'The Runners' by Cthulhu

[Quaker2k9]

Does anyone of you have the new, expensive 5-disc release of Blade Runner? It's worth getting for this alternate ending alone:

Scene : In Deckard's car, driving on the old mountain road up north.

Rachael: "Are you and I lovers?"
Deckard: "Yes."
Rachael smiles.
Rachael: "Did you know your wife a long time?"
Deckard grins.
Deckard: "I thought I did... What's a long time?"
Rachael: "Forever."
Rachael: "You know what I think? I think today has been the best day of my life..."
Rachael: "You know what else I think? That you and I were made for eachother."
Deckard freezes for a second, looks at Rachael, shocked.
Rachael leans back, smiles.

Fade to End Theme.

[Cthulhu]

Rutger Hauer is not a Nexus-6.
As you can tell, all the runners have a "(Nexus-6)" in their last names (Except the Nomad/Gully Foyle). I needed two guys in the final scene to keep you from shoot Ray Batty before he gives his speech, and to give him something to shoot at.

I've taken some liberties, like, in the movie the Blade Runners were the cops right?

(By the way, the book (Do androids dream of electric sheep) is nothing like the movie, if I remember correctly, I read it a few years ago, and it was mostly about Deckard wanting to buy a pet, a real pet, not an android one. But I don't really remember it at all.)

I just came to a great realization, in just a few years time there will be people out there, that's never seen the original Blade runner, just the DVD -Directors cut, without Harrison Fords narrating voice!

And whats even worse, the same people will think that the original star wars is with those horrendously atrocious poorly made digital special effects that George Lucas added during the late 90's. It's like Cartman says in South Park: "What ever, I do what ever I want, I digitally added Jabba the Hut to the original Star Wars movies"

[Quaker2k9]

Computer effects are really horrible... The guys producing these movies so inflationary really aren't thinking.

Look at the great models in Blade Runner, these scenes really pass the test of time and will always look good.

Have you watched Jurassic Park 1 recently? When it came out, the animations were praised very much. Today, as the quality of CGI has improved and the audience has gotten used to looking at animated stuff, the dinos in JP1 look awful. Pixels everywhere, don't feel natural at all, you can easily tell where they put together live-film and effects even if you want to believe the illusion.

[WorkerDrone]

Well. I must say, this was one lengthy quest, but I finished it, and I enjoyed it to the fullest extent that I could. I loved the...well, I really liked the great job you did here, and it really brings life to the game when you get absorbed in quests like this. I EAGERLY await the next installment.

[Cthulhu]

Thank you very much for your kind words Quaker2k9 and WorkerDrone. They mean a lot to me, as I spent a lot of time writing this quest. I would never have finished it if it wasn’t for Christian who helped me finding the final errors, causing the ‘Victory’ to be lost in space, so big thanks!

I EAGERLY await the next instalment

I actually built in the possibility of a sequel (that’s why I have the Nomad), but it will not be about hunting Nexus-6 units. I don’t have any ideas other than how I’m going to “connect” the two quests, and what the theme of the quest will be. I think I’ll wait until v. 0.6.x where you can dock, since this might be an essential part of the next quest, but I could always work around that.


Partial Spoiler alert:
-----------------------
Most of the time I spent writing this quest went to stuff you won’t notice if you just follow the normal storyline, for instance, what happens if you kill Leon but fail to get back to Commander Jameson in time? Or don’t kill him? Or if J.F. dies? What should Jameson say if you don’t act on the information you receive at bars and from neighbors, but just go back to him? (the mission says “find information, report back to me). Or if you kill Roy Batty right away? Or if you try to enter Rynkel through the other nav-point? (don’t try this unless you have a death wish)
By the way, try turning down the Commanders original proposal during your first conversation. It took me quite a while getting it right, until I realized I had to insert two hyphens (-) to get it correctly aligned, try it and you’ll find out.
However, there are no “alternative” storylines, just alternative conversations. My thought was that if you don’t know what to do you could always go back and ask the Commander.

[Quaker2k9]

By the way, try turning down the Commanders original proposal during your first conversation. It took me quite a while getting it right, until I realized I had to insert two hyphens (-) to get it correctly aligned, try it and you’ll find out.

I've seen that, looked pretty cool. Also seen what happens if you want to bail on the job of killing Zhora (the conversation on Hooper's that had the bug)... Haven't checked out the other possibilities though.

[Flyboy]

Here's my critique of the quest. The storyline was pretty good, the fights were well done, and all but one of the dialogues were good. The only reason I gave this quest a 2 was because of the profanity. If you recall, I subtracted points from the rating of Quaker2k9's "A lady in trouble" because of language. This quest had only a couple of profanities, in only one dialogue, yet I felt that the profanity was far worse than the profanities used in "A lady in trouble". The fourth of the Ten Commandments says "You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain...". Please recall that the Ten Commandments were God's direct commands to humanity. I believe that everyone would agree that the player's response to Roy Batty was in blatant violation of this commandment. As I said in the beginning of my post, the only reason I gave this quest a low rating was because of the profanity. You obviously put a lot of hard work into this quest, and you are to be commended for that. My only objection is the profanity.

Please understand that I am not in anyway attacking you personally, as before I am only posting a critique of the quest, not a personal attack.

[Christian Knudsen]

Please don't bring religion into this or any other thread. I understand if you don't like profanity. Fair enough. It doesn't bother me, but we're all different. What does bother me is using religion as an argument.

[Cthulhu]

That line you're referring to is from another movie.
I'm sorry if it upset you, but since the player in this quest kills a few people I guess the fifth commandment is violated as well.

[Flyboy]

Christian: Sorry to upset you, I did not think that my reply would be offensive, or I would not have posted it. I meant to use that not as an argument, but as a basis for my objection. I will not do so in the future.

Cthulhu: Thank you for being understanding. I don't think the player commits murder, because the player is employed by the authorities to neutralize a threat. Christian has just asked not to bring religion into the discussion, so if you want to discuss the murder versus not topic further, I would be happy to do so but not as part of the discussion here.

[Quaker2k9]

Don't recall the line in question at the moment but in my opinion, it's a bit different when it's a movie quote. Quotes are references and have to be put also into the context of the piece of art they refer to which in some cases...... uh, what was I going to say? Well I don't mind rude language too much, while I do understand that some people have a problem with it.

But then... "I'm gonna deep-fry your guts" isn't that nice either and the player says that to the Retros all the time...  :eeeee:

[VincentFirePony]

Now I own both definitive versions of Blade Runner and The Running Man I like them both but how people could confuse a quest titled "The Runners" with The Running Man I'll never know... Sigh... My hats off to you for making a good quest... I like it. Here's what I've gathered of the nods to other stories from this quest so far:

Commander Jameson = ?
Nexus-6 = Blade Runner
Leon Kowalksi,Zhora, JF Sebastian= Blade Runner
Admiral Piett = Star Wars
Insys = Sounds familiar but can't place it... Lol...
Gully Foyle? =
Enoch Wallace = ??

[Quaker2k9]

I'm with you there with the recognized references... Except that I have one more:

Nomad = Star Trek TOS (renegade space probe destroying stuff)

The "Tiger" poem Nomad quotes is quite popular, and it is also quoted prominently in the intro to Westwood's circa-1998 adventure genre computer game Blade Runner (which, by the way, I consider a real gem. Maybe not the right thing for every die-hard BR fan, but certainly a very nice computer game). The other quote in the Nomad ship dialogue I didn't recognize.

[Flyboy]

True, it was a quote, but it was an obscene one and unnecessary to use. As to the context, this quote was an obscene one whether or not you put it in context. If you recall, I objected to some rude/obscene language in part 1 of "A lady in trouble". However, it was of a different nature so my objection was also of a different nature. My objection to that was simply crude/bad language, my objection to this is of a different matter entirely, which is why I had a different basis for objection. Again if you recall, my basis for objection to language used in "A lady in trouble" was simply obscene and unnecessary language. I made my basis of objection clear then, and I made it clear again in this incident. I thought it unfair to criticize somebody's work without saying why, which is why in both cases I said why I was bothered.

My point in saying all this is that what I said that Christian found offensive was not my argument, but instead my basis for objection.

True, threatening Retros that is rude, but in a different way, in that it isn't obscene or vulgar.

Christian, again I apologize for offending you, my intent was to provide my basis for objection, not to use that for an argument.

[VincentFirePony]

Cool... I don't want to give anything abt the quest away any more than I have... but I'm to the point where I'm fighting off two of them grr! got one then the other got me... Don't try to shoot someone on the other side of town when they attack you... Sigh...