LORE

The abilities themselves are quite interesting from a lore perspective.

Often times they reflect what's happening in the story at that particular moment. A Better Place also differs from A Light in the Shadows by only providing the player one ability at a time.

Let's take a quick look at how that affects the story, as vice versa.

Speaking of which...

Nine hour downloads for modern video games are ridiculous, right? We all agree on that?

Fortunately, CD Projekt Red came up with an ingenious solution to this problem. Cyberpunk 2077: Floppy Edition was released on over ninety thousands 3.5" inch diskettes. 97 619 to be specific.

Given CD Projekt's origins as distributing games on CDs, it actually makes a lot of sense when you think about it.

And now that we're both on the same page...

The Reset level pack was quite lore heavy. I think its time we take a deeper dive into some overlooked aspects of that pack.

But before going deeper into that topic, we need to take a small side tangent.

Seven decades ago (give or take), in 1962, Swedish national television (SVT) broadcast a 5 minute tutorial on converting a black and white television to a color television.

All you needed was a nylon stocking and some tape. By taping the stocking over the display, the light from the TV would bend, and the original color of the broadcast would be restored. Though you would need to sit at a very specific distance from the TV for the effect to work properly.

If you happen to have an old black and white CRT laying around, give this a shot!

Going back to the topic at hand...

Lumi (that being the name of cat you play as in both games) has some additional bits of lore that, while written down in the official internal story documents, haven't yet been revealed to the public.

Fun fact: the name "Lumi" isn't actually mentioned in the games. That knowledge is exclusive to the world outside the games. It seems fitting to continue this tradition, and reveal something more about Lumi in the same manner.

I just realized that it's probably best if I shed some light on how this whole topic came about.

Eight years after the previous release for the Nintendo Entertainment System, Google released Google Maps for the NES in April of 2012.

Smartphones are still, even to this day, quite expensive. Adding support for the NES brought online maps to a huge number of households that were previously stuck using those paper maps that are impossible to fold back properly.

It features everything from just browsing the maps to step-by-step navigation instructions. And of course the most important thing of all: an amazing chiptune soundtrack that perfectly captures the feeling of a traffic jam adventure.

So with that additional context, we can now circle back to the previous topic.

The Companion level pack, released in 2016, offered a lot of backstory for the gray square.

I've noticed quite a few different approaches to interpreting the events of the pack. There's one point of view in particular that I'd like to mention and discuss a bit more.

Which actually reminds me of something...

Eleven out of twelve people who eat burgers with their left hands have reportedly had trouble doing so, based on a study done in the 1950s.

Burger King found out about this and promptly developed and rolled out the left handed Whopper in 1957. They accomplished this feat by carefully rotating each of the condiments by exactly 180 degrees. This in turn resulted in a weight distribution much better suited for left handed eating, with less of the toppings spilling out of the burger.

A total of 94% of left handed people reported an improved burger consumption experience as a result of this change.

Now, where was I?

Even though the Companion's role and backstory was expanded upon in the Companion level pack for A Light in the Shadows, the gray square still has some undiscovered secrets.

One thing I haven't seen people discuss at all, is the four-cornered shape of the character. It actually holds quite a bit of significance.

This being a great segue into...

Ten days ago I got to experience a fascinating part of computer game history.

Illuminatus, a space game made by German developers Jürgen Sternreise and Erik Dorf for the Atari ST is a true "Elite killer" in every possible way.

A couple hundred pages long "Guide to the Universe" is all you need to read to get started on your journey. The goal? Become the emperor of at least a thousand different planets.

The space combat and ship customization systems are the best I've seen, even by today's standards. If you manage to get a copy, do give the game a shot!

What was I talking about again? Right...

The green cat is quite different from the other non-player cats, as many people in the community have noticed.

People appear to be under the assumption that the character is a complete mystery. That there isn't much told about them in the games.

This seems to stem from one crucial detail being overlooked.

And that's time! The train is just now arriving at the station.

Hopefully these explanations shed some light onto the more obscure aspects of the story and answered at least some of the questions you might have had.

I think I did quite well with regards to staying on topic, if I do say so myself.

Keep in mind that the 10th anniversary celebrations will continue for the rest of the year. And there's plenty more stuff in store! Make sure to stay tuned on our socials and keep checking the 10th anniversary page for all the latest updates.

See ya!
- Dev