TOW1's intro cinematic says that Halcyon is "the only colony on the edge of the frontier owned and operated by corporations"

[Infinitron]

Emphasis on only. Does that mean the new star system we'll visit in TOW2 will have a larger representation for some sort of Earth Directorate civilian authority (and not just a pathetic "Earth Minister" who is a hostage in his own home)?

Edited June 22, 2021 by Infinitron

[Wormerine]

TOW1 teased the mistery of whats-up with Earth Directorate pretty hard. I would be surprised if it will turn ou to not be a hook set up for the sequel. 

It's also impossible to tell if tOW2 will take place more or less within the same timeframe as tOW1, or if they will move time forward (like they did Fallout1->Fallout2). If it would be "standalone" sequel, then they can expand corpo influence as much as they need. 

Edited June 14, 2021 by Wormerine

[Theonlygarby]

I think it would be interesting to have non corporate owned groups that come with their own issues. Outer worlds was a little one note with "capitalism bad" so some nuance and exploration of other things that are also bad could elevate the story.

 

Also some non earth humanoids would be cool

Edited June 15, 2021 by Theonlygarby

[uuuhhii]

with months of travel time

most distant colony would have to adapt to local condition and run themselves

 

[Ethics Gradient]

Quote

the only colony on the edge of the frontier owned and operated by corporations

Depending on how you want to parse the semantics, Halcyon doesn't have to be the only corporate colony, just the only (known) one on the edge of the frontier.

Maybe there's another corporate colony even further out.  Or a colony slightly closer to Earth.  Or a non-corp colony somewhere else on the frontier.  Or some wildcat colony that the corporations built in secret.  Still plenty of ways to spin a sequel while not retconning TOW1.

[kanisatha]

18 hours ago, Theonlygarby said:

I think it would be interesting to have non corporate owned groups that come with their own issues. Outer worlds was a little one note with "capitalism bad" so some nuance and exploration of other things that are also bad could elevate the story.

Yeah, Obsidian (and others) need to learn that corporations and capitalism are not the same thing. Plenty of socialist mega-corporations in the West these days.

[ComradeYellow]

4 hours ago, kanisatha said:

Plenty of socialist mega-corporations in the West these days.

Ain't that the truth!  It's like they merged together.

[Theonlygarby]

5 hours ago, kanisatha said:

Yeah, Obsidian (and others) need to learn that corporations and capitalism are not the same thing. Plenty of socialist mega-corporations in the West these days.

Do you mean like.. liberal corporations?  For some reason my brain can't merge socialism and corporatism

[ComradeYellow]

1 hour ago, Theonlygarby said:

For some reason my brain can't merge socialism and corporatism

I dunno about that, many modern corporations seem attracted to the idea of doing business with socialist governments, should they let them in.

China, for instance, remains a Marxist government but many many corporations across the world are attracted to Chinese investments like you know what, and even their richest entrepreneurs are members of the Communist Party.

Seems like a natural evolution of socialism, the government remains firm in providing employment and services to its citizens and owning a good chunk of the economy, but businesses also being allowed to flourish so long as they follow government protocol and don't "rise above" the state, like western governments where corporations seem to own all aspects of society, especially politicians.

[Theonlygarby]

7 minutes ago, ComradeYellow said:

I dunno about that, many modern corporations seem attracted to the idea of doing business with socialist governments, should they let them in.

China, for instance, remains a Marxist government but many many corporations across the world are attracted to Chinese investments like you know what, and even their richest entrepreneurs are members of the Communist Party.

Seems like a natural evolution of socialism, the government remains firm in providing employment and services to its citizens and owning a good chunk of the economy, but businesses also being allowed to flourish so long as they follow government protocol and don't "rise above" the state, like western governments where corporations seem to own all aspects of society, especially politicians.

I wouldn't say that's corporations being socialist.  That's just corporations having no soul, so they will do anything for profit.  I mean maybe the Chinese businesses are socialist.   Though that's more communism than socialism.  People often conflate the two, but there is a difference.

[kanisatha]

18 hours ago, Theonlygarby said:

Do you mean like.. liberal corporations?  For some reason my brain can't merge socialism and corporatism

On one level yes, liberal or leftist corporations. But also socialist in that they are always out for subsidies, handouts, bailouts, and special protections including especially protectionism from competition.

[ComradeYellow]

23 hours ago, Theonlygarby said:

Though that's more communism than socialism.  People often conflate the two, but there is a difference.

EU: Socialist

China: Communist

US:....sinking ship? xD

[Clawdius_Talonious]

We have no idea what the timeframe for this is, but... What if Earth detected some sort of imminent, unavoidable, extinction level event? What if they packed up every ship they could with cryo pods and sent every human they could to some other world? That could explain what happened to the directorate ships, they were commandeered for the evacuation of Earth. 

That would explain a lot of stuff about what happened to Earth as well as where and why there's a new colony. If the Earth knew that people in Halcyon could very well be dying and doomed, it would make sense to say "Well, let's not put all our eggs in that basket" for the evac. As for the reason why people from Halcyon make their way to a new colony, new jobs, a new place full of consumers, trade of goods for food would keep Halcyon afloat?

Or possibly, they need Phineas Welles' research on thawing people who were in cryo for longer than expected... Hell, that would give the second game a similar potential intro, Phineas picking a new subject to send hither and yon in search of stuff.

[Theonlygarby]

On 6/17/2021 at 2:26 PM, ComradeYellow said:

EU: Socialist

China: Communist

US:....sinking ship? xD

Hopefully it's not a sinking ship, because that ship has a whole lot of military equipment, that just might fire off if it does sink.

[daven]

On 6/25/2021 at 8:51 PM, Theonlygarby said:

Hopefully it's not a sinking ship, because that ship has a whole lot of military equipment, that just might fire off if it does sink.

At themselves by the looks of it. America's enemy are its own citizens.