Post #3560349

Sometimes I feel I should start making youtube videos about this kind of stuff, but then, you'd have to hear me talk - you're better off reading this. Recently, algorithmic social media has thrown a lot of #Cyberpunk2077 at me - and specifically, a lot of hot takes on Songbird. How awful she is. How bad it is that she swindles everyone, specifically dupes V. How reckless she is to run away with that little Blackwall problem. How players kill her, or send her off back to Myers. And I've got to concede, yes, she is pretty bad. She gets a lot of people killed, miracolously for Night City some of them probably innocent. She commits treason against the NUSA, sells out President Myers to Hansen, and artfully spins her talks of the cure that we believe she promises it to V - although a closer look at all the dialogue reveals that she always stops short of outright saying that, while leaving the implication so heavy that we feel she actually did. And I say... so what. Because Songbird is V's mirror image. Nothing she does, V doesn't. V hasn't. Or V won't. We are in Night City, and however we got there, V doesn't even start as a law abiding citizen. Be it as a street kid who doesn't shrink from nicking a supercar, a smuggling nomad, or a corpo with likely an international body count - under the control of the player, they'll be up to worse in the course of events, culminating in attempted theft of the pinnacle of Arasaka tech. And that is where we enter the game proper. V is a merc. V kills, lots and lots - for fixers, in gang shootouts, as assassin, for money. There are remarkably few instances of V ringing a doorbell instead of breaking and entering. We can give a hint of honor among thieves here and there, but by and large, V is a gun that doesn't care too much what they're aimed at. We can go light on lying to acquaintances and, for example, not rat out Panam to Saul, or not take 30 silver from Maiko to follow through on Judy's plan. But the full extent of what's going on with our Silverhandosis is only known to Vic, maybe Misty - and Songbird. We didn't tell any of them. Our romances we leave in hope for a cure, and in the Sun ending, nip in the bud any discussion of our obviously deteriorating condition. We are lying, baiting with hope that we know is at best fairy dust. In many small ways, we lie, cheat, and smoothtalk our way to the top, make deals we don't intend to honour, make a deal with an AI from beyond the Blackwall. We're not concerned with the collateral damage of infiltrating a public parade, or cutting the city off electricity, or destabilizing communities by slaughtering community leaders. Because we have a goal: to get cured from the biochip's affliction. ... what was Yorinobu's plan with taking it away from Saburo, anyway? But we see, if he gets it back, Arasaka gets a rejuvenated emperor. We deal with devils. Any devil that becons with a deal for survival. We sacrifice those beside us and throw them to the slaughter. And then... we meet Songbird. Our mirror image. I think how we deal with her is a meditation on how aware we are of what we do ourselves. If we truly understand, if we could stand where a Rogue stands, when she goes to battle once again to Arasaka Tower with Johnny, or if we would go to battle and ruin at the risk of everything we worked for like Panam. If we ourselves could be for V what they need.