While I love the original Blade Runner (Final Cut), I've found the subsequent returns to the world of Blade Runner don't hit the mark. 2049 is an especially low point for poor world building and story telling in my opinion.
(Don't confuse world building with production design, the level of detail put into the visuals and sound of 2049 is exceptional)
I'm looking forward to the RPG for the fantastic visuals and a different viewpoint to the established time lines.
For my actual games I'm toying with a number of one shots set in the leadup to 2019. Each one shot highlighting a divergence from our own timeline so there doesn't have to be a huge exposition drop when the main campaign starts.
2019 will be the point at which my campaign world diverges from that of the main Blade Runner property.
Why do you think ”2049 is an especially low point for poor world building and story telling”? I actually think that the sequel is a better movie than the original. I really like stuff like K:s identity issues, the memory designer, the orphanage, the ruins of Las Vegas and the visit att the corporate archive. All that stuff would be very useful in scenarios. Much of that could be useful also in 2037.
As i said just my opinion.
There have been very few films that i've had such a strong negative visceral reaction to on first viewing, Blade Runner 2049 is one of them.
It just didn't deliver for me.
A few of the issues I had, but in no means all
In November 2019, a small team of Nexus-6 Replicants steal into the Tyrell HQ on earth and kill the CEO of the only company apparently able to manufacture Replicants. The response to this assassination is to rush out a new version, the Nexus-8, without a lifespan restriction, that is actually prone to personality formation and rebellion faster than the Nexus-6?
If you take the three mini films (2022, 2036, 2039) as canon, you have Nexus-8 models with an incept date before the events of the original Blade Runner. Sapper Morton for example was 22 Mar 2019. Trixxie from 2022 has gone rogue within a year of her incept date (5 May 2021).
Not only does this seem a ridiculous progression it suggests that within the Blade Runner world ALL manufacture and data regarding Replicants is based within the Tyrell facilities on Earth specifically LA. If this is indeed the case then it also suggests that space-travel is far easier and mundane for Replicants to be taken from the surface of Earth to any of the off world colonies.
While I'm on Replicant development, 2049 feels the need to upgrade Rachel to a Nexus-7 , why?
In Blade Runner she is clearly referred to as a Type 6, there is nothing to dispute this in the original other than she has been exposed to the new advancement of burning in a real persons memories.
When Tyrell rolls out the Nexus-8 product line don't you think people are going to ask where are the Nexus-7s?
And on a similar note, given the imagined horrors and loss of life that is likely to occur from a prolonged power outage and the complete destruction of Tyrell's databases, why on earth would Wallace want to promote his replacement product line of Replicants as the direct descendants of Tyrell technology?
As an aside, and this is likely to be a production oversight, the Replicant Wallace displays to the authorities of LA. in 2036 is clearly identified as a Nexus-8 and not a Nexus-9. If this is indeed the case it suggests the biological component for control is not the Replicant model but instead the Memory implants.
If Nexus-9 control IS purely a factor of the memory implant process surely this would be under tighter controls and oversight than allowing an outside contractor to provide memories for Nexus-9s in sensitive roles. If Wallace Corporation are the sole providers of Replicants then they are the sole marketplace for the creation of memory implants. All they would have to do to buy out independent providers is to cancel their orders and financially cripple them. That is if the technology of memory recording and burning, something that seems just as important (if not more so) than Replicant production would be available outside of Wallace Corps to begin with.
While I'm on Memory Implants, what's the deal with that character? Okay she has a rare (made up) genetic disorder that compromises her immune system which triggered on puberty (very handy, at least it allows her to build up some memories). But, why would it confine her to a facility? We know the world of Blade Runner has expanded to off world colonies through faster than light space travel, and yet at no point has the Environmental Suit been developed?
And, she works from yet another example of a huge, brutal, industrial sized building that is staffed by one, apparently with no security.
This is a part of the world building that really bugs me. Given the overcrowded population all of the vast facilities have no staff. Or if they do they have to cover multiple roles.
Take Luv, Neander Wallace's right hand Replicant, not only is she head of security, and seemingly his personal assistant, she is also part of the sales team.
The vast files archives, inhabited by a single clerk.
This vast building that relies on construction methods that dwarf the already oversized, but just about believable Tyrell pyramids, suggests that vast construction projects are fairly easy.
Remind me again, why is Wallace Corps HQ on Earth given Neander and Luv's seeming hatred of having to return to search for Rachel's child? Surely it would be on one of the nine colonies Neander has already set up, somewhere with little if no oversight from meddling Earth authorities.
But this ease of construction also undermines Neander's whole drive.
Why would you want to reinvent a biological process that takes nine months before a physically risky birth, followed by years of maintenance to raise the child to adulthood?
The only example so far, was in a Nexus-7 that killed the mother and resulted in a child with a life impairing genetic mutation.
Or, he could invest the time and resources into production facilities on colonies that are able to churn out adult Nexus-9s with long lifespans, all to a preset and controllable template.
Of course Neander's whole being just seems to be to reduce women to a physical product, if they can't create life, or they don't look a specific way, they are disposable. In as cruel and graphic way as possible.
Don't even get me started on Joi.
Or K.
Or the Replicant uprising XD