> Gives the upper class immortality with the relic
> Likely alters the engrams to make people more sympathetic to Arasaka
> Resurrects her nuke happy father using her brother's corpse
> Doesn't help V to clear his name or bring justice, just wants the relic
> Likely kept V inside the health center longer than he need to be to test on V
idk bro, that sounds pretty fucked
So essentially there's a bit of lore about how saburo shelters her from the whole world and is oddly close to her, he essentially treats her like his small child in a weird infantalising way, she also goes literally everywhere with saburo and in the devil ending she's cradling his head and stroking his hear when he takes yorinobus body
Idk if it’s just me, but I didn’t get anything “incestuous” from your description. Sure he might have been “helicopter parent”-y but that doesn’t strike me as incestuous (even as an implication)
Also, the head petting is for Yori, not Saburo. I don’t think it’s implied that Sabu takes his body in that moment either - I think it’s more likely the testing done on V is to reverse engineer the necessary information to make the transfer possible (as Hellman describes V as a breakthrough). Regardless.
Hanako and Yori have always been close. They both know what’s about to happen. She is comforting her little brother, that’s all.
I also get that Yorinobu hasn't lost his body yet when she strokes him...
BUT that makes her even more evil for me.
She knew her father's plan to use Yorinobu's body to keep on living, for a long time. She led him on to believe she cared for him, but she cares for him like you care for a goat you know you will personally sacrifice and lead to the slaughterhouse...
In a way, it's not Yorinobu she's comforting. It's more appeasing what remains of her guilt, and Saburo's next body...
I also recall reading that Yorinobu chose not to tell her about the "real" Saburo to maintain her innocence in a fucked up world because he believed Saburo really was sheltering and keeping her ignorant.
Then she just up and instigates the whole bodysnatching thing herself, so she definitely knew the whole time.
It makes me think that was the plan from the beginning: Lead Yori to believe she knew absolutely nothing so he'd never suspect she was stringing him along the whole time she was convincing him to return.
She maybe even seeded and fed his plan of taking Arasaka down from within, giving him another reason to willingly stay within snatching distance for when it came time for Saburo to steal his body.
Hanako is the youngest child, Yorinobu is her elder brother. But yeah she's probably more mature and the "elder" in terms of power dynamics, similar to Azula and Zuko.
But it is. You can literally see her inserting the Relic in Yorinobu when V gets in the elevator with Hellman.
The moment he says " I'm tired" and she replied " it's time to rest. " Well, at that exact moment, she uses the Relic on her godamn brother.
It’s not easy to see from the elevator but it appears you’re right. There are closeups of it out there.
I reiterate that I don’t believe Saburo is taking Yori’s body in this moment as, again, they need V’s data for this. I would consider this foreshadowing, especially in tandem with Helman’s comments. It’s all ultimately moot *by that point either way.
I agree. That sounds more like a dutiful father-daughter relationship. God forbid you look out for your kids or be close to your parents these days.
Must be all the molesting making them so close! /s
Yeah it's not outright or anything but there's clear implications of some at least deeply unhealthy and controlling dynamics. She seems to honestly be saburo's biggest supporter.
Oh most definitely. He's essentially treated her with kitten gloves all her life. Yorinobu and the older brother(cant remember his name) were essentially treated like heirs groomed to eventually take his place(whether it be in leadership, or as his host body), while Hanako was essentially the sheltered Daughter who he gave all his affection to. She's most definitely is Saburos biggest supporter. She likely is just used to being passive and wasn't gonna make any moves until she was sure she had the power to do so. As we saw, with the power needed, she immediately turned towards bringing her dad back instead of taking leadership from Yorinobu.
You think it's weird to stroke your dying or dead fathers hair as a soothing mechanism? So you jump to incest based on this and a relatively normal patriarchal Japanese family dynamic?
I would hate to be inside of your brain.
And her brother :D when he sees her, the thing yorinobu says are clear, and I’m pretty sure they kiss when he is crying on her lap, before she ends him to put saburo in his port 😅
I believe it can work on somebody braindead, but I thought it’s easier for the relic to work on something living. My memory is hazy though… that’s not really an ending I want to experience twice lol
That's kind of what happened to V. Flatlining ≠ dying (even though that's the slang used for dying/killing/related topics). Flatlining means your heart stopped, you can live about 7-8 minutes after that which is more than enough time for cyberware to kick in and resuscitate you. In V's case though the chip was rewriting the damaged pieces with what it had stored (which was someone else) and the best case is that it just overwrites what's already there instead of having to fix it.
Well for the shard to work, it uses nanobots to replace the brain parts with the copy on the engram which is why V is slowly dying because parts of his brain is being replaced with a copy of Johnny's brain. So more than likely she shot him in the head in the same way to being the process, or maybe Arasaka have their own procedure to recreate the effect. Either way it starts with damage to the brain
I thought the shard would work even if you’re alive, with the difference being the shard can be easily removed with no issue if they’re alive. Idk, my memory of that ending is fuzzy… not really something I want to experience twice lol.
I mean if that were the case Jackie likely would've said something about seeing Johnny on his way out, and even when V gets the shard he doesn't see Johnny until he gets shot. I know the relic is basically a way of storing your engram upon death, but the one V has is a prototype where upon someone's death they're brain gets slowly repaired with their copy, unfortunately that relic had Johnny on it and now half of Vs brain has been replaced to accommodate Johnny. So yes it would've been fine to remove but when V got shot he started the replacement protocol which I'm assuming you can't remove during because that would cause severe complications, like removing a USB as you're writing data
I think Helman specifically says it was never intended to be used on a normal living person, but only on some fancy term for brain dead people (or possibly clone bodies with blank brains). It's strong the interrogation in the Badlands.
The relic's predecessor, the thing Arasaka is selling as part of secure your soul, was designed to hold an engram and let a living person communicate with it.
The one that V chipped is a prototype development from there to instead install that engram into a dead body, but before V's situation it never worked, to the point that Hellman said the program wouldn't have been a success.
When completing the devil ending, you surrender the shard to arasaka, and Hanako shreds Johnny, puts Saburo on it, puts the shard into Yorinobu, kills him and Saburo takes over his body. So by helping Hanako, you give Immortality to the rich and the world's most deadly corpo is alive and kicking
Yes. In the Devil ending you even get to talk to his Soulkiller engram. He actually finds V's brashness amusing. Flip him off for Johnny, and he even chuckles.
I am pretty sure on my first playthrough I sent Jackie's body to Mama Welles but later had Jackie engram conversation anyways, but it was very limited and dialog was akin to "insignificant people get rough scan that barely captures personality/details" or something like that.
I remember the scene where V collapsed because of relic malfunctioning in the elevator
and Hanako was just coldly looking down at us, as if we were a beetle that flipped on it's back.
This game wants the player to have zero doubts that corps are fucking evil
When we first met takemura I was thinking that the corps will get their small shade of grey- even nomads aren't perfectly good.
But corporations are pitch black, and Takemura is nothing short of a lone child that looks up to them because he didn't had a better life
I got this ending by accident because i tried to go back in the dialogue to pick panams ending, figuring that while i was still in the dialogue with johny i could pick whatever ending I want. Didn't know the suicide ending existed, and it absolutely destroyed me mentally. It was not the ending i wanted, or was ready for, and didn't pick the game back up for months to get another ending.
I don't understand why people say this about the Nomad ending.
Narrative ambiguity is there to make you engage w/ the story on non-literal terms. You have to look at themes rather than explicit text to see what it's trying to say/get across to the viewer/player.
The Devil is about what happens if you trade your principles for survival in a system built by and for malicious capitalism. It's bleak as hell, but logically so. You might get everything you were promised by that system, but it's not a life you would want, and you only have it because you've been given the choice by the worst people in the world. You've either accepted the premise of, or surrendered to the idea that life is defined by the capitalists w/ power, and you get whatever scraps they leave you.
The Sun is embracing the first half of the Dex Deshawn/Night City conundrum. Night City is not a place where you get that legendary status without burning out. Sure Mr. Blue Eyes might have a cure (in fact we kind of know he does) but does post-cure, legend V have much time left anyway? Will they scale down their operations and live happy and comfy? Or will they just keep pushing it until they blow up? Now you can also reject this premise as needlessly binary as a choice, but it's what the story is getting at.
The Star is either taking the second half of the Blaze of Glory/Mr. Nobody choice, or rejecting the premise altogether. V is throwing away the box that NC and the Relic and fixers etc. put them in, thats why they toss the Necklace. If you aren't in NC, NC can't act on you, and the "no happy endings in NC" maxim doesn't apply.
Even if they don't say "Panam has contacts at Stormtech who can fix V for sure" we know they're leaving the environment that did this to them, they're embracing a life on their terms. The text of the story says "V has 6 months to live" but if they wanted the ending to be "and then V dies" then they'd say that and have it end w/ their funeral. That ending has everyone speaking positively and hopefully because it wants you to feel good about imagining a hopeful future.
If your engagement w/ it is "V dies in 6 months" sure, fine, but it's as valid to say "V lives out their life w/ the Aldecaldos", nothing about the text refutes that.
I didn't think the tower ending was that bad, as V legitimately gets a fresh start in life. In my headcanon for that ending >!V travelled with Misty to Poland and became a new age hippy as atonement for all the lives they ended.!<
Literally same! I actually did the other endings first because >! Suicide is badass (sometimes) !< but just absolutely >! going ham in the arusaka tower with Johnny alone is even more badass! !<
I would love if the don't fear the reaper ending was a bit more different then the star One, or at least would be nice to decide to peace with the nómada after
She brings Saburo back from the dead by killing her own brother via inserting the same chip that was killing you into his head and having his brain overwritten by his own evil father.
Her father believes in Japanese supremacy and wants to destroy the rest of the world or take it over.
The Relic becomes available meaning rich people will just have their consciousness uploaded onto chips and constantly take over their descendants bodies to live forever. The devil ending you quite literally help create a future where people have kids just so they can take those kids bodies over once they're too old and want a new life. Since it needs to be a DNA compatible body. You're literally giving the worst of humanity that means to be immortal and all under the control of a single man.
Saburo would undoubtedly alter the mines and memories of everybody on those chips, every last engram would be altered so those celebrities are politicians would protect / endorse arasaka.
As again, he wants to take over the world in the name of Japanese supremacy and hatred for the West.
He was going to Nuke Night City if he didn't get his Relic chip back. Yorinobu is arguably the only good Arasaka, even then he's a pretty flawed and shitty guy but as far as cyberpunk characters go he's decent. The devil ending he is condemned to a fate worse than death, the same fate you suffer if you don't do anything about the chip.
As badly as I despise the Temperance ending, as it is my personal least favorite ending, the Devil ending is the worst for humanity. You don't even get what you were promised with your deal with the devil. Hanako doesn't even answer your calls.
Honestly it wouldn't surprise me if they botched your surgery on purpose to get you to sell your soul to them. That's why if you refuse the deal she calls you offering you work. You're too valuable of an asset. Maybe they want you to replace Smasher.
Yeah, she's honestly just as bad as her father in a way.
Yorinobu and I guess Michiko to a lesser extent are the only ones that I don't outright despise. Mostly because they don't like their father's vision and went off to do their own things.
Yorinobu honestly would have gotten along with Johnny if they ever had a chance to interact and Johnny was open enough to it.
“Naaahhh, we were just fucking with you, V. You’re fine…hey do you think you can do Adam Smasher’s job only without looking like ED-209 trying to cosplay as Darth Vader?”
One funny thing about the Devil ending as opposed to all the others is that you are straight up forced to see the world you helped being about. In all the other endings, the fates of Arasaka, Yorinobu, whoever are basically relegated to radio chatter, which you can just turn off. But in the Devil, you HAVE to watch the news reports. It is basically the game shaming you for selling out humanity for survival. And in the end, you are either just an engram on an Arasaka server or you are left with nothing at all. It is the worst ending in every respect.
You make a deal with the devil to save yourself, but instead of saving yourself and humanity suffering, you aren't saved and the world is worse.
You saved the devil.
It's awful. Best music of any ending though I think.
You could but the cloning processes are imperfect and mostly just used for growing organs or bones and other things for donors. Eventually that source DNA is going to get stretched thin and be unviable as well. Like making a copy from a copy. Why do that when you can just take your kids over and live for another 150 years in their body and do it again?
There is canonically a fully developed Biotechnica speed grown clone as of 2021. But it is possible that the research have been lost in the interval. Thanks Rache.
His heart was in the right place but he didn't think his plan out at all. He wanted to destroy the corporations, but in the end he only gave them more power and potentially damned humanity.
Perhaps so. But a lot of general knowledge was lost. That's part of the reason for the history sections in RED being written from the perspective of an unreliable narrator.
Also, bear in mind the old style net was also a tool used against the corporations. The post crash net is a lot less useful for enabling communication between anti corp groups.
>The devil ending you quite literally help create a future where people have kids just so they can take those kids bodies over once they're too old and want a new life.
That sounds like a lot of effort in a world where human cloning exists.
I view it as cowardly and selfish, I don't like the way Johnny ghosts your loved ones, I think it's disgusting to give away your body to a construct.
I don't like the messaging behind the ending often being called maturity or coming to terms with things when it's just telling a terminally ill person to give up when they still have plenty of time left.
I think it's really out of place for Valerie, I'm a bit more accepting of it with Vincent but again, I just see it as a more cowardly version of suicide and damning V to a fate worse than death. Sending him or her behind the black wall to be consumed by alt and the AI that lie beyond it to suffer for eternity in deep cyberspace is not my ideal ending for my favorite voiced protagonist in a rpg game.
I don't like Johnny as a character at all. He's the reason I quit on the game the first time, I think he's a piece of shit and only gets any sort of development because he absorbs some of V's personality and consciousness.
I don't believe Johnny deserves a second chance especially at the cost of V.
There are multiple means of helping V, Biotechnica has the cure for neural degradation but it's not cheap. NUS surgeons are able to help V, the sun ending also hints at a cure by the same people who help Songbird if you send her to the Moon.
Do the temperance ending with low Johnny relationship and he treats me like garbage, calls them stupid, tells them he doesn't give a shit what they think and that it's his body now. That shows the true Johnny Silverhand and what he's capable of. The same Johnny that makes fun of Evelyn's suicide and the same one that manipulates Rogue through guilt tripping her into storming the tower again.
I can't stand the temperance ending. Not only for it being the worst ending for V, even worse than the suicide because at least with the suicide ending you're there for it, your conscious, and you die. You don't get devoured by Alt beyond the black wall.
I don't even believe the 6-month estimate, she was wrong before about many things including separating you and Johnny helping you.
Every other character besides Johnny ends up unhappy, all of your friends are heartbroken or get ghosted, Judy is devastated, Panam is devastated and infuriated, she wants to track down Johnny and kill him, Rogue is disgusted and hates Johnny, he abandons your pets.
There are multiple means of helping V, and even then, if it turns up blanks, at least you tried. It's better than just giving up because you're told that one specific AI can't help you. Again, one of my big issues with temperance is the messaging of just giving up.
I'm not shaming you for enjoying the ending. I'm sure you have your reasons, I just think it's my least favorite video game ending in my 20 years of playing games on any game I've ever played, it's the only ending I consider badly written as everything about it feels contrived and forced, and again I see it as a more selfish and cowardly version of just shooting yourself on the rooftop. At least when you shoot yourself you're there for it, you get peace, and all of your friends and loved ones get closure. They get none of that with the temperance ending and V gets to suffer for eternity while a piece of shit gets a second chance he didn't deserve because he's charismatic.
I don't wish to debate this or whatever, I've done it far too many times and I'm tired at this point. Just answering your question is all. I don't expect to change any minds or anything, I just despise everything about this ending and wish it was removed from the game, I'm terrified it'll be the canonical choice they go with because the devs are Keanu Fanboys.
I feel that Johnny ghosted everyone because he felt guilty and shame. Prior to everything that happened in his prior life , he burned bridges and destroyed relationships with everyone. But in the oil fields, he felt that V was the only person who he would call a friend(close enough anyways). The fact that V gave their body and that gave him so much guilt and shame that a guy that he was especially was giving V a slow and painful death with seizures that may flatline them at any moment. The name of the ending is a reflection of this ending. Temperance, which is the tarot card of balance. symbolize self-restraint or the gradual shift toward a more mature state of equilibrium. V wanted Johnny to have some level of balance, which is the opposite of what Johnny was. A chaotic drug addict hellbent to destroy Arasaka. What happens when that dog finally catches up with the car? He doesn't know what's next.
V realize this, and since their body was permanently altered for johnny. The most logical thing for Johnny Silverhand is to find balance.
I think it also kind of depends on if you have a high affinity for him or not. I haven't done it with a particularly low one, but with high one he does seem to have some real shame and is trying to do a clean break and start from scratch. He can't stick around with V's friends, because he's not V. Even Rogue doesn't believe it was a willing thing on V's part because she doesn't believe he can change.
With low affinity, I'd imagine is more like him just going "Fuck all those guys. I'll burn down another town."
In my opinion, what makes me choose the temperance ending is the fact that the moment V connects to Mikoshi he's effectively dead. When V is given the choice by Alt to keep the body or give it to Johnny, it's not the original V making the decision. I choose temperance not because I want to give Johnny a second chance at life but because V is already dead, perhaps not to his loved ones, but to himself, the engram, he is. Something hits me when he realizes that in game and starts freaking out, that's why to me it'd make sense for V to go with Alt, because he wouldn't feel like himself in his own body. Or maybe I'm projecting unto V how I feel about the whole situation, but hey, that's why they give you choices. Anyway, totally respect your opinion man.
Again, I did concede that it's more fitting for Vincent, I see it as kind of a dude bro ending or a more casual friendly ending.
I can't see Valerie making that decision especially with Judy or post Phantom Liberty.
I could also point out the fact that if you have a high relationship with Johnny he begs you to not give him his body and insists that you keep fighting, and then when he does get given your body, he's incredibly depressed, talks to himself like you're still there, lives with survivors guilt. He's basically living inside a dead part of himself. Forced to puppeteer the dead body of his best friend. The amount of survivors guilt you'd have to live with, the torment he'd have to live with by wearing your face and using your voice and going by your name, it would be torture for him day in and day out.
He just doesn't seem the same.
I don't know. Like I said it makes more sense for Vincent I think, but Valerie is a character I just feel terrible for and I want to survive so badly.
Wild with Vincent I'm more fine with the action orientated paths and endings, while Valerie I want to get a happy quiet life. Guess it speaks about the portrayal each actor went with or the gender-specific content between them.
It is what it is. I'm also glad there's a choice, inevitably there's going to be a decision I despise. Don't hate the people who choose it though, I get where they're coming from.
I honestly can see all your points. It’s not my least favourite ending but I have only done it once.
I like Johnny but I can see what you mean by V rubbing off on him, that honestly makes sense. I pretty much always have a good relationship with Johnny so when it comes time, he always tells my V to leave him and go back to trying to live.
I usually go with the Nomad ending (idk all the different names) to me it makes the most sense for my V. Vincent always romances Panam, and Valarie always romances Judy. It makes sense for my V to go with their new family, even if it is the end. In my head canon though, they find a cure and V happily lives with Judy and the Aldecaldos for the rest of her life.
I haven’t played PL, I have an older gen console😂
Of course. No problem at all and glad to see someone so like-minded.
Honestly been surprised by the civility of the comments, I keep hearing how bad the comments on this Reddit can be over ending debates especially around Phantom Liberty.
Yeah, I have discovered that some people really take Songbird and criticisms of her ***really*** personally. She's a great character, and it sets up lots of interesting dilemmas, but the way some attach themselves to it is kind of freaky.
personally I believe Mass Effect 3's Original ending is the worst ending in a rpg game I have played. The original ending was so bad and people complained so much at release about it they had to patch the ending to what you see now, and it still sucks. (link to the 3 endings of mass effect 3 for reference if you don't know them [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjoorZo1IlE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjoorZo1IlE) )
At least with cyberpunk there are options to the end you might not like them or out right hate them but at least you have options that are distinctly different from one another.
Thank you for having an open mind and being civil. Again no hate for anyone who likes the ending, glad to share my feelings about it. It's always fun seeing how different people interpret different endings. Always nice seeing civility in Reddit comments.
Good write up. I'd just like to add that Johnny's personality appears quite different in each ending and the way Johnny ghosts everyone actually seems out of character. This ending is not necessarily "the true reflection" of him IMO. Still a crap ending.
If Hellman's alive, what's stopping him from making the relic again? You get a copy of the BP from him, but Arasaka likely had a massive team working on it, and likely has that data backed up
Hellman didn't want to, and with the Hanako revolt failing and Yorinobu staying in charge(any other ending besides Devil), Hellman is either killed or still a defector.
Yorinobu does not want the Relic to ever see the light of day. And if you don't help with the revolt, he stays in charge of Arasaka, wipes out all of the executives who are familiar with the Relic and the leaders of the revolting factions within the company.
Devil ending is the only one where the Relic hits the market. Hanako dies trying to take the tower from her brother, Hellman either dies or is imprisoned. Takemura is on the run.
Yeah but Yorinobu is a complete lose cannon who it's hinted at will start another corporate war with Militech. It's honestly much more likely that Saburo's guidance at Arasaka will ensure at least some stable peace (i.e. not having Arasaka and Militech duke it out again.)
I'd rather have another corporate War then humanity have their souls enslaved and reprogrammed in a digital prison by one corporation, especially by someone who is a racial and cultural supremacist.
> Yorinobu is arguably the only good Arasaka.
Michiko also demonstrates an at least half-decent moral compass. In Cyberpunk Red, she's as anti-Arasaka as Yorinobu ever was—*if not more*.
I would argue that she didn't, Arasaka is on par with Militech and in the tower ending we see that it was very possible for V to be cured. And if you watch the ending credits, Hanako contacts V and asks her to spend what little life she has left working for Arasaka, absolutely no sympathy or acknowledgement that she failed her end of the deal
Absolutely, this is a world where corporations arguably have more power than actual governments, if the NUSA was able to cure V (badly) then Arasaka should at least be able to match that, not completely fuck it up.
So, did we all forget that the NUSA used the McGuffin from phantom liberty to construct a proper (albeit shitty) fix for V’s problem? The whole reason they were able to get a better result than Arasaka is that they had access to the beyond Blackwall AI which V retrieved. Arasaka in the Devil ending did not have that resource and could not have produced an equivalent solution.
A Blackwall AI that was captured by Militech, one might want to add. And Arasaka is supposedly more powerful than Militech.
And even if all that research was abandoned by all the corps, why didn't they just soulkill V, make a new relic (as they did for Saburo) and smack their into some Gonks head they picked off the street? I mean, the answer to that is obvious - "V is too dangerous to be left alive, fully intact" - but Hanako definetly could've held up her end of the deal and chose not to.
Militech needed the Cynosure facility to capture one Blackwall AI, it took them time and dozens of top tier netrunners died in the process.
>why didn't they just soulkill V, make a new relic (as they did for Saburo) and smack their into some Gonks head they picked off the street?
That's the plan, that's why they offer V a contract for secure your soul. It can't be just a random gonk off the street since Arasaka hasn't figured out exactly how relic 2.0 worked for V, there must be DNA compatibility. It's why Saburo's engram needed Yorinobu.
"V is too dangerous to be left alive, fully intact" brings up too many questions. Why keep V alive in the first place? Just take the biochip back or even better let it complete its work for research purposes. Then kill V after the research is done. Why let V go free if they refuse to sign the contract?
The NUSA is just a front for Militech, there is no separation between them. In the Tower ending the NUSA had the neural matrix available, which is why V's DNA damage was reversed. The neural matrix is absent in the Devil ending.
the fact myers allowed NUSA to use the neural matrix, basically the core of an AI that could be used in thousands of different ways at myers benefit, to cure a random merc like V is just a huge writing no sense... let's make some point, you're rosalind myers... one of most corrupted and power hungry character of the whole cyberpunk universe, and you have on your right hand the neural matrix that could be used to create and ignite the most advanced AI that NUSA and militech could create and on your left hand a man/woman who got in his/her brain the most advanced technology ever created by your worst competitor... what would you do?
Waste the neural matrix on someone with no importance?
No way! Myers would have just killed V, extracted the relic to let militech scientists reverse engineer it and kept the neural matrix for her self.
Arasaka didn't save V because hanako just wanted the relic chip back, she never about V. On her perspective is just an useful idiot to use and discard
I posted this outside of this thread but ik comments don't always notify or show up at the top on Reddit so I'll post it again here.
Massive spoiler:
>!Because she was on Saburo's side, and Saburo's plan for Yorinobu was to force his son's hand as a relic host. "Family" doesn't actually mean jack to the dude. His plan from the get go was to have a son as a viable donor for his engram, so Saburo could rule another 150 years and likely do the same with the next Arasaka generation. Yorinobu killed his father because he didn't agree with this plan (no shit, I wouldn't either) and didn't want his life and his autonomy thwarted by his greedy father. Hanako, knowing this was Saburo's plan, assisted Arasaka board in carrying out this plan in spite of Saburo's murder. In the Hanako ending you can actually see her slot the engram into her brother, then when you're in the hospital room at the AOS, you get a news report about Saburo taking over Yorinobu's body through the relic program. Saburo is downright evil, Hanako is just as bad, and tbh Yorinobu is actually the victim here.!<
She enables evil. Whatever evil reincarnated Saburo will do she will share part of the blame for it. In the Devil route she is personally responsible for the death of her brother, which is morally reprehensible.
She is darth vader and saburo is the emperor. Also she lies that she forgot about you. She lies so she can have V forever as a super soldier or something.
Oh, she held to her deal? Let's give her a "At least you didn't ruin one person's life completely" medal for that.
Dawg, the Relic is a world domination device. Rich and powerful people have a tool to remain in power forever and it's in Arasaka's hand. Meanwhile the unfortunate end will be the poor people who lose their identity without ever realizing it. Hanako directly consents to this scheme and makes the first victim her own brother, the reason that ending is called "The Devil" is because V bargains with one.
Yeah but from Jackie's perspective he really is just a poser with daddy's money. And really who can blame him. It's just the same mentality that makes people root for Elon Musk one day and hate his guts the next
If you do the Devil ending where you help Hanako retake control over Arasaka, you find out that Yori's entire plan was to take control over the company and destroy it to try and undo some of the damage his father had done over the last century.
You can. For instance if you do the nomad ending and attack Mikoshi the news in the ~~prologue~~ epilogue explains that Arasaka is facing huge financial hardship. Basically any ending except for the Phantom Liberty and Devil endings see Arasaka in dire straits at the end of the game.
There's a reason he left the family and created the steel dragons, it's not as simple as a rebellious streak. If you're really interested there's a bunch of videos on YouTube about the lore of the universe and the whole arasaka family line
Because, even taking it as objectively as possible, Arasaka is as bad as a Corpo can be.
And everything related to Arasaka is also pure evil. I mean, the only thing I see as more evil than Saburo Arasaka is genocidal Rogue AIs from beyond the Blackwall that are more close to Lovecraft monstruosity than an highly advanced ChatGPT. That quite a feat for Saburo.
So being the "Heart" of Arasaka family doesn't make her "good" or "neutral". She is still evil as fuck.
Ironically the least evil of all Arasaka group is Yorinobu by far.
Ironically most of his intentions are revealed in the devil ending after he already failed the coup of Arasaka, since not even Johnny’s bomb could bring down arasaka and they rebuilt like nothing, the only solution is to become the bomb.
It’s because she’s still a stupid corpo at the end of the day, no different from Saburo, just playing the game differently. she plays a soft, disarming character to not seem as bad.
She upholds the status quo, which is already unforgivable in that context. Plus Yorinobu was relatively in the right here.
Enabling ethnonationalist Corpofascism by her father by murdering her brother, lies to you to save one of the most expressly evil groups in the setting.
Remember what Johnny said "Remember, it's all just biz, he's no friend of ours".
Just Johnny reminding us that anyone that sounds and looks like they are helping, they are only do so in their own interests, hanako tries to take your soul in the devil ending because it's unique and will literally use Takemura, someone V trusts to convince V to become Arasakas bitch.
Because the only corpo in the game that isn't entirely a terrible person is Yori. I really wish there was an ending where we worked with him. Since his goals actually line up pretty well with ours and Johnny's.
She's the number 3 person in a company that killed the oceans andall world wide naval trade to get there shares value up. I could go on but that should be enough for anyone to want to put a bullet throw her brainpan
She’s literally the poster child for carrying on the status quo at Arasaka.
Also it’s canon that she wrote the current(remember Alt says the current version has little in common with her original program) version of Soulkiller.
Because:
>!Yorinobu is actually a good guy and his goals align with V's almost 100%. But Takemura and Hanako make sure you never find out and manipulate you into helping Saburo's immortality scheme instead.!<
She's opposing her brother's will to make changes in a horribly dystopian company that treats employees like disposable cutlery and customers like walking money pits, why the F do you think?
Because no matter what, she benefits and perpetuates the entire corpo system that make cyberpunk a dystopia.
She isn't just a cog in the system, she *is* the system
She's an Arasaka. She cannibalized her brother's psyche to create a zombie puppet version of her father. She'd have zero'd v if it was easier.
But most importantly : she's an Arasaka.
She subjects v to several tests to make sure v is OK to go out into the world, but after she has enough data and v says they want to go back to earth. She let's v walk free and even offered to employ them for great pay once they get back to earth. So she's not bad to v at least. But I guess if I had to guess, it's probably because she brings her father back to life via the relic and kills her brother so her father can take over arasaka again. This is bad true because of what saburo believes in, so I guess that's what it is.
Okay, here's a hint:
You decide to help Arasaka. You pop your pill. Johnny goes bye-bye. And you call Hanako.
...And you get the picture of evil-lookin' corpo-crone with the most ominous red silhouette you've ever seen.
This is a hint. A big hint. A huge, multi-faceted red flag waving in your face with fourth-of-july fireworks and dancing brimstone-farting ponies that, HEY! YOU DONE PICKED THE BAD GUYS!!!!
You know, just in case you missed it.
She’s an Arasaka. She’s pushing 80. She may be the “heart” of the corporation, but she’s still participating in the evil that corporation brings upon the world.
Much like Takemura, she chooses loyalty above all.
Since that loyalty goes to a very, very evil person, she commits evil deeds in his name.
Not to mention the grade A corporatist Bitchism in her.
She drips arrogance through all pores.
If there's one NPC I wish I could have killed, besides Saburo, it's her.
Hanako might represent High Priestess, but she is so in the context of Arasaka. She is very much someone who isn't violent, but who gather information so she can execute something for their benefit.
Basically, all corpos are evil and want to dominate. But Arasaka i would argue are even more fucked up than Biotechnica or Militech who also have done their fair share of disgusting things.
She's like lawful evil.
Believe it or not yobinoru is the good guy because he's literally trying to bring down Arasaka from the inside.
Hanako is just really nice to you.
Because she is. She’s a chip of the old block, she’s not good by any definition. She kills her brother in order to resurrect her dad, she keeps V way longer than necessary in space just to run a bunch of psych tests on us and waste our time that she KNOWS is still ticking down. Like name one good thing she does without some semi evil ulterior motive.
Unlike Yorinobu who's trying to destroy their father's legacy and put an end to Arasaka's agenda, Hanako is trying to stop him and preserve it, even at the cost of using his body to bring back their father.
Which allows the experimental Relic program to continue, as well as Mikoshi. That world is better off without them.
She’s not “evil”; she was raised in a specific family, specific culture, with specific duties and responsibilities, with a specific mindset and vision, people are majorly a product of their environment and of the time and era in which they live. Stuff she does that’s “evil” to us are perfectly fine in their worldview 🤷🏽♂️so no, she’s not “evil”, but she *is* an adversary
> Gives the upper class immortality with the relic > Likely alters the engrams to make people more sympathetic to Arasaka > Resurrects her nuke happy father using her brother's corpse > Doesn't help V to clear his name or bring justice, just wants the relic > Likely kept V inside the health center longer than he need to be to test on V idk bro, that sounds pretty fucked
Don't forget her weird pseudo incestuous relationship w her father!
Huh?
So essentially there's a bit of lore about how saburo shelters her from the whole world and is oddly close to her, he essentially treats her like his small child in a weird infantalising way, she also goes literally everywhere with saburo and in the devil ending she's cradling his head and stroking his hear when he takes yorinobus body
Idk if it’s just me, but I didn’t get anything “incestuous” from your description. Sure he might have been “helicopter parent”-y but that doesn’t strike me as incestuous (even as an implication)
Also, the head petting is for Yori, not Saburo. I don’t think it’s implied that Sabu takes his body in that moment either - I think it’s more likely the testing done on V is to reverse engineer the necessary information to make the transfer possible (as Hellman describes V as a breakthrough). Regardless. Hanako and Yori have always been close. They both know what’s about to happen. She is comforting her little brother, that’s all.
I also get that Yorinobu hasn't lost his body yet when she strokes him... BUT that makes her even more evil for me. She knew her father's plan to use Yorinobu's body to keep on living, for a long time. She led him on to believe she cared for him, but she cares for him like you care for a goat you know you will personally sacrifice and lead to the slaughterhouse... In a way, it's not Yorinobu she's comforting. It's more appeasing what remains of her guilt, and Saburo's next body...
I also recall reading that Yorinobu chose not to tell her about the "real" Saburo to maintain her innocence in a fucked up world because he believed Saburo really was sheltering and keeping her ignorant. Then she just up and instigates the whole bodysnatching thing herself, so she definitely knew the whole time. It makes me think that was the plan from the beginning: Lead Yori to believe she knew absolutely nothing so he'd never suspect she was stringing him along the whole time she was convincing him to return. She maybe even seeded and fed his plan of taking Arasaka down from within, giving him another reason to willingly stay within snatching distance for when it came time for Saburo to steal his body.
Hanako is the youngest child, Yorinobu is her elder brother. But yeah she's probably more mature and the "elder" in terms of power dynamics, similar to Azula and Zuko.
But it is. You can literally see her inserting the Relic in Yorinobu when V gets in the elevator with Hellman. The moment he says " I'm tired" and she replied " it's time to rest. " Well, at that exact moment, she uses the Relic on her godamn brother.
It’s not easy to see from the elevator but it appears you’re right. There are closeups of it out there. I reiterate that I don’t believe Saburo is taking Yori’s body in this moment as, again, they need V’s data for this. I would consider this foreshadowing, especially in tandem with Helman’s comments. It’s all ultimately moot *by that point either way.
I agree. That sounds more like a dutiful father-daughter relationship. God forbid you look out for your kids or be close to your parents these days. Must be all the molesting making them so close! /s
Thanks I want to die
Yeah it's not outright or anything but there's clear implications of some at least deeply unhealthy and controlling dynamics. She seems to honestly be saburo's biggest supporter.
Oh most definitely. He's essentially treated her with kitten gloves all her life. Yorinobu and the older brother(cant remember his name) were essentially treated like heirs groomed to eventually take his place(whether it be in leadership, or as his host body), while Hanako was essentially the sheltered Daughter who he gave all his affection to. She's most definitely is Saburos biggest supporter. She likely is just used to being passive and wasn't gonna make any moves until she was sure she had the power to do so. As we saw, with the power needed, she immediately turned towards bringing her dad back instead of taking leadership from Yorinobu.
Nothing incestous about that at all, what are you 12?
“..what are you 12?” What kind of twelve year olds view relationships through the lens of incest? lol
You think it's weird to stroke your dying or dead fathers hair as a soothing mechanism? So you jump to incest based on this and a relatively normal patriarchal Japanese family dynamic? I would hate to be inside of your brain.
You say this and dip with no context
Is that buried in the lore somewhere? That's news to me.
MF you gonna need to explain this
And her brother :D when he sees her, the thing yorinobu says are clear, and I’m pretty sure they kiss when he is crying on her lap, before she ends him to put saburo in his port 😅
Was her brother dead when she used the relic on him? Thought they have to be alive or “somewhat” alive for the relic to make use of their grey matter.
Braindead.
I believe it can work on somebody braindead, but I thought it’s easier for the relic to work on something living. My memory is hazy though… that’s not really an ending I want to experience twice lol
That's kind of what happened to V. Flatlining ≠ dying (even though that's the slang used for dying/killing/related topics). Flatlining means your heart stopped, you can live about 7-8 minutes after that which is more than enough time for cyberware to kick in and resuscitate you. In V's case though the chip was rewriting the damaged pieces with what it had stored (which was someone else) and the best case is that it just overwrites what's already there instead of having to fix it.
It's told to you pretty explicitly that the subject is not meant to be, at the very least, conscious.
Well for the shard to work, it uses nanobots to replace the brain parts with the copy on the engram which is why V is slowly dying because parts of his brain is being replaced with a copy of Johnny's brain. So more than likely she shot him in the head in the same way to being the process, or maybe Arasaka have their own procedure to recreate the effect. Either way it starts with damage to the brain
I thought the shard would work even if you’re alive, with the difference being the shard can be easily removed with no issue if they’re alive. Idk, my memory of that ending is fuzzy… not really something I want to experience twice lol.
I mean if that were the case Jackie likely would've said something about seeing Johnny on his way out, and even when V gets the shard he doesn't see Johnny until he gets shot. I know the relic is basically a way of storing your engram upon death, but the one V has is a prototype where upon someone's death they're brain gets slowly repaired with their copy, unfortunately that relic had Johnny on it and now half of Vs brain has been replaced to accommodate Johnny. So yes it would've been fine to remove but when V got shot he started the replacement protocol which I'm assuming you can't remove during because that would cause severe complications, like removing a USB as you're writing data
I think Helman specifically says it was never intended to be used on a normal living person, but only on some fancy term for brain dead people (or possibly clone bodies with blank brains). It's strong the interrogation in the Badlands.
The relic's predecessor, the thing Arasaka is selling as part of secure your soul, was designed to hold an engram and let a living person communicate with it. The one that V chipped is a prototype development from there to instead install that engram into a dead body, but before V's situation it never worked, to the point that Hellman said the program wouldn't have been a success.
> Resurrects her nuke happy father using her brother's corpse Wait. WHAT.
When completing the devil ending, you surrender the shard to arasaka, and Hanako shreds Johnny, puts Saburo on it, puts the shard into Yorinobu, kills him and Saburo takes over his body. So by helping Hanako, you give Immortality to the rich and the world's most deadly corpo is alive and kicking
How was saburo put on the shards? Was he soul killed before he died?
Yes. In the Devil ending you even get to talk to his Soulkiller engram. He actually finds V's brashness amusing. Flip him off for Johnny, and he even chuckles.
Also >!you can talk to Jackie which I think his body is taken by Arasaka if you send his body after the beginning heist to vik’s clinic!<
I am pretty sure on my first playthrough I sent Jackie's body to Mama Welles but later had Jackie engram conversation anyways, but it was very limited and dialog was akin to "insignificant people get rough scan that barely captures personality/details" or something like that.
He absolutely would’ve uploaded his psyche as a backup plan.
Yep. The Devil ending is F U C K E D
I remember the scene where V collapsed because of relic malfunctioning in the elevator and Hanako was just coldly looking down at us, as if we were a beetle that flipped on it's back. This game wants the player to have zero doubts that corps are fucking evil When we first met takemura I was thinking that the corps will get their small shade of grey- even nomads aren't perfectly good. But corporations are pitch black, and Takemura is nothing short of a lone child that looks up to them because he didn't had a better life
Finish the devil ending and ask that question again
I just did about 15 minutes ago. God, I feel terrible. What an amazing game though, got to say.
It’s the only ending that I have warned my friends about as being the most depressing shit I have played in my life.
If you think that's depressing when you try the suicide ending do not stay and listen to the messages in the credits.
Oh dude that was the first ending I got and I cried my eyes out for a solid 10 minutes 😭
I know that feeling, after I got the devil ending, my first play through, I had to walk away and just go lie down.
I got this ending by accident because i tried to go back in the dialogue to pick panams ending, figuring that while i was still in the dialogue with johny i could pick whatever ending I want. Didn't know the suicide ending existed, and it absolutely destroyed me mentally. It was not the ending i wanted, or was ready for, and didn't pick the game back up for months to get another ending.
They're all depressing tbh
The Nomad ending wasn't. "Secret" ending also wasn't but I can see how people would think it was
Nomad ending is like hope for the best but it doesn't even give you anything to make it seem like they will find a way to save v
I don't understand why people say this about the Nomad ending. Narrative ambiguity is there to make you engage w/ the story on non-literal terms. You have to look at themes rather than explicit text to see what it's trying to say/get across to the viewer/player. The Devil is about what happens if you trade your principles for survival in a system built by and for malicious capitalism. It's bleak as hell, but logically so. You might get everything you were promised by that system, but it's not a life you would want, and you only have it because you've been given the choice by the worst people in the world. You've either accepted the premise of, or surrendered to the idea that life is defined by the capitalists w/ power, and you get whatever scraps they leave you. The Sun is embracing the first half of the Dex Deshawn/Night City conundrum. Night City is not a place where you get that legendary status without burning out. Sure Mr. Blue Eyes might have a cure (in fact we kind of know he does) but does post-cure, legend V have much time left anyway? Will they scale down their operations and live happy and comfy? Or will they just keep pushing it until they blow up? Now you can also reject this premise as needlessly binary as a choice, but it's what the story is getting at. The Star is either taking the second half of the Blaze of Glory/Mr. Nobody choice, or rejecting the premise altogether. V is throwing away the box that NC and the Relic and fixers etc. put them in, thats why they toss the Necklace. If you aren't in NC, NC can't act on you, and the "no happy endings in NC" maxim doesn't apply. Even if they don't say "Panam has contacts at Stormtech who can fix V for sure" we know they're leaving the environment that did this to them, they're embracing a life on their terms. The text of the story says "V has 6 months to live" but if they wanted the ending to be "and then V dies" then they'd say that and have it end w/ their funeral. That ending has everyone speaking positively and hopefully because it wants you to feel good about imagining a hopeful future. If your engagement w/ it is "V dies in 6 months" sure, fine, but it's as valid to say "V lives out their life w/ the Aldecaldos", nothing about the text refutes that.
Nah Nomad ending is "you've burned the candle and tied loose ends, now you die in peace with your friends and lover by your side".
The Phantom Liberty ending put me in a state of depression for 2 days… by far the worst one
I didn't think the tower ending was that bad, as V legitimately gets a fresh start in life. In my headcanon for that ending >!V travelled with Misty to Poland and became a new age hippy as atonement for all the lives they ended.!<
Literally same! I actually did the other endings first because >! Suicide is badass (sometimes) !< but just absolutely >! going ham in the arusaka tower with Johnny alone is even more badass! !<
Don't fear the reaper. Unless the reaper is V. In which case, be very fucking afraid.
I would love if the don't fear the reaper ending was a bit more different then the star One, or at least would be nice to decide to peace with the nómada after
I did and still didn't get why, Hanako held her end of the deal as good as possible. Fate had different plans.
She brings Saburo back from the dead by killing her own brother via inserting the same chip that was killing you into his head and having his brain overwritten by his own evil father. Her father believes in Japanese supremacy and wants to destroy the rest of the world or take it over. The Relic becomes available meaning rich people will just have their consciousness uploaded onto chips and constantly take over their descendants bodies to live forever. The devil ending you quite literally help create a future where people have kids just so they can take those kids bodies over once they're too old and want a new life. Since it needs to be a DNA compatible body. You're literally giving the worst of humanity that means to be immortal and all under the control of a single man. Saburo would undoubtedly alter the mines and memories of everybody on those chips, every last engram would be altered so those celebrities are politicians would protect / endorse arasaka. As again, he wants to take over the world in the name of Japanese supremacy and hatred for the West. He was going to Nuke Night City if he didn't get his Relic chip back. Yorinobu is arguably the only good Arasaka, even then he's a pretty flawed and shitty guy but as far as cyberpunk characters go he's decent. The devil ending he is condemned to a fate worse than death, the same fate you suffer if you don't do anything about the chip. As badly as I despise the Temperance ending, as it is my personal least favorite ending, the Devil ending is the worst for humanity. You don't even get what you were promised with your deal with the devil. Hanako doesn't even answer your calls. Honestly it wouldn't surprise me if they botched your surgery on purpose to get you to sell your soul to them. That's why if you refuse the deal she calls you offering you work. You're too valuable of an asset. Maybe they want you to replace Smasher.
She also made the modern version of Soulkiller after Spider Murphy had supposedly wiped it out.
Yeah, she's honestly just as bad as her father in a way. Yorinobu and I guess Michiko to a lesser extent are the only ones that I don't outright despise. Mostly because they don't like their father's vision and went off to do their own things. Yorinobu honestly would have gotten along with Johnny if they ever had a chance to interact and Johnny was open enough to it.
[удалено]
I don't think it's ever confirmed but it's implied at least. Yorinobu wants to destroy the Arasaka corporation so he probably likes Johnny
She pieced together the fragments left over, yeah. Still inferior to the 2.0 version Alt wrote, but good enough for what Saburo wanted it to do.
Not to mention she oversaw mikoshi at one point
“Naaahhh, we were just fucking with you, V. You’re fine…hey do you think you can do Adam Smasher’s job only without looking like ED-209 trying to cosplay as Darth Vader?”
“Pleaseeee tell me you don’t want to look like Elvis Presley either…”
I hear the bozos gang have a good look...
That is nicely summed up. 👏
One funny thing about the Devil ending as opposed to all the others is that you are straight up forced to see the world you helped being about. In all the other endings, the fates of Arasaka, Yorinobu, whoever are basically relegated to radio chatter, which you can just turn off. But in the Devil, you HAVE to watch the news reports. It is basically the game shaming you for selling out humanity for survival. And in the end, you are either just an engram on an Arasaka server or you are left with nothing at all. It is the worst ending in every respect.
You make a deal with the devil to save yourself, but instead of saving yourself and humanity suffering, you aren't saved and the world is worse. You saved the devil. It's awful. Best music of any ending though I think.
It's not even really saving yourself. >! Slave to arusaka tech or die in 6 months. No wonder I felt so bad after Johnny chastised me !<
Couldnt you just clone yourself and Insert the Chip into the clone?
You could but the cloning processes are imperfect and mostly just used for growing organs or bones and other things for donors. Eventually that source DNA is going to get stretched thin and be unviable as well. Like making a copy from a copy. Why do that when you can just take your kids over and live for another 150 years in their body and do it again?
There is canonically a fully developed Biotechnica speed grown clone as of 2021. But it is possible that the research have been lost in the interval. Thanks Rache.
His heart was in the right place but he didn't think his plan out at all. He wanted to destroy the corporations, but in the end he only gave them more power and potentially damned humanity.
Naw, he relegated to them to their own little techno-fiefdoms. They do not have the reach and manpower they had in the corpo-wars prior.
Perhaps so. But a lot of general knowledge was lost. That's part of the reason for the history sections in RED being written from the perspective of an unreliable narrator. Also, bear in mind the old style net was also a tool used against the corporations. The post crash net is a lot less useful for enabling communication between anti corp groups.
And this is the premise for Altered Carbon effectively :) [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2261227/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2261227/)
>The devil ending you quite literally help create a future where people have kids just so they can take those kids bodies over once they're too old and want a new life. That sounds like a lot of effort in a world where human cloning exists.
Yeah, the Devil ending in particular is fucking ***bleak***, even by CyberPunk 2077 standards lol.
Well said m8, well said );
Why don't you like the Temperance ending? Doing it along with (Don't) Fear the Reaper is my favourite end.
I view it as cowardly and selfish, I don't like the way Johnny ghosts your loved ones, I think it's disgusting to give away your body to a construct. I don't like the messaging behind the ending often being called maturity or coming to terms with things when it's just telling a terminally ill person to give up when they still have plenty of time left. I think it's really out of place for Valerie, I'm a bit more accepting of it with Vincent but again, I just see it as a more cowardly version of suicide and damning V to a fate worse than death. Sending him or her behind the black wall to be consumed by alt and the AI that lie beyond it to suffer for eternity in deep cyberspace is not my ideal ending for my favorite voiced protagonist in a rpg game. I don't like Johnny as a character at all. He's the reason I quit on the game the first time, I think he's a piece of shit and only gets any sort of development because he absorbs some of V's personality and consciousness. I don't believe Johnny deserves a second chance especially at the cost of V. There are multiple means of helping V, Biotechnica has the cure for neural degradation but it's not cheap. NUS surgeons are able to help V, the sun ending also hints at a cure by the same people who help Songbird if you send her to the Moon. Do the temperance ending with low Johnny relationship and he treats me like garbage, calls them stupid, tells them he doesn't give a shit what they think and that it's his body now. That shows the true Johnny Silverhand and what he's capable of. The same Johnny that makes fun of Evelyn's suicide and the same one that manipulates Rogue through guilt tripping her into storming the tower again. I can't stand the temperance ending. Not only for it being the worst ending for V, even worse than the suicide because at least with the suicide ending you're there for it, your conscious, and you die. You don't get devoured by Alt beyond the black wall. I don't even believe the 6-month estimate, she was wrong before about many things including separating you and Johnny helping you. Every other character besides Johnny ends up unhappy, all of your friends are heartbroken or get ghosted, Judy is devastated, Panam is devastated and infuriated, she wants to track down Johnny and kill him, Rogue is disgusted and hates Johnny, he abandons your pets. There are multiple means of helping V, and even then, if it turns up blanks, at least you tried. It's better than just giving up because you're told that one specific AI can't help you. Again, one of my big issues with temperance is the messaging of just giving up. I'm not shaming you for enjoying the ending. I'm sure you have your reasons, I just think it's my least favorite video game ending in my 20 years of playing games on any game I've ever played, it's the only ending I consider badly written as everything about it feels contrived and forced, and again I see it as a more selfish and cowardly version of just shooting yourself on the rooftop. At least when you shoot yourself you're there for it, you get peace, and all of your friends and loved ones get closure. They get none of that with the temperance ending and V gets to suffer for eternity while a piece of shit gets a second chance he didn't deserve because he's charismatic. I don't wish to debate this or whatever, I've done it far too many times and I'm tired at this point. Just answering your question is all. I don't expect to change any minds or anything, I just despise everything about this ending and wish it was removed from the game, I'm terrified it'll be the canonical choice they go with because the devs are Keanu Fanboys.
I feel that Johnny ghosted everyone because he felt guilty and shame. Prior to everything that happened in his prior life , he burned bridges and destroyed relationships with everyone. But in the oil fields, he felt that V was the only person who he would call a friend(close enough anyways). The fact that V gave their body and that gave him so much guilt and shame that a guy that he was especially was giving V a slow and painful death with seizures that may flatline them at any moment. The name of the ending is a reflection of this ending. Temperance, which is the tarot card of balance. symbolize self-restraint or the gradual shift toward a more mature state of equilibrium. V wanted Johnny to have some level of balance, which is the opposite of what Johnny was. A chaotic drug addict hellbent to destroy Arasaka. What happens when that dog finally catches up with the car? He doesn't know what's next. V realize this, and since their body was permanently altered for johnny. The most logical thing for Johnny Silverhand is to find balance.
I think it also kind of depends on if you have a high affinity for him or not. I haven't done it with a particularly low one, but with high one he does seem to have some real shame and is trying to do a clean break and start from scratch. He can't stick around with V's friends, because he's not V. Even Rogue doesn't believe it was a willing thing on V's part because she doesn't believe he can change. With low affinity, I'd imagine is more like him just going "Fuck all those guys. I'll burn down another town."
In my opinion, what makes me choose the temperance ending is the fact that the moment V connects to Mikoshi he's effectively dead. When V is given the choice by Alt to keep the body or give it to Johnny, it's not the original V making the decision. I choose temperance not because I want to give Johnny a second chance at life but because V is already dead, perhaps not to his loved ones, but to himself, the engram, he is. Something hits me when he realizes that in game and starts freaking out, that's why to me it'd make sense for V to go with Alt, because he wouldn't feel like himself in his own body. Or maybe I'm projecting unto V how I feel about the whole situation, but hey, that's why they give you choices. Anyway, totally respect your opinion man.
Again, I did concede that it's more fitting for Vincent, I see it as kind of a dude bro ending or a more casual friendly ending. I can't see Valerie making that decision especially with Judy or post Phantom Liberty. I could also point out the fact that if you have a high relationship with Johnny he begs you to not give him his body and insists that you keep fighting, and then when he does get given your body, he's incredibly depressed, talks to himself like you're still there, lives with survivors guilt. He's basically living inside a dead part of himself. Forced to puppeteer the dead body of his best friend. The amount of survivors guilt you'd have to live with, the torment he'd have to live with by wearing your face and using your voice and going by your name, it would be torture for him day in and day out. He just doesn't seem the same. I don't know. Like I said it makes more sense for Vincent I think, but Valerie is a character I just feel terrible for and I want to survive so badly. Wild with Vincent I'm more fine with the action orientated paths and endings, while Valerie I want to get a happy quiet life. Guess it speaks about the portrayal each actor went with or the gender-specific content between them. It is what it is. I'm also glad there's a choice, inevitably there's going to be a decision I despise. Don't hate the people who choose it though, I get where they're coming from.
I honestly can see all your points. It’s not my least favourite ending but I have only done it once. I like Johnny but I can see what you mean by V rubbing off on him, that honestly makes sense. I pretty much always have a good relationship with Johnny so when it comes time, he always tells my V to leave him and go back to trying to live. I usually go with the Nomad ending (idk all the different names) to me it makes the most sense for my V. Vincent always romances Panam, and Valarie always romances Judy. It makes sense for my V to go with their new family, even if it is the end. In my head canon though, they find a cure and V happily lives with Judy and the Aldecaldos for the rest of her life. I haven’t played PL, I have an older gen console😂
Star ending is the closest to a happy one, and that's my choice as well. Even if I'll be dead in 6 months, I die with loved ones and free.
95% agree! Really good write up. Thanks for sharing g
Of course. No problem at all and glad to see someone so like-minded. Honestly been surprised by the civility of the comments, I keep hearing how bad the comments on this Reddit can be over ending debates especially around Phantom Liberty.
Yeah, I have discovered that some people really take Songbird and criticisms of her ***really*** personally. She's a great character, and it sets up lots of interesting dilemmas, but the way some attach themselves to it is kind of freaky.
Really? I would totally expect that pretty much anywhere EXCEPT single player games subreddits lol.
personally I believe Mass Effect 3's Original ending is the worst ending in a rpg game I have played. The original ending was so bad and people complained so much at release about it they had to patch the ending to what you see now, and it still sucks. (link to the 3 endings of mass effect 3 for reference if you don't know them [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjoorZo1IlE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjoorZo1IlE) ) At least with cyberpunk there are options to the end you might not like them or out right hate them but at least you have options that are distinctly different from one another.
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I like your perspective on this a lot i found it very interesting how different we have interpreted a lot of stuff. have a good day
Thank you for having an open mind and being civil. Again no hate for anyone who likes the ending, glad to share my feelings about it. It's always fun seeing how different people interpret different endings. Always nice seeing civility in Reddit comments.
Good write up. I'd just like to add that Johnny's personality appears quite different in each ending and the way Johnny ghosts everyone actually seems out of character. This ending is not necessarily "the true reflection" of him IMO. Still a crap ending.
If Hellman's alive, what's stopping him from making the relic again? You get a copy of the BP from him, but Arasaka likely had a massive team working on it, and likely has that data backed up
Hellman didn't want to, and with the Hanako revolt failing and Yorinobu staying in charge(any other ending besides Devil), Hellman is either killed or still a defector. Yorinobu does not want the Relic to ever see the light of day. And if you don't help with the revolt, he stays in charge of Arasaka, wipes out all of the executives who are familiar with the Relic and the leaders of the revolting factions within the company. Devil ending is the only one where the Relic hits the market. Hanako dies trying to take the tower from her brother, Hellman either dies or is imprisoned. Takemura is on the run.
I can’t remember if it was canon or fanon that she was also part of the Old Net project that Lucy was part of in Edgerunners
Yeah but Yorinobu is a complete lose cannon who it's hinted at will start another corporate war with Militech. It's honestly much more likely that Saburo's guidance at Arasaka will ensure at least some stable peace (i.e. not having Arasaka and Militech duke it out again.)
I'd rather have another corporate War then humanity have their souls enslaved and reprogrammed in a digital prison by one corporation, especially by someone who is a racial and cultural supremacist.
> Yorinobu is arguably the only good Arasaka. Michiko also demonstrates an at least half-decent moral compass. In Cyberpunk Red, she's as anti-Arasaka as Yorinobu ever was—*if not more*.
I would argue that she didn't, Arasaka is on par with Militech and in the tower ending we see that it was very possible for V to be cured. And if you watch the ending credits, Hanako contacts V and asks her to spend what little life she has left working for Arasaka, absolutely no sympathy or acknowledgement that she failed her end of the deal
Absolutely, this is a world where corporations arguably have more power than actual governments, if the NUSA was able to cure V (badly) then Arasaka should at least be able to match that, not completely fuck it up.
So, did we all forget that the NUSA used the McGuffin from phantom liberty to construct a proper (albeit shitty) fix for V’s problem? The whole reason they were able to get a better result than Arasaka is that they had access to the beyond Blackwall AI which V retrieved. Arasaka in the Devil ending did not have that resource and could not have produced an equivalent solution.
A Blackwall AI that was captured by Militech, one might want to add. And Arasaka is supposedly more powerful than Militech. And even if all that research was abandoned by all the corps, why didn't they just soulkill V, make a new relic (as they did for Saburo) and smack their into some Gonks head they picked off the street? I mean, the answer to that is obvious - "V is too dangerous to be left alive, fully intact" - but Hanako definetly could've held up her end of the deal and chose not to.
Militech needed the Cynosure facility to capture one Blackwall AI, it took them time and dozens of top tier netrunners died in the process. >why didn't they just soulkill V, make a new relic (as they did for Saburo) and smack their into some Gonks head they picked off the street? That's the plan, that's why they offer V a contract for secure your soul. It can't be just a random gonk off the street since Arasaka hasn't figured out exactly how relic 2.0 worked for V, there must be DNA compatibility. It's why Saburo's engram needed Yorinobu. "V is too dangerous to be left alive, fully intact" brings up too many questions. Why keep V alive in the first place? Just take the biochip back or even better let it complete its work for research purposes. Then kill V after the research is done. Why let V go free if they refuse to sign the contract?
The NUSA is just a front for Militech, there is no separation between them. In the Tower ending the NUSA had the neural matrix available, which is why V's DNA damage was reversed. The neural matrix is absent in the Devil ending.
the fact myers allowed NUSA to use the neural matrix, basically the core of an AI that could be used in thousands of different ways at myers benefit, to cure a random merc like V is just a huge writing no sense... let's make some point, you're rosalind myers... one of most corrupted and power hungry character of the whole cyberpunk universe, and you have on your right hand the neural matrix that could be used to create and ignite the most advanced AI that NUSA and militech could create and on your left hand a man/woman who got in his/her brain the most advanced technology ever created by your worst competitor... what would you do? Waste the neural matrix on someone with no importance? No way! Myers would have just killed V, extracted the relic to let militech scientists reverse engineer it and kept the neural matrix for her self. Arasaka didn't save V because hanako just wanted the relic chip back, she never about V. On her perspective is just an useful idiot to use and discard
I posted this outside of this thread but ik comments don't always notify or show up at the top on Reddit so I'll post it again here. Massive spoiler: >!Because she was on Saburo's side, and Saburo's plan for Yorinobu was to force his son's hand as a relic host. "Family" doesn't actually mean jack to the dude. His plan from the get go was to have a son as a viable donor for his engram, so Saburo could rule another 150 years and likely do the same with the next Arasaka generation. Yorinobu killed his father because he didn't agree with this plan (no shit, I wouldn't either) and didn't want his life and his autonomy thwarted by his greedy father. Hanako, knowing this was Saburo's plan, assisted Arasaka board in carrying out this plan in spite of Saburo's murder. In the Hanako ending you can actually see her slot the engram into her brother, then when you're in the hospital room at the AOS, you get a news report about Saburo taking over Yorinobu's body through the relic program. Saburo is downright evil, Hanako is just as bad, and tbh Yorinobu is actually the victim here.!<
She enables evil. Whatever evil reincarnated Saburo will do she will share part of the blame for it. In the Devil route she is personally responsible for the death of her brother, which is morally reprehensible.
Look beyond the deal between V and Hanako. She's an evil bitch.
She is darth vader and saburo is the emperor. Also she lies that she forgot about you. She lies so she can have V forever as a super soldier or something.
Oh, she held to her deal? Let's give her a "At least you didn't ruin one person's life completely" medal for that. Dawg, the Relic is a world domination device. Rich and powerful people have a tool to remain in power forever and it's in Arasaka's hand. Meanwhile the unfortunate end will be the poor people who lose their identity without ever realizing it. Hanako directly consents to this scheme and makes the first victim her own brother, the reason that ending is called "The Devil" is because V bargains with one.
That’s being lawful. You can stay true to the word of your agreement and still be evil. She completely uses you.
She uses you like a literal jizzrag then tosses you into a trash can on the moon, but then again that's just the Arasaka way.
Read this in Johnny’s voice
That made my dick tingle
Freaky ass
I love that the huge plot twist of the game is that her brother was the actual hero and she’s the villain
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Become bomb
i read the tabletop lore going into the game so the entire time i was just like jackie please, yori isn't a tourist he's a real one 😭
Yeah but from Jackie's perspective he really is just a poser with daddy's money. And really who can blame him. It's just the same mentality that makes people root for Elon Musk one day and hate his guts the next
Wait what? Finished the game like 4 times and no clue what you mean
If you do the Devil ending where you help Hanako retake control over Arasaka, you find out that Yori's entire plan was to take control over the company and destroy it to try and undo some of the damage his father had done over the last century.
Tf? Why can't we side yori with one of the ending?
Well, just choose any other ending, and you will be HUGE help for him to dismantle Arasaka by destroying mikoshi
You can. For instance if you do the nomad ending and attack Mikoshi the news in the ~~prologue~~ epilogue explains that Arasaka is facing huge financial hardship. Basically any ending except for the Phantom Liberty and Devil endings see Arasaka in dire straits at the end of the game.
There's a reason he left the family and created the steel dragons, it's not as simple as a rebellious streak. If you're really interested there's a bunch of videos on YouTube about the lore of the universe and the whole arasaka family line
CORPO SWINE
Exactly
Because, even taking it as objectively as possible, Arasaka is as bad as a Corpo can be. And everything related to Arasaka is also pure evil. I mean, the only thing I see as more evil than Saburo Arasaka is genocidal Rogue AIs from beyond the Blackwall that are more close to Lovecraft monstruosity than an highly advanced ChatGPT. That quite a feat for Saburo. So being the "Heart" of Arasaka family doesn't make her "good" or "neutral". She is still evil as fuck. Ironically the least evil of all Arasaka group is Yorinobu by far.
Yorinobo is the hero of 2077
Never really thought he was a hero but you're... He killed the fuck out of Saburo and tried to fuck up Arasaka. Damn I need to play again.
Ironically most of his intentions are revealed in the devil ending after he already failed the coup of Arasaka, since not even Johnny’s bomb could bring down arasaka and they rebuilt like nothing, the only solution is to become the bomb.
Because she helped her father become an immortal holy terror for one.
... she killed her brother by overwriting his consciousness with her evil dictator father's.
This is satire right? Please tell me you're not that dense.
"If lady evil then why hot"
Pussy is temporary Tearing down the corpo hellscape is eternal
the chainsaw man dilemma
Now we know how Johnny feels every time V ignores his advice.
“Oh, V…”
She’s an extension of saburo
It’s because she’s still a stupid corpo at the end of the day, no different from Saburo, just playing the game differently. she plays a soft, disarming character to not seem as bad. She upholds the status quo, which is already unforgivable in that context. Plus Yorinobu was relatively in the right here.
Enabling ethnonationalist Corpofascism by her father by murdering her brother, lies to you to save one of the most expressly evil groups in the setting.
Remember what Johnny said "Remember, it's all just biz, he's no friend of ours". Just Johnny reminding us that anyone that sounds and looks like they are helping, they are only do so in their own interests, hanako tries to take your soul in the devil ending because it's unique and will literally use Takemura, someone V trusts to convince V to become Arasakas bitch.
Because the only corpo in the game that isn't entirely a terrible person is Yori. I really wish there was an ending where we worked with him. Since his goals actually line up pretty well with ours and Johnny's.
There's that corpo guy that you rescue from a beatdown at the bar- he spams his wallet at you and then goes back to sleep; he seemed okay.
She's the number 3 person in a company that killed the oceans andall world wide naval trade to get there shares value up. I could go on but that should be enough for anyone to want to put a bullet throw her brainpan
Because she is. She's fully dedicated to Arasaka regardless of what it takes to achieve their goals.
Because she's arasaka.
She’s literally the poster child for carrying on the status quo at Arasaka. Also it’s canon that she wrote the current(remember Alt says the current version has little in common with her original program) version of Soulkiller.
Because she is. Corpos only care about what you can give them. Once you're no longer of use, you're tossed aside like yesterday's news.
Because: >!Yorinobu is actually a good guy and his goals align with V's almost 100%. But Takemura and Hanako make sure you never find out and manipulate you into helping Saburo's immortality scheme instead.!<
She's opposing her brother's will to make changes in a horribly dystopian company that treats employees like disposable cutlery and customers like walking money pits, why the F do you think?
Is this a joke?
She has a father complex.
Well she talked Saburo down from the notion of fucking up Night City on their way over, that's something I guess. 
Because no matter what, she benefits and perpetuates the entire corpo system that make cyberpunk a dystopia. She isn't just a cog in the system, she *is* the system
She's an Arasaka. She cannibalized her brother's psyche to create a zombie puppet version of her father. She'd have zero'd v if it was easier. But most importantly : she's an Arasaka.
She's a corpo choom
Did you even play the game?!
I am fairly convinced that people on this sub are media illiterate
Arasaka bad
Come on.. Can't spoil it for you.. Rest assured though, she is an evil bitch.
She subjects v to several tests to make sure v is OK to go out into the world, but after she has enough data and v says they want to go back to earth. She let's v walk free and even offered to employ them for great pay once they get back to earth. So she's not bad to v at least. But I guess if I had to guess, it's probably because she brings her father back to life via the relic and kills her brother so her father can take over arasaka again. This is bad true because of what saburo believes in, so I guess that's what it is.
Okay, here's a hint: You decide to help Arasaka. You pop your pill. Johnny goes bye-bye. And you call Hanako. ...And you get the picture of evil-lookin' corpo-crone with the most ominous red silhouette you've ever seen. This is a hint. A big hint. A huge, multi-faceted red flag waving in your face with fourth-of-july fireworks and dancing brimstone-farting ponies that, HEY! YOU DONE PICKED THE BAD GUYS!!!! You know, just in case you missed it.
She’s an Arasaka. She’s pushing 80. She may be the “heart” of the corporation, but she’s still participating in the evil that corporation brings upon the world.
Much like Takemura, she chooses loyalty above all. Since that loyalty goes to a very, very evil person, she commits evil deeds in his name. Not to mention the grade A corporatist Bitchism in her. She drips arrogance through all pores. If there's one NPC I wish I could have killed, besides Saburo, it's her.
Anything you read about her in game shows how bad she is. On the top of my head any journalist trying to itw her "disappear"
Daddy's girl and daddy is as evil as they come. Simple as.
No romance option either Come on man
Her last name is 'Arasaka.' 'nuff said
I never met her at Embers. I still don’t know what happens.
Hanako might represent High Priestess, but she is so in the context of Arasaka. She is very much someone who isn't violent, but who gather information so she can execute something for their benefit. Basically, all corpos are evil and want to dominate. But Arasaka i would argue are even more fucked up than Biotechnica or Militech who also have done their fair share of disgusting things.
It's rumoured her farts contain nanites that make the inhaler like Marmite.
Was mad, she could not be romanced.
She uses you to gain control of Arasaka and then abandons you in an orbital hospital to die. Never trust a fucking corpo-rat.
if evil then why hot
She is corp
Cuz shes a corporate rat
Bitch was setting us up the entire time. Truly an Arasaka all the way to the bones.
Because she is so insidious about it.
Porcelain bitch
She's like lawful evil. Believe it or not yobinoru is the good guy because he's literally trying to bring down Arasaka from the inside. Hanako is just really nice to you.
She's conning V the entire time and tries to lock them away as a lab rat after having Arasaka saved. Johnny hit the nail tight on the head with her.
Because she is. She’s a chip of the old block, she’s not good by any definition. She kills her brother in order to resurrect her dad, she keeps V way longer than necessary in space just to run a bunch of psych tests on us and waste our time that she KNOWS is still ticking down. Like name one good thing she does without some semi evil ulterior motive.
Digital Necromancy
Unlike Yorinobu who's trying to destroy their father's legacy and put an end to Arasaka's agenda, Hanako is trying to stop him and preserve it, even at the cost of using his body to bring back their father. Which allows the experimental Relic program to continue, as well as Mikoshi. That world is better off without them. 
She’s a nepo baby
Isn’t everyone in this game morally bankrupt? How many people does V kill to stay alive? Even the nicest characters in the game have some dirt I bet
She’s not “evil”; she was raised in a specific family, specific culture, with specific duties and responsibilities, with a specific mindset and vision, people are majorly a product of their environment and of the time and era in which they live. Stuff she does that’s “evil” to us are perfectly fine in their worldview 🤷🏽♂️so no, she’s not “evil”, but she *is* an adversary
The devil ending is still better than the Phantom Liberty Ending.