For instance, I would love to see some missions that take up the Bolshakov storyline. It would be great if we could open the red door in Underground station C, to explore the collapsed area and find evidence that Bolshakov was killed in the nuke attack or that he survived.
After opening the red door, the traversing towards the centre of the bunker, to the servers where Bolshakov was going, could be a maze like system alternating through different floors riddled with obstacles that has some parkour, climbing, and jumping work, opening doors, breaking through walls, etc, hidden collectables, and nice scenes, which ultimately lead to some evidence about Bolshakov’s fate. And maybe find out that there is that - long suspected - Underground train network reaching many regions of Östertörn and Himfjäll.
Additionally to adding narrative, I would like to see new funny and serious scenes to find especially in remote areas. Most of the Veteran players are missing the thrill of finding new little POIs. Camps Graves, Items (letters) that throw some light on open-ended NPC storylines, etc.
I really liked the shopping trolley on the side of the road alerting us to investigate, or just finding a shopping trolley on the roof. Also the yellow ducks addition was funny. So more of that type of surprise finds would be nice.
I get what you mean, but tbf there’s plenty of “narrative” in the game already, right? Just yesterday, I ran into the “apple orchard” side quest for the first time. That’s hella good storytelling imho, seriously creepy, and very fitting (in a world ravaged by death, some opportunistic psycho adds some of his own).
What strikes me as a bit odd, is that most of the narrative is through text alone. Very little NPC interaction (even with the very few people that are alive), very little recorded dialog. I understand that’s most likely a budget issue, but if there is ever a generation one game, I’d hope they could add a bit more budget for voice actors.
I meant narrative to continue the story, not stand-alone side-narratives like the apple murders, although I like them too. About this apples murder narrative, it is not finished, there is still the question unanswered, why Kenneth performed the strange rituals and why he killed all those people, soviets, civilians and military.
Can you elaborate on what story narrative you would like to see involving NPC interaction?
I see your point about continuing the main story, though that’s probably more realistic for another title (or a paid expansion maybe).
The NPC interaction I meant wasn’t necessarily “story” per se, just how eerily silent even the few human enclaves are. Maybe it’s not so much “narrative”, but more “atmosphere by NPC interaction”.
Take a game like Diablo. There’s not much talking when you fight, obviously. But when you come back to town, the blacksmith greets you, the gem vendor has a few lines, all just adding a bit of richness to the world, and making the contrast more stark between the “dead world” of combat, and the human world where you can take a break.
In Gen0, if you go back to the bunkers, there’s Therese sitting there ignoring you permanently. Soldier guy (forgot his name) stares at the war board eternally, never acknowledging you came back from a mission.
A few lines of dialog, and a few interactions could add so much: “Hey, good job out there” after finishing a story mission. “They caught you unprepared this time, huh?” after dying several times in a row. Stuff like that is what I had in mind.
For games, the problem with leading the story to a final conclusion, like for instance, defeating FNIX, or find a way to coexist with FNIX, is that it stops the need for fighting.
So we need some progression in the storyline, but still leave more story to follow.
But yes, a paid DLC, preferably on a new island, revealing the location of Camp Kabarga, for instance would be very welcome.
That’s why I asked, what sort of story progression players like, and try to describe it a bit like I did. It might give the devs Ideas, knowing what we like to see…
Main story:
You might like to learn more about what FNIX is using Humans for, and how that affected them, and if they could be rescued still?
Is there more to tell about the connection Tatiana and FNIX had. Or was FNIX just using her?
Maybe you like to see Veronica return into the picture? Maybe meeting up with Elsa?
Side story:
Do you like to hear more about what happened to Janek?
Who is R. Salonen?
Will Tatiana ever gain the trust of the civilians and the resistance, after she sent the nuke?
A bit more revealing narrative around the Iron Church group would be entertaining too.
the empty houses could use random encounters with NPCs trapped inside with robots standing out waiting for the NPCs to come out, maybe the bunkers to, NPCs trapped in one of the Dead end hallways of the bunker & couldn’t possibly sneak by the hunter, with the hallway being so narrow
I Like that idea. I could imagine some interesting procedual missions for that, just to deliver us some more signs of life in this world.
I just think that it won’t happen that soon, because a NPC has to be designed (maybe not just one to have some variety) and animated and needs some audio. Well, at least you need some idle animation and a “thank you very much” in different voices.
In the beginning of GZ when we had quest sending us all over the map for clues to find a rusty Magnus .44 and some meds and we spent hours for the missions.
And I liked the change on the location in North-West you have to go around all entrances to explore the bunker that caved in.
IMHO i think there still gives room for a number of longer side stories with all the doors both in bunkers and other places that still say they require a key to open.
And with all the new bunkers and tunnels blown up and collapsed there are even more bunker doors waiting to be broken up everywhere!
Let the sirens go off when we pry open a door!
Maybe add hacking of some of those electronic locks?
We could need a car battery, some metal, lockpickers and something more to be collected and then some of the powerless doors can be open if we also found the access card before, of course.
The devs were talking about adding some more narrative in '24. So the more ideas people share here the more the devs can see what parts of the story people like to have told a bit more of.
I saw in yesterday’s Stream that someone said that they would like to find out what happened to the missing inhabitants of Östertörn. So I am not alone in this.
You never know.
East and West weren’t best friends before, too.
And the swedish developed the machines because of the cold war crisis, if I remember right.
Well, maybe the crisis wouldn’t have gone so far, because maybe nuclear weapons wouldn’t have been invented…
There’s also the story about the Research Lab scientist Egorov, who had discovered new crucial information about the FNIX machines. However he’s is not seen again or heard of, since he had to run from the lab followed by one of the captured Hunters. We know he made it to an old shack, but we do not know if he lived to return and continue his research.
What direction would you like the Tatiana-Bolshakov story to go? The lore hints strongly towards possible survival of Captain Bolshakov, because of a found captains insignia.
At least I would like to meet Tatiana someday.
Especially because I want to see her body… Well, you know, how she looks like with a hunters leg.
It would be great to get new locations in the north eastern island with a resistance outpost where Tatiana lives. Either wounded in a medical station or as prisoner or even as leading part of another resistance group.
The informations or missions we could get from her could lead us to a final fight against Bolshakov. I imagine a fight in the normyrra arena with a new soviet bossmachine-type, in this case controlled by Bolshakov himself. During this fight we learn that it’s not the end, but just the introduction of this new soviet machine, but ai-controlled, so that we would get a counter-part to the reaper which may spawn as rival from this fight on.
Additionally we could get a new FNIX support machine or a new class of the existing machines that helps FNIX to fight firebirds in a better way to balance those battles.
On our way to fight Bolshakov there could also be new soviet bases like the FNIX bases and a revamped region score system: a score for each faction that determines who has more control over a region which affects the spawned rivals and bases.
I don’t think she could walk with a hunters leg. I expect her to have a human form leg-prosthetic totally built by the FNIX machine.
I agree, the possibilities are endless. Nice ideas btw.
Any ideas about whether Commander Marakova still will want to bring Tatiana to justice for killing so many soviet soldiers with the sending of the nuke, or will she finally see what Bolshakov was really about, and understand that Tatiana was acting to protect the Motherland.
I would believe in this happy “ending” for Tatiana.
Finally not all the soviets are bad. There are just few who abuse their force to reach their own goals
Any ideas where the story might go with Egorov’s findings in mind? Makarova thinks his ideas are crazy, but she still want Egorov back at work, in the case he is correct.
When the game started, we were told by the devs in streams, that the machines are machines, not self-aware, not self-thinking, and no emotions. But now, if Egorov is right, some machines besides FNIX, seem to have also evolved to a sentient machine (AI), which goes further into the realm of science-fiction. Quite a feat in 1990. Even today in 2024, no AI system has achieved true sentience.
I don’t know where his findings could lead the story too.
For us players it’s nothing new. But what could the soviets do with this knowledge?
It would at least be a bad idea to turn it into something useful for the soviets because it would change the balance too much if they would become able to control FNIX machines.
An other option, to make the soviets able to improve their own machines to make them smarter and sentient, could be difficult to let us feel the difference.
On the other hand, maybe it’s exactly this difference which could lead to point where the soviet machines decide to construct own self-running bases like FNIX does.
