[General Battuta]

His journey into the alternative universe, and his reconciliation with his son, would, I imagine, very much change the elder Bei's perspective on his orders.

[Androgeos Exeunt]

E, Norbert. His family name's [size=9]Bei[/size].

[terran_emperor]

Just out of curiosity, how do people pronounce his name?

I pronounce it "bay"...
Cos in chinese, "ei" is pronounced "ay"
Mei => May
Fei => Fay
Wei => Way
By that logic
Bei => Bay

[Jeff Vader]

Well, yes, in your English terms, I'd pronounce it "bay". IT immediately struck my mind as such, and we Finns would also pronounce it like that in any case.

[Androgeos Exeunt]

That's how "Bei" is pronounced, yes. I (still) know a bit of Chinese from secondary school, so I know. And so does Stormkeeper, for that matter.

[Colonol Dekker]

Phonetically in english thats BAY as well, as in Reign or Sleigh

[Androgeos Exeunt]

True.

[foolfromhell]

Spoiler:

Well, BETAC might signify the GTVA as the only legitimate authority, but

A. BETAC was signed after the Sol Node collapsed. That's like the USA passing a law saying the USA is the only legitimate government in North America. Hundreds of years after Mexico and Canada were formed.

B. Even if Earth was part of GTVA when they signed BETAC, the collapse of Sol Node has unique circumstances. Under BETAC, they would need to follow the GTVA security council, to whom they would have no access to. If they were bound to BETAC still, they would not legally be able to form a government.

C. The UE ship was probably given orders to investigate the jump node and to not accept unification yet. They were probably instructed to tell the GTVA Earth is sovereign for now.

D. You cant just go and rampage around a planet just because they were yours 60 years ago. Things change. That's quite literally like having your wife accidentally marooned on an island, and expecting things to just be peachy 60 years later when she swims back to the mainland...

[General Battuta]

Maybe High Command played too much Inferno.

[-Norbert-]

D. You cant just go and rampage around a planet just because they were yours 60 years ago.

I'd say it was the other way round. Earth was the place of government of the GTA and thus the other systems belonged to Earth, not the other way round.
If the GTVA would love law so much as to follow it to the letter, it would make more sense to join Earth and accept the elders council as their superiours than trying to take over the Sol system.

Besides I have a problem with the BETAC saying the GTVA is the only legal government. That would mean they "own" the entire universe. Didn't the BETAC specify in which systems it was the legal government?
And considering that nobody from the Sol system ever signed the BETAC (or had any chance to hear about it) it simply doesn't count there, at least if you take todays international law or any national law as example (barring the occasional communistically or dicatorialy governed country)

[General Battuta]

It was obviously GTVA High Command's cynical and paranoiac attempt to seize control of a dangerous unknown element in one fell swoop -- rather than risk drawn-out war or the potential collapse of the GTVA in the face of a massive return-to-Earth movement.

At least in my analysis.

[Snail]

Besides I have a problem with the BETAC saying the GTVA is the only legal government. That would mean they "own" the entire universe. Didn't the BETAC specify in which systems it was the legal government?

BETAC dismantled the governments of the Terran blocs and recognized the General Assembly, the Security Council, and the Vasudan Imperium as the supreme authorities of Terran-Vasudan space.

No, not the whole universe.

[Droid803]

Well, I guess a factor in the GTVA's decision is that the GTVA ruling council doesn't want to secede even a bit of power to Sol...
Human (and possibly Vasudan) greed.

[Snail]

Well, I guess a factor in the GTVA's decision is that the GTVA ruling council doesn't want to secede even a bit of power to Sol...
Human (and possibly Vasudan) greed.

Well if you read the summary on the Wiki it kind of says that Emperor Khonsu II didn't want much to do with the Earth war... Or at least didn't share GTVA High Command's opinions on the matter.

[Dark Hunter]

I'd think the Vasudans would stay neutral in the conflict... what the Terrans do with their homeworld isn't any of their business, really. Either way it doesn't much affect the Vasudan government.

On the other hand, they might support the GTVA's decision on the grounds that Earth may not have gotten over their xenophobia regarding the Vasudans. Earth has had none of the team spirit that represents the GTVA since the end of the war. As far as anyone on Earth remembers, Vasuda is a power hostile to humans, that reluctantly teamed up with them to defeat the Shivans. The Vasudans might have feared what Earth would do when they entered the playing field again.

But, yeah, the Terran bloc of the GTVA has gotten comfy ruling Terran space, and don't want to hand that power over to Earth. Thus, they hoped to hit Earth with a surprise assault and end it quickly.

[Chrisatsilph]

Ending took me by surprise, I thought they were there to bring peace. Well that what happens when you got too much power I suppose =/.

[eliex]

I'd think the Vasudans would stay neutral in the conflict... what the Terrans do with their homeworld isn't any of their business, really. Either way it doesn't much affect the Vasudan government.

It is certain that some Vasudan assets will take part in WiH.

[CaptJosh]

Droid, you mean the GTVA doesn't want to CEDE any authority to earth. Secede is a totally different word.

[Droid803]

Yep. Used the wrong word.

[Tomo]

I'm afraid I found that Journey's End spoiled the campaign as it was completely unbelievable.
A shame, because the story and gameplay right up until that moment was truly excellent.

Three things bugged me particularly:

1) It doesn't make any sense to issue an ultimatum of that kind to any single vessel.
They cannot possibly have the authority to accept - it would have to go all the way to the very top of their command structure.

The only reasoning could be that the GTVA genuinely wanted to fight another war with an almost completely unknown foe - they only have info from a couple of probes.
They could not have seen any of the 'heavy weapons' of the opponents - just the physical size of the capships.

Which is nuts - nobody chooses to start an invasion without very good intelligence.

2) The reaction of the ship doesn't compute either. The sane response (after the attack commenced) would be to run like hell, not wander into range of the blob turrets and sit there for several minutes until destroyed.

3) The vessel took *far* too long to die. It should be destroyed within seconds of opening fire - on my runthrough it took almost 3 minutes!

I'll assume that the ending was intended to set the scene for a sequel, thus the finality was required.

As I've always believed never to criticise without offering possible improvements, here's a couple of suggestions:

A few relatively minor script changes would make the end more believable:
A more direct statement of the GTVA intention to annex, the GTVA should fire warning shots before directly attacking, and should repeat their surrender and boarding demand.
The warning shots could be the trigger for the ship to return fire, and it then should be destroyed almost immediately.

Possibly the ship should 'accidentally' hit some other GTVA capships instead of the flagship with a 'big gun', which would cause them to open fire on the ship as well - thus faster destruction. (Would have to do significant damage in one hit to make that work - railgun?)

That's closer to the kind of 'apparent misunderstanding' that would be believable 'back home' (both sides).
- Remember that the GTVA military do have to answer to civilians. If they're intent on having a war 'for fun', they've got to sell it to the civilians who pay for the war - probably by engineering a misunderstanding.

Also, if the sequence from "Standing orders confirmed" to destruction happens *really fast*, then the player is more likely to be simply blown away by the speed of events and not question them too much.
(Several parts of Derelict don't really make sense, but they happen too fast to question their believability until much later)

Bei's choice to join his father in defection can be triggered by his father's response.

I genuinely thought "That's really crazy. Am I supposed to take out my own capship turrets to save the ship?"