Exploring the Depths in Subnautica

Sometimes you just have to look over your pile of shame and reflect on your choices.  I’ve purchased numerous games that I’ve thought sounded like something I’d be interested in only to find out that they’re an absolute miss.  For example, Civilization VI  is a very beloved title among some gamers, but I have found that I dislike 4X games.  They’re not bad–they’re just not my proverbial cup o’ tea.  Upon completing a re-play of DOOM (would recommend the demon smashing madness to any teachers trying to make it through the pre-holiday break weeks), I was browsing my library to find my next adventure.  I’ve been on a bit of a mission to re-play or just play titles from the pile of shame.  One title caught my eye–Subnautica.  I bought it back in 2016, played it for about 4 hours and then decided that it wasn’t for me.  I decided it was time to give it another go and actually found myself enjoying it (...and also not enjoying it at points).

What is it?

An open-world survival game based in a mostly underwater environment.  The basic premise of the story is that you’ve survived the crash landing of your ship and now have 1.) survive, 2.) find out if there are other survivors, and then 3.) discover the mysteries of the planet (not going to spoil it).

How much playtime can you expect?

This number could greatly vary.  If you’re invested in the more creative elements of the game (base building) you could invest many hours.  On the other hand, if you’re just wanting to stick to the main “story” elements you could probably finish it in ~15 hours.  As to replayability, once you’ve experienced the main story beats it kind of kills the replayability.

Pros:

+ The underwater setting helps provide some novel survival elements and unique exploration.  Besides keeping an eye on the normal food/water aspect you also have to make sure to watch the oxygen gauge.  The highlight of the game is definitely the variety of different underwater biomes–they vary from the giant coral tubes of the shallows to the deep volcanic zones of the endgame.  It’s highly enjoyable to find and experience a new biome.

+ Survival is the main focus, but there’s also several storylines to uncover.  You periodically receive distress calls and radio signals from other escape pods and can spend time locating them.  There’s also a hidden story tied to the planet itself that involves mysterious alien structures.

+ Exploration is the best part of the game.  There are new species of life to discover and scan in each new biome.  There’s also the promise of new, fancier minerals and other elements that can be used to craft increasingly more complicated items.  Many blueprints must be discovered, so it’s vital to find and scan wreckage scattered across the world.

+ Crafting and gathering isn’t too onerous and even endgame items generally don’t take a long time to create.  (*mostly).  There are several underwater craft that can be created as well as base building elements that offer up the ability to build an amazing underwater lair.  If building bases is your thing, there are no limits to the number of bases you can build.

+ Multiple game modes for different types of players.  If you just want to explore and build, there’s a creative mode that turns off the survival elements.  The default mode is survival mode where players must eat, drink, and try not to take too much damage.  If you do die, you’ll respawn at the closest base (or large craft, once you build it).  You lose some items, but they can be recovered (if you can find them).  Avoiding dying is fairly easy (although I will say that it’s easy to get distracted by exploration and lose track of your oxygen meter–especially early in the game when you only have a small tank) but you do take damage from certain aggressive creatures and environmental causes (like heat from volcanic vents).

Cons:

- No map.  Yes, it’s an exploration based game and the entire point is trying to find things scattered around the world.  However, I found the lack of map to be irritating.  I’m not saying that I want everything uncovered, but it would be nice to have a map that uncovers as you explore.  Especially as a new player, I didn’t understand that you basically need to be dropping beacons to mark anything you want to find again as your chances of finding something again are small (they’re cheap to craft, so it’s easy to do).  Just drop beacons anywhere you think you’re going to need to return to.  Even with dropping beacons I still had difficulties returning to some of the deeper zones in the late game.

Descriptions on where to find things are fairly vague–something like “1000m SW of this place”.  I found myself looking things up way more than I would’ve liked.  I’ve seen many comments from people saying “well, it’s an exploration game, what do you expect?”  Fair I guess, but I do not find it enjoyable to be fruitlessly searching for something for hours.

- Piloting the largest vessel is a chore.  Yes, it’s basically a floating base, but it’s slow, bulky, and difficult to navigate through some of the tighter areas.  I managed to get it stuck at several points and had to re-load.  You don’t absolutely need to use it, but without some of the key upgrades to the more agile vehicles it is a bit of a necessity at the deeper depths.

- Some players have described the game as “scary.”  I didn’t find it that way, but I suppose some of the sound effects from the aggressive creatures could freak some people out.  There are aggressive creatures that will attack you and your ship, they are threatening and it’s best to steer clear of them.

Recommendation:

Besides the annoyance at the lack of map and my own poor understanding of utilizing beacons, I ended up mostly enjoying Subnautica.  The exploration is enjoyable and there’s a lot of possibility for creativity in building up a mega-underwater base.  Don’t be surprised if you find yourself doing a bit of searching to discover elements of gameplay that aren’t well logged/explained.  I’m someone who tends to struggle with open-ended games that don’t have a clearly defined storyline, but found myself engrossed in exploration, building, and discovery.  Overall, Subnautica is worth your time and money despite a few shortcomings.

Big News in Witcher World!

Last night I logged onto the ol' socials to do some scrolling and got a pleasant surprise--one of the first things that popped up was the brand new trailer for the upcoming Witcher title!  As someone who is a huge Witcher fan, this is something I wasn't anticipating for quite awhile.  The next game in the series will be titled The Witcher IV (kind of uninspired, but continues the progression) and it seems that Ciri is the protagonist.  If you haven't had the chance to take a gander at it yet, here it is in all it's sparkly glory:

I'm sure in the coming days we'll get a bajillion analysis videos of people trying to pick apart every tiny detail.  It's inevitable, so why not simply join the fray?

I completely expect there to be an entire discourse about Ciri being a witcher for a couple of reasons.  Firstly, Ciri never underwent the full mutations to become a witcher.  Geralt and company didn't want to put her through that torture.  This doesn't mean that she's not capable of fighting off monsters, after all she trained with witchers AND she is gifted with extremely powerful magical abilities.  Curiously, her powerful abilities do not feature at all in this trailer.  Anyone who played The Witcher 3 knows that one of her best abilities is blinking as a form of dodging.  As the Lady of Time and Space, Ciri might not need those witcher mutations to be a top notch monster slayer.  I'm betting that people will also call out the fact that Ciri gulps down a witcher potion in the trailer--something that she likely shouldn't be able to do per the lore of the game.

(Spoilers below about The Witcher 3 endings!)

The second discourse will likely be about the the fact that choices that led to certain endings in The Witcher 3 seem not to matter--Ciri becomes a witcher appears to be the canon ending.  There will probably be some sad panda folks griping about the fact that their choices don't matter...blah, blah.  Honestly, Ciri becoming a witcher is my favorite ending and was the one that made the most sense for a potential sequel.

(ADDENDUM: The Game Director has addressed the questions about Ciri not being a full witcher and revealed that in the fourth game she is a full witcher--she took the trial of the grasses in the time between the third and fourth game.  It makes sense given the fact that she has gone the route of being a witcher--I am curious if it will be something detailed in story.  It's also bound to stir up some controversy because the Kaer Mohren witchers stated that they didn't want to ever have to do it again [during the scene where they administer the trial to Uma/Avallach].  Ciri becoming a full witcher tracks with me--there's a moment in the "becomes a witcher" ending where Geralt implies that she'll never be as fast or as good as a real witcher since she hasn't had the mutations.  I could totally see her making the big decisions to go through with it.  We'll just have to wait and see how it ties into the story.) *My sourcing for this isn't great--it was posted on a fan page with no source listed.  It seems plausible to me though.

There are a few other details that I've seen some discussion around.  The very beginning of the trailer mentions that it's rendered with a "unreleased NVIDIA GPU," so I think folks can expect the 50 series cards to be dropping in the near future (*the folks who want to spend $2k on a GPU).  The trailer does look amazing though.

Personally, I enjoyed the fact that the same core Witcher vibes are present in this video.  You've got the scared villagers bowing to actually needing a witcher while simultaneously disliking them; you've got the whole "who's the real monster?" message hanging over the scenario--it's one of the best parts of the series.  I'm hoping that the new game keeps that core in place.

One thing that stood out to me is that Ciri is plainly older (*people will also probably complain that her VA seems to be different) and more seasoned.  Maybe part of the story will address the endings and the time between the end of The Witcher 3 and this new game?  Maybe Ciri's been honing her skills with Geralt (who, in my game, is living the good life in Corvo Bianco in Toussaint)?  Maybe she's been conquering the world with Nilfgaard (not my favorite ending)?  I'm curious about how this will be addressed.

I found the 2025 release date to be a bit surprising--it seems like next year has the potential to be a big year in gaming with the release of Grand Theft Auto VI and now The Witcher IV.  I've been thinking about building a new PC (it's getting to be that time) and maybe it's finally time.  In reality, CD Projekt games are usually delayed (*with the exception of the absolute fiasco that was the CyberPunk 2077 release--and I don't expect them to make that mistake twice) and they seem like they want to avoid a bad release.  We'll see what happens.

Overall, I'm pretty pumped about this trailer.  Lots of fans were hoping that they'd get a game with Ciri as protagonist.  I'm very interested to see where they take the lore since there aren't any more books.

Surviving the Onslaught

Even though every holiday sale makes me want to start scratching titles off my Steam wishlist, I managed to contain my purchases to just one game (and collected DLC).  The best part--all of it was under $15!  I've been mostly managing to die, but I did survive once (and it was downright magical).  Of what title do I speak?  Vampire Survivors, my friends.

What is it?

Steam uses the following tags: action roguelike, bullet hell, pixel graphics, and 2D.  Basically, you pick a character (who is maybe a vampire?), you pick a map, and you try to survive the onslaught of enemies and run out the clock.  You gain experience from picking up various crystals that drop from killed enemies.  That experience is used to gain new abilities.  Much of the gameplay is avoiding enemies, snatching up crystals, and trying to figure out the synergy between different abilities.  Basic, right?  It's anything but simple though.

How much playtime will you get?

Potentially an infinite amount.  There are a ton of unlockables that will keep you playing.  Most maps have a time limit (basically the point at which you are killed...in the rare case that you manage to make it that long) around 30 minutes.

Pros:

+ Almost infinite playtime for a low, low price.  I snagged the base game for $3.74 as part of the Steam Autumn sale.  I enjoyed it so much that I decided to grab all the DLC for an additional $10-ish.  If you're someone who doesn't have a lot of money to spend on games, it's the perfect option.

+ Deceptively simple gameplay.  The entire premise of the game is surviving as long as you can.  Actually doing that is quite challenging.  A big part of the challenge is figuring out which combination of weapons/buffs work best.  There's definitely some strategizing involved.  Each time you level up you get to choose from a list of 3-4 random options--some are offensive/weapon options and some are buffs (like speed).

+ Roguelike elements.  Each map and the progression of enemies stays the same, but drops can vary.  One of the best parts are enemies that occasionally drop treasure chests.  These chests will give you one upgrade to an ability plus a certain amount of gold.  Gold can be used to unlock new characters or purchase permanent character buffs (such as +5% speed) that apply across the board.  Basically, your character gets slightly stronger with these buffs (that you can choose to purchase...or not, if you're super leet).

The character selection screen.  There's a scroll bar, so that's only a few.

+ Tons of unlockables. Certain characters are only unlockable once you've reached specific milestones.  New maps are also unlockable (again, they require accomplishing a specific goal).  Even if you just stick with the base game, there are a lot of options.  Each character starts with a certain ability and has their own strengths (and weaknesses).  It's a lot of fun figuring out how to play each character and picking out favorites.  There's also an entire system of weapon evolution that unlocks largely through discovery and picking the correct combination of items (you could always look it up, but that spoils the fun).

+ Low requirements.  Got an older PC?  This is a perfect choice.

+ Crossover content from other games/fandoms.  I'm not very familiar with them, but the newest DLC is Castlevania themed.

+ A fun soundtrack of high energy music.

+ Controller support.

Weapon/ability unlockables.  I've barely made a dent.

+ Multiple gameplay modes.  There's the regular survival mode and then "adventure" mode (*might be a DLC feature) which lets you play a story-based mode.  Each map in adventure mode has a specific goal that has to be accomplished before the next map unlocks.  Characters, weapons, and abilities from adventure mode can then be played in the base game.

+ 4-player local co-op.  Perfect for couch play with friends.

Cons:

- Moments of feeling repetitive.  The basic premise of the gameplay is always the same--run around, avoid enemies, kill as many as you can, and try to survive.  Mostly the roguelike elements make it feel fresh, but it's the kind of game that's best if played in shorter sessions.

- Can feel frustrating.  There's definitely a learning curve for figuring out which abilities work best together and you fail a lot.  I still haven't fully figured it out.

- No tutorial or explanation about certain aspects of gameplay.  The basic premise of the game is so simple that it doesn't really need a tutorial, but I was boggled by the concept of evolving weapons and had to look it up.  (Certain weapons and abilities work together and when fully upgraded can unlock a new, more powerful form of a weapon)   There are relics located on each map but no explanation about what that means (relics are items that unlock new, helpful features of gameplay--for example, finding the map of the Milky Way will unlock a map of each level that shows where certain permanent power-ups and, more importantly, coffins--which contain new, unlockable characters but require the ability to kill off all the guardians of the coffin--are located).  Expect to be doing some Googling to figure it out.

The one time I won.

Recommendation:

Vampire Survivors is an enjoyable game that is extremely affordable.  The almost infinite replayability and low requirements mean that it's perfect for a lot of gamers.  It has moments of feeling repetitive and frustrating, but mostly it's a lot of fun.  I would recommend grabbing it (even at full price--which is only $4.99).

Smokin' Hot Deals

Enjoying the 5 billion Black Friday e-mails you've received?  I know that I've woken up to my inbox crammed full of hysterical e-mails begging me to buy something because the deals are sooo amazing (fun fact--they're really usually not that great but our little peanut brains just like buying things waaaay too much).  But I'll admit...my little peanut brain has been buying things!  And, of course, the Steam Autumn sale is here so that I can extend my purchases to the world of video games as well.  What to buy though?  Here's my advice on what to grab in the current Steam sale.

1.) Mass Effect: Legendary Edition

If you're like me, you might be somewhat opposed to purchasing remasters/remakes/basically the same game(s) twice.  Buuuut, thanks to the magic of the SALES you can grab the updated Legendary Edition for the smokin' hot price of $4.99.  For the price of a fancy coffee drink you can play one of the best sci-fi RPG's out there.  The legendary edition does have some benefits over the basic games--firstly, the first game has received a graphics update and a few minor gameplay tweaks.  It looks good for a game from 2007, but it unfortunately does still play like the original game from 2007.  Secondly, you get all the DLC (this includes special promotional content/pre-order bonuses).  Lastly, it's nice not to have to manage importing saves and having everything just carry over from game to game automatically.  There are some other fun features like a new screenshot tool that make your $4.99 worth it.

Avoid the baddies and grab those crystals.

2.) Vampire Survivors

Don't want to spend a fortune on a new game?  Well, for $3,74 you can get an oddly enjoyable game that I've found myself being really bad at, but still wanting to play.  I knew very little about the game but thanks to crossover content in Balatro and a goofy meme about games that are great and don't have uber-leet graphics, I decided to give it a try.  It's a sort of survival/roguelike/bullet hell/run around grabbing crystals for as long as you can/video game.  There are a ton of different characters to unlock and it has some mechanics that give it a ton of replayability.  

3.) Dave the Diver

I can't rave enough about Dave the Diver and would recommend it to someone who's looking for a relaxing, but fun game that doesn't require a top of the line PC to play.  It's part action adventure/exploration/roguelike/management and has a great cast of characters, story, and gameplay.  You can grab it for $13.99 and there's a lot of fun crossover content from other games that has been added in.

4.) Red Dead Redemption 2

No, I'm not recommending the recently released re-master of the original Red Dead Redemption (I am still of the opinion that it's overpriced), but would steer folks toward the amazing RDR2.  For $19.79 you can grab one of the best RPG's out there.  Us PC folks had to wait a long, long time for it to finally migrate to the PC world, so there's a chance that some people might've slept on it.  It's definitely worth your time and is one of my all-time favorites. (*Who knows when we'll actually see Grand Theft Auto VI on PC....I wouldn't anticipate it any time soon though)

5.) Cyberpunk 2077

Maybe you were turned off by the extremely bad release back in 2021 (it was a disaster) and just never pulled the trigger on it.  Thanks to years of redemptive work by CD Projekt, Cyberpunk has evolved into a fun and replayable RPG.  It's still not perfect, but I do have a special place in my heart for Night City and all its violent dysfunction.  For $26.99 you can easily spend 100+ hours tooling around as a decked out V.  (*for $46.90 you can get the base game and the "Phantom Liberty" DLC).

There are a ton of other deals out there, but those are my personal recommendations.  And, in just a few weeks the holiday sale will roll around and there will be even more deals to consider.  Happy shopping and gaming!

Retrospective Platforming

There's a feature on Steam that I mostly ignore--recommendations from your library about what to play next.  Mostly it picks games that you haven't played either at all (AKA the ol' pile of shame) or for a long time.  I had just finished up my latest quest for cult domination in Cult of the Lamb and just happened to glance at he recommendation.  It was showcasing Ori and the Will of the Wisps--a game that I had purchased but never played through Steam (I did play it during my brief foray into the world of the XBOX PC Game Pass back when they offered an introductory month for $1).  I thought to myself "huh, why not?" and decided to start my Ori journey with the original game (Ori and the Blind Forest).  I thought I would reflect on it after replaying for the first time in seven (woooow) years.

Ori and Naru

What's Great About It:

1.) Modern platformers are so much more than ye olde Nintendo classics like Mario Bros.  Ori takes the classic formula of jumping, navigating risky terrain, and fighting off enemies and adds in a ton of fun variations that truly make cute little Ori feel like the lithe forest spirit that they are.  I love the bash mechanic that lets you move for long distances without touching the ground--it requires a bit of practice before you'll get the hang of it, but once you do, it's downright magical.

2.) The story (yes, there's a story), the artwork, the environments, and the music are all fabulous.  As much as you want to just stop and take in everything around you while you play, you've gotta keep Ori moving along on his quest.  The soundtrack is by far one that deserves to live on your video games playlist--tons of beautiful piano that perfectly accents the mood of the game.  You'll find Ori navigating through a diverse array of environments--a lush forest, a swampy marsh, a rocky mountain....each environment has its own enemy types and unique hazards to avoid.

3.) Hidden secrets to find.  As you unlock new abilities for Ori it's very worthwhile to travel back to previously visited areas to use those skills to traverse terrain that was previously unreachable.  Finding all the hidden energy orbs and health boosters is an additional challenge (*extra points for finding them yourself and not looking up a guide)

4.) Ori and the Blind Forest features a save mechanic that is unique--using Ori's energy, players can create save points almost anywhere.  It's nice to be able to save throughout particularly tricky areas and not have to completely re-navigate them (if you have enough energy, that is).

5.) It's short.  If you're looking for an option that's not going to take months to complete...you can finish the entire story of Ori in ~10 hours (if you decide to go secret hunting, it could add time to that).

What's Not-So-Great:

1.) If you're someone who gets frustrated and gives up easily, Ori is likely one that will push your buttons.  It has the ability to simultaneously make you feel awesome and also like chucking your controller through the nearest object (don't do it!).  You die a lot--that's just part of learning the mechanics of the game.  I could see how this might turn some players off.

2.) Pulse pounding chase sequences that require near perfection.  No spoilers, but at the end of each zone there's some sort of event where Ori must quickly escape from some encroaching threat.  These are set events and they must be 100% completed--there are no saves!  It can take many tries, but you'll eventually get it right.  It can be VERY frustrating and there are times where that controller chucking urge is needs to be quashed.  To those who want games to be harder...well, here you go (there are also multiple difficulty options for the leet among us).

Retroactive Opining:

I thought Ori and the Blind Forest was great the first time I played it, and I still fully agree with that assessment.  Even if you're someone who's not big into platformers, it's an all-around enjoyable experience.  If you haven't played Ori yet, I'd recommend picking it up (*the Steam autumn sale is right around the corner and I'm sure you could snag the two game Ori bundle for a song).

Bless the Lamb!

I decided it would be worth investing $5.99 in a little DLC for Cult of the Lamb and decided to fire up an entirely new cult.  After conquering the evils within and building up a cadre of loyal cultists, I'm ready to report on the "Pilgrim Pack" DLC.  It's always nice to fire up a game that I haven't played in a minute and see what has been added.

Firstly, I have to admit that I didn't read the description of the DLC that closely, which is something that you should do.

The comic book and additional fun book.

Pros:

+ It's only $6.99!  That's pretty cheap for some additional content (I saved $1 from a sale).

+ The DLC adds in a short, comic book style story based in the world of Cult of the Lamb.  The comic book is a fun piece of artwork/additional storytelling.  It's short and probably takes 10-15 minutes to read through.

+ As part of the story tied to the comic book you unlock two new followers (and follower forms).  There's a quest to initially rescue one of the characters from a dungeon and then later there's another one.  Upon rescuing the second character there's an additional quest to travel back to the dungeon to find the personal effects of the character.  Once found, this also unlocks another goofy little artbook that is fun.

+ There are a few new decorative items added in as part of the DLC.  They're sort of bamboo garden inspired.

Cons:

- As I admitted at the top, I didn't fully read the description of what the DLC was (like a dum-dum) and absorbed that it involved new quests, a story, and some new followers.  I figured there would be a bit more to it...and, I suppose the comic book/goofy book were that other part.

Recommendation:

I would say that it would be best to try to get this DLC on sale--you don't get a ton of new content and $6.99 feels steep for what do you actually get.  Granted, I did want to re-play it and the new content does help give you something to look forward to.  If you're a fan of the game, you'll likely enjoy it (I did).

That Ending Tho--Part 2

This summer I finally decided it was time to invest in the "Phantom Liberty" DLC for CyberPunk 2077.  Yeah, I'm a bit late to the party, but I wanted to see how everything shook out before dropping an additional $29.99.  I did enjoy the DLC, but thanks to a recent conversation with a student about video games, I realized that I never wrote up a reflection on the "new" ending that's one of the added bonuses of purchasing the DLC. (Here's the link to my "Phantom Liberty" review--link) Spoiler warning:  This post will reference ALL endings to CyberPunk 2077.  Read on with caution!

Like any good RPG/CD Projekt Game, the end of "Phantom Liberty" forces V to make some heavy decisions about the key characters wrapped up in the events taking place in Dogtown.  There's Solomon Reed, the sleeper FIA agent whose loyalty to the NUSA seems unwavering (voiced and modeled after the excellent Idris Elba).  And, of course, there's So-Mi "Songbird," an enigmatic netrunner type whose motivations are hazy at best.  Your choices of endings comes down to decisions made during the last mission of the "Phantom Liberty" DLC--you can choose to help Songbird escape or to work with Solomon to capture Songbird.

I opted to help Songbird escape and if you're someone who enjoys intense combat, I would highly recommend choosing it as an option.  To help her escape, V must travel to the lunar launch port (a referenced, but inaccessible part of the base game) and infiltrate it so that Songbird can make it to a rocket that will help her escape to the moon.  The downside is that the FIA/NUSA is onto the plot and once V makes it to the port, it's crawling with goons--things fall apart quickly and escaping turns into a desperate sprint/battle through hordes of NUSA soldiers.  The entire thing culminates in one of the most intense combat sequences in the game--one last defensive stand against waves of soldiers trying to capture Songbird.  I've gotta admit, it's a rough battle (you probably want to holdout on starting "Phantom Liberty" until later in the game for the best combat abilities).  V, with Songbird's ability to utilize the dark magics of hacking the Blackwall, holds out long enough to escape...but Songbird is in rough shape and is barely hanging on.

Dogtown has its own vibe.

Once V and Songbird arrive at the shuttle, none other than Solomon Reed appears for one last plea--V must turn Songbird over to the NUSA.  He makes very few guarantees of her safety and dangles a big bonus to the deal--if V turns over Songbird, they can have access to the best doctors and scientists in the NUSA...specialists who could likely extract the Relic and save V's life.  Alternately, you can shoot Reed and put Songbird on the shuttle to the moon.  There's no deal, but Songbird lives.  Since I wanted to experience the "new" ending, I opted to turn Songbird over.

One of the most interesting aspects of opting for Reed's deal is that it seems like you don't even have to play through the rest of the game (if you choose to).  You can call him up at any time and the new ending will play out (that's the impression I got anyway).  I did choose to play through the rest of it and when you get to the point of making the "big" choice with Johnny you can opt to call Reed.  Reed shows up with a helicopter and a doctor who can assess V's condition.  There's an uncomfortable discussion that's basically Johnny's goodbye--V can apologize for the choice but Johnny's pretty salty about simply disappearing.  I don't love Johnny, but it feels bad to just cut him loose to save V's life.  V's condition declines and the doctor is forced to give them an anesthetic...everything cuts to black.

The next scene starts with V waking up in a hospital room.  A few seconds later, Solomon Reed appears and explains the situation to V--the surgery was a success, the Relic is gone (and Johnny with it).  The bad news...V has been in a coma for three years...plus, the Relic caused so much damage to V's nervous system that they will never be able to utilize any cyberware.  He then presents V with some options--they can choose to stay and take a desk job with the FIA or they can return to Night City.  Before the choice is made, a scene that is slightly similar to the Arasaka ending plays out.  V can call up some of their former pals from Night City.  The first call my V made was to her romantic partner, Judy.  Judy is shocked to hear from V, but the reality is that three years have gone by...life, and Judy, has moved on.  Judy is happily married and has left Night City.  It's a bit of a bummer, but V can still try to contact their other pals--calling Panam results in no answer (weird for someone who was best pals with V).  Viktor does answer and offers up his medical expertise to try to see if V can actually use cyberware.  Solomon then re-enters the room and you can make your final decision--stay or return to Night City.  I opted to have V return.

Upon returning to Night City, V is greeted with a city that has obviously been overtaken by Militech interests (there are some newsy type of references that imply that Arasaka withdrew from the NUSA thanks to internal family turmoil)--the streets are crawling with Militech soldiers and mechs.  V arrives at what used to be Misty's store to discover that it's gone--replaced with a Zetatech tech store.  It turns out that Viktor finally chose to sell out to the corporate interests and is now under their employ.  V manages to negotiate a quick visit with Viktor and heads down to his shop.  Viktor is pleased to see V and assesses her condition...unfortunately, Reed was correct, V's system is beyond repair and they can't equip any cyberware.  The whole situation ends awkwardly when a Zetatech client shows up and Viktor has to essentially push V out the door to handle them.

V is understandably shook and is trying to navigate the narrow alleys around the shop when they are confronted by two street thugs (a common occurrence in Night City).  V of the past wouldn't even blink at these two fools, but current V is cyberware-less and still recovering from a three year long coma.  V takes a beating, but luckily a bystander shows up...it's Misty, but a much different Misty--she's lost her punk aesthetic.  They're shocked to see each other and strike up a conversation--V asks about the store and Misty discusses Viktor's decision to sellout.  Of course Misty was adamantly opposed and it has strained her relationship with him.  In fact, Misty is there because she's saying goodbye--she's leaving Night City for good.  Misty's always good for a deep conversation and V reveals their inability to wield cyberware.  Misty implores V to accept things--yeah, V can't be the badass, edgerunner that they wanted to be, but they still have a life...even if it is bland, normal one.  Misty grabs a cab and departs...V blends into the crowd of nobody's walking the streets of Night City.

Like any good CD Projekt Red ending...it's a mixed bag.  This is the only ending where V gets to live (longer than a few months and as themselves--not Johnny's consciousness in V's body).  The obvious downside is that V's dreams of climbing the ladders of Night City success have been completely dashed.  I guess it does really come down to Dex's two choices--would you rather live fast and die young as a Night City legend or live a long, boring life?  V's faced with the long, boring life choice (but is that such a bad thing?  It definitely feels like it in this context).  I was vaguely excited for this ending because I had seem someone comment that they cried...I thought they meant that in a good way!  It turned out to be a bit of a bummer.

It's nice to have another ending after having played through ALL of the others (and honestly, none of them are "perfect").  I like to envision V as staying in Night City and becoming a top fixer.  At least that's semi-positive.