Robots would be easier and cheaper.
Except they're not. No robot can do what a human can do. Not completely. And not all in one package. One or two robots can out perform humans at chess or go. One or two robots can compete on Jeopardy. Giant, stationary robots can lift and move huge weights. And they're far more expensive than clones. Look at real-world present day technology. And it's fiction. It's the author's prerogative to write the story however they want.
Philip Dick stories are really horror first and science fiction second.
As someone who's read almost every word the man ever published, I think that's laughably inaccurate.
And the horror is about dissolving the boundaries of the self and being stripped of the fundamentals of humanity. I see the sci-fi elements as a tool for turning these ideas into narratives that can be communicated. They don't need to make any more sense than in Star Trek or Inception.
The bulk of PKD's work centers around the nature of reality and perception of it. Some of his stories deal with what it means to be human, memories, and empathy...like Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and We Can Remember it For You Wholesale.
If asking questions like "what does it mean to be human?" and "what is the nature of reality?" makes something horror for you, then I guess you could twist and mangle PKD's work and call it horror. But it's really not.
Also, in the novel the humans as the species are dealing with major existential crisis. They essentially are facing their own psychological extinction event - that's why Rick is having artificially induced quarrel with his wife, that's why there is the artificial participation in the suffering of their new Saviour.
At the start of the novel they're fighting over whether Iran, Deckard's wife, will use the mood organ to artificially change her mood to something happy or positive. It's not a fight that's artificially induced.
And physical extinction event as well.
Humanity is going back to its roots in search of a meaning to its existence.
They seem to have found it with the empathy box and Mercerism. I'm not sure that's what I'd call "roots" of humanity.
At the same time Replicants are imbued with all psychological qualities humans lost. They struggle because they were built to do so. Their lack of free will makes them not-human.
Rachel's act of vengeance vs. Deckard lack of ability to question himself is at the core of the novel.
The novel and the first film approach similar subject, with the novel being much more pessimistic despite Deckard being "saved" by Mercer and Rachel.
No offense meant, but you might want to re-read the novel. I just finished it for like the 20th time a few days ago and this doesn't track.
Some humans are mutated and less smart than baseline humans. Replicants are also designed with a range of mental capabilities. The only thing replicants lack is empathy. They have free will. Which is necessary for them to rebel, kill humans, and illegally go to earth...which is the inciting incident that kicks off the novel. If they had no free will...there'd be no novel.
Rachel does what she does specifically because Deckard doesn't lover her more than his wife and his pet.
And the second 1/3 to 1/2 of the novel is Deckard questioning himself.
In what way does Rachel save Deckard in the novel? That's not how it plays out.
I wonder if the game will allow us to explore the novel concepts.
I really hope so. There's so much more texture and richness to the novel than the movies.
I've been pretty surprised at how slow the progress has been, too. It's moving along at about half the daily rate of TOR 2e during the same period in its campaign.
Maybe that's because there aren't as many add-ons? More people want to buy this stuff than play it.
But also TOR 2e had some really juicy additional content as stretch goals, like additional books. Maybe they realized in hindsight that it wasn't worth stretching themselves like that? Or maybe it's just that they can't exactly pump out or even promise to pump out a slew of additional BR books, since that means making up tons of new lore and having all of it approved by Alcion (whereas with a LotR license there's tons of available source material that's part of the license).
Plus, TOR 2e had a monster final stretch goal: solo mode. That seemed to really light a fire under the campaign. I get why FL doesn't want to try for that as part of this first BR campaign, but I don't know if they can come up with a similarly enticing stretch goal, unless they figure out more dice colors or an origami unicorn kit or something (barf).
I'm not sure they're even going to make the listed stretch goals, much less any new ones added on.
I'm a dice fiend and I don't care about the dice colors. Or the origami foil cover vs the kanji. It's weird. There's only like two people talking about those things. I'm much more interested in solo mode. I think it would be far easier than Tomas estimates. Whatever random process they're using for the random case file generation system could just as easily be used by the player as they play. Mystery games aren't about hiding information behind rolls, they're about deciphering what the information means. And something like Blade Runner is more action-adventure with a dose of noir. From the start Deckard knows who is and who isn't a replicant and simply tracks them down. In the book there's more of a "who's who" and mystery element. Unless they add a lot of proper murder mystery and noir to the game, it's not likely to be a huge pillar.
www.enworld.org
www.kickstarter.com
