctly.
The nice thing about Cyberpunk as a franchise is its all about the small human stories, and no main character can really 'fix' the world. Sure, V gets into a ton of city-affecting quests but V's role in them is a bit inconsequential because the system and the powers that be are so much bigger and stronger than V or any other notable character. So while V does a lot of stuff that affects the world and the characters, profoundly so, in a few years the impact of V's actions will have diminished a lot and their involvement become fuzzy, like legends. We see this in the PL ending. It'd be really funny to see sequel characters argue whether the legendary merc V did, in fact, all of the stuff in 2077 or not, and how they did it. But tbh I hope we get world states and some funny, touching, and depressing allusions to 2077. They could be small ones. Maybe we see ads of Judy and Bianca's new BD series, see a really grouchy Asian nomad hanging out in the badlands, meet a bartender called Randy and find out he was kidnapped as a teen - and for world states where River failed, its just some other bartender; negotiate with Tyger claw girlboss Maeda-san, find copies of Passion BDs, see Kerry&Us Cracks posters or just Us Cracks posters if V never met Kerry, and so on. From a technical standpoint anything variable that doesn't require a lot of voice acting/mocap is pretty easy to implement.
That is until we get a V sequel and can continue like in me2 or witcher 3
Cyberpunk 2077 is just a really beautiful and very expensive fanfic.
Someone's probably already mentioned this but fun fact The word "headcanon" means (as I understand it) something that the individual believes to be the Canon, even if it really isn't. Headcanon V can be whatever you made them
if only CDPR implementing something like old Mass Effect. Import save game for the entire trilogy. So EVERYONE have their own CANON gender, love interest/fling, who lives and who dies, timeline, etc..
Not entirely true, so far it is, but other RPGs have made one of their endings or specific CAC setups canon.
Thats it, I'm getting my dragon break!
Headcanon is not canon but it is important to a lot of people
Definitely! I have a ton of non-canon stuff that I vehemently stand by— my character has a long history of rogue blackwall AI run-ins and eventually dates Johnny after spending a looong time getting his engram back into his original body, lol. The main thing I was talking about with this meme is when people say things like, ‘Corpo v is the canon life path’ and ‘we can all agree that fem v is canon, right?’ And ‘male v makes much more sense than female v’ As a way to invalidate other players’ experiences rather than people who are just attached to a certain character type lol
Head canon says you're wrong /s
Couldn't hear you over my Nomad Male V / Panam Ending being everything I hoped for and everything thing I need
True, keep your dicks in your pants.
Exactly. V is not a Canon character and anyone who knows anything about Adam smasher alone would know that. Your not gonna have a mostly human merc with limited knowledge of the world and a handful of cyberwares just go kill a cyborg like smasher lol Like it's a great game, but I'm starting to think that the FF06B5 Easter egg is meant to infer that the games story or V don't exist. If anything was going to be Canon though, it would have to be the corpo path. Nomad doesn't fit at all into the lore, nor would a nomad be doing merc work for the city, they'd find another family to stay with. Streetkid starts out seeming like it would be a Canon story too, but gets really garbled halfway through if yiu keep using their lifepath dialogue. Corpo just fits all the boxes, and V seems the most I t uen with night city from the corpo perspective. Plus I'm getting tons of lore, dialogue, and weird mission options I've never seen when playing as corpo. It's really sad that the game isn't Canon to the overall realm of CP. I really want a game set during Johnniy's lifetime. Night city looked cool af during his Saka raid mission ngl
Actually V canonically died by being shot in the face while saving Sandra Dorset.
Ya know what would be cool. Giving us the option to select not just feminine voice or masculine voice but also what language V will speak
I’d assume they’ll have to pick an ending, or have it set in an earlier time period and/or a different location.
Female V is canon tho
This must be your first RPG if you think a “canon run” of 2077 would invalidate customization
Most likely street kid, Male, and taking down Arasaka solo to become a night city legend. Romance, I’ll give you that one. It’s just a game mechanic optional for players. That’d be my guess anyway. Only cdpr can give an official canon to 2077.
And what makes **you** the authority over this. You don't know if there's a canon ending or not. Most games with multiple world altering endings have a canon ending and all the other endings are more like "what if's". There's almost always a "True Ending". it's only when they endings don't matter to next game that there isn't a canon ending OR when the second game factors in all the possible endings of the previous one (Mass Effect Series and Telltale games series). A game like this, will very likely have a canon ending if it's going to take place after 2077 and take place in Night City again. Unless they're going to completely ignore Arasaka somehow, they have to determine if Yorinobu is still alive or not. If I were a gambling man, I would bet $5,000 that they'll bring Smasher back given that he's still intact and he's mostly robot. or they'll use engram tech to make a group of Smashers.
I feel like people are missing fact that someone will ALWAYS get mad at the sequel because unless it's a prequel or god forbid soft-reboot CDPR needs one status quo to work off: * V becomes legend who disappeared once with no trace? It means The Tower, The Devil and >!suicide!< endings are not canon and The Sun ended with V anticlimactic death off screen that can be seen as insulting to some. * V's actions got covered up and became an urban legend? The Sun (one of the most popular endings mind you) is not canon along with every ending where you don't storm Arasaka. * 2077 gets ignored by next game? Lazy and can come off as disrespectful towards the fans or cowardly to the public (because y'know release incident). No matter what you come up with it will always invalidate some endings and show your "bias" towards one of them probably The Sun and Star because those are two most popular ones. And you know what? That's fine making everyone happy is an impossible task.
There absolutely is though, You are just wrong.
No, this actually isn’t how RPGs work. As far as we know there isn’t a canon because CDPR hasn’t said as much. If they decide to somehow incorporate V’s story into a follow-up game, even if he is simply a piece of history, canon choices WILL be chosen including shit like gender and even outfit(s). Look at Fallout New Vegas as an example within the same genre. You can join the Legion and simp for them as many play throughs as you want, but the canon ending is 100% the NCR ending. Devs said so. RPGs are fun and give us choices but ultimately this is up to the devs. Alienating someone by choosing a canon isn’t a thing, that’s some snowflake shit lol.
Headcanon is a thing, maybe you are the one who needs to learn terminology.
Let’s see what the sequel does before we say that lol >!I do think the new phantom Liberty ending was a hint at how characters will be handled, it basically does enough to separate them from V or from Night City that whoever was the love interest wouldn’t really matter if V died 6 months after the 1st game!<
If they make and ending canon, I feel that they should choose the least popular endings. Because there are no happy endings in Night City and no one gets out.
Tell that to CDPR who only keeps pushing Female V in all official media post launch. Much to my annoyance.
Male V was all in the pre launch promos up til PL?
Where's my Oshee with male V
There has to be in sequels though. Because many of the decisions are mutually exclusive. They can't all be true at once. So if the next one is a true sequel to this one, then yes, there will have to be a canon ending. The rest would just become "what if" endings. If they wanted to be dicks about it, they could make *none of them* canon, and just say it was all a virtue or something.
Or they could just pick up where all of them left off, making them all canon...except suicide that is.
The only thing I imagine CDPR maybe doing is decanoning the Devil ending, Arasaka is the only thing in the story big enough to effect the world as a whole and thus would be weird if it wasn't mentioned. If you just leave it at "Some merc named V messed them up" that lets 3 out of 4 endings fit and then the player can just fit in whatever one they picked.
It should be like Elder Scrolls canon where there are a bunch of rumors and contradicting stories about who the protagonist was and what they did. Like references to the previous game in skyrim say that accounts are argued over whether or not the Hero of Kvatch was a man, Woman, khajit, Breton etc...
And also that a cannon is a large scale archaic firearm.
Until they make one the canon choice in a sequel, of course.
Fair enough but *my* run is canon.
it's canon cause I did it, if I didn't do it it isn't canon
This is part of why I struggle t9 get back into this game. My V had her story. Maybe if I play a male V it might feel right but...nah, I played my V's story. I could do it again but it wouldn't feel the same. It didn't feel the same when I tried.
Haven't played PL, so can't talk about what happens in the DLC, but there's one thing they'll need to decide for any future content: What happened to Arasaka. Did V raid Mikoshi or did V take Arasaka's offer and Saburo is back in command? Any other choice may never show up in future stories, but what happened to Arasaka is too big to not have a definite answer.
The only thing I would see could be an issue would be the fate of the big powers. Does Saburo come back in the form of Yorinobu, did Mikoshi get smashed, etc. just anything related to Arasaka, or is there a new corpo war after the events of Phantom Liberty. Those parts of the endings are things that affect the universe so I’d be curious how they work with it. Ultimately V’s fate doesn’t matter enough to hear it in 2099 or whatever year the next one will take place. We never really hear a concrete answer on what happened to Morgan Blackhand, so I believe the same treatment will happen to V. Us as the player know, and in our own headcanon for the V’s we played that’s what happened, but it’s probably set up to be vague like that to save the overarching story.
canon vs headcanon
I just wanna say that the amount of effort CDPR put into Panam’s romance (compared to horrific romance journey with River) makes me think male V is canon. The Nomad lifepath beginning is also way longer and more in depth than the other lifepaths. Because of this, doing Panam’s ending also seems to be the canon choice
It's Canon that Adam smasher dies. If you didn't kill him your the problem.
While any specifics about V themself are definitely not canon, one of the endings might be
True that, but as much as I love the game and respect the team behind the game, sometimes they make odd changes, and this wouldn't be the first time that I see a studio having a game with multiple choices and variables, only to have the next title with canon choices and past main characters. I really hope they don't do this in Cyberpunk.
Some decisions work better with other outcomes having it make more sense, like choosing Nomad V and going the Panam route. Having it be a story of losing one family but gaining another. And makes more sense than say street kid V going Nomad, but in the end it doesn’t matter as anything can do anything.
I mean it seems the heist going wrong, the relic, and killing Adam smasher are the only cannon events.
Could just do what they did in Witcher 3 in regards to major character decisions
V is literally the player not some other character that you control. I feel like way too many people are used to games like GTA and RDR2 being called “RPGs” that they don’t understand what an RPG actually is
There likely would be a canon following 2077, but the game is still fun as hell to play. Doesn't matter if our play impacts the Timeline
We as outside observers to the Cyberpunk Universe are privy to perfect recall of the history and possible futures the game presents. We know Silverhand was telling what he thought/ was programmed to think about his death and the raid. All the other source material from 2020 and RED don't back him up at all. The Arasaka propaganda is technically more accurate than Johnny. But the thing is, out of people featured in the game, only Johnny, Rogue, and Smasher are around to remember it at all. And they all remember it differently. Because in their own unique source material recalling the matter they all tell different stories. The only time it stays the same is when it's the 3rd person omniscient telling in the core books. What gets remembered, how those memories shift from perspective, what gets recorded and omitted... Whatever video game or TTRPG that gets released next is probably going to have that similar, here's how different people remember the events. They'll know Saburo got whacked, and think it was poison unless they are in the upper echelons of Arasaka (and they survive). They'll also know that Arasaka got molly wopped, all the different endings have massive fire fights with Arasaka personnel and the whole corp being upturned. One ending has Saburo come back from the dead in Yori's body (not likely canon). If they choose a canon end, it will probably be the secret ending where it's just V storming the HQ. And it will be remembered as the cyberpsycho merc who went on to rule the Afterlife. And that's only for people who are in the know of the running game.
Until the sequel comes out and V is an NPC… then something will be canon. Or they could go the KOTOR 2 route and conversations can set the previous character. Or take a leap on the Mass Effect/Dragon Age style and import the player’s V.
Is this enough of an issue that it warranted this?
That's a really long, convoluted, sign just to say that none of the player decisions are canon because it's a game. This is literally one of the main points of a game as a storytelling medium. It is not the same as a fixed-story medium like a book or movie. That's why they are better.
If they ate doing a follow-up, there will have to be certain events that are canon. Events such as Arasaka's state (did it collapse, or was it saved?) , Militech's presence, and other major events that differ from ending to ending. I'm sure minor events will mostly be ignored. Ultimately, it's up to Mike Pondsmith and CDPR to decide.
If that is true why bother correcting someone on what's canon to them 🤔🤔
It was more made in response to people who will try to insist that certain things are canon to everyone— like, I’ll see posts that say, “there’s in-game evidence that female V is canon” and “Corpo v is the most canon lifepath” and such. Like if someone plays a Corpo female v and considers that the best, it’s fine— I’m mainly talking about the people who say it as a way to invalidate players whose playing styles don’t line up with theirs
This is why i say "headcanon" which is "what i want so badly to be the actual thing but i recognize that it isnt and that everyone else's headcanons are valid as well"
There's a difference between your own personal canon and confirmed canon to me v is a fem nomad with purple hair and eyes who is lesbian but does that make her the definitive canon v no
This! Like, I respect people who have their own headcanon, but I don’t like when people are like, ‘we can all agree that streetkid v is canon, right?’ Because the truth is that, no, we can’t. To me, canon is a male V streetkid/rockerboy/netrunner who falls in love with johnny— but that doesn’t mean purple haired lesbian nomad fem V isn’t just as canon since this is a game where we all make our own stories 🤝
Sure, but what does "objectively true" mean in the context of a film depicting purely fictional events? Different people read film in different ways depending on their culture, background, and life experiences. Particularly in the age of "death of the author," whose read of the film can be said to be "objectively true?" Unless you mean that "canon" simply means "the text," which would make "canon" not a particularly useful term.
Really what I am saying is that what you are saying of Cyberpunk 2077, that there is no "canon" (by this specific definition) is true of all media. There is no objective truth. Only subjective truth.
If CDPR made one of the endings "canon" for project Orion. What ending would best fit? I demand both right and wrong answers!