Jackie Welles

Jackie Welles was a merc from Heywood who teamed up with V to become legends of Night City. He is one of V's early points of contact as well as the player's partner during several missions. He valued friendship, loyalty, and family above all else. Eventually he would plan to provide for his own family and live in luxury, but he got impatient because this was still just an elusive dream.

2047 - 2060s
Jackie Welles was born in 2047. When he was a child, his father would get drunk and beat him and his mother mercilessly with his belt, but when Jackie became strong enough, he returned the favor and hospitalized him, and threated to kill the old man if he returned home. His father left and was never seen again. Jackie kept his father's belt and planned to use it on him if he ever returned.

Jackie grew up in the same streets with Misty Olszewski and the two saw each other a lot, though they never got together. At the age of fifteen Jackie first got on a bike, and since then he has been tinkering with any that he could get his hands on.

Early on, Jackie joined the Valentinos along with Gustavo Orta, quickly becoming both friends. However, a near-fatal incident from getting shot in a firefight during a gang war with the Maelstrom convinced Jackie to leave the gang for the sake of his mother when he was 19, but he stayed on good terms with the gang and Padre.

2076
In 2076, Jackie began dating Misty. Jackie's mother disapproved of Misty and preferred his ex-girlfriend, Camilla, but Jackie continued to see Misty and even attempted to understand her spiritualism by making a mandala in his garage.

Much later that same year, depending on the lifepath chosen for V by the player, Jackie will have a different introduction, with each having a different intro questline that leads into the main plot:


 * Jackie hires V to smuggle a crate from the SoCal Badlands into Night City. After crossing the border, they are pursued by an Arasaka convoy, but manage to slip away through the Biotechnica Flats. With the car broken down and no where to go, Jackie offers V to stay with him until they have enough money.


 * Jackie encounters V while attempting to steal a luxury car. They are arrested, however, by an old NCPD acquaintance of Jackie, inspector Henry Stints. The car's owner appears and orders Stints to kill them. The inspector then orders his men to knock them out, and decides to toss them on a back alley; bruised but alive. Afterwards Jackie introduces himself to V, stating he has seen them a few times in El Coyote Cojo. Then Jackie invites V to a breakfast, eventually offering them to stay in his apartment until they have enough money.


 * Jackie is a long time friend and confidant of V, helping them out whenever possible. During a meeting in Lizzie's Bar, an Arasaka entourage strips V of their corporate status, but before proceeding to execute them, Jackie intervenes. Afterwards the former Valentino ensures V this is a new start over for them, offering V to stay in his apartment until they have enough money.

2077
Six months later by late April 2077, Jackie and V were recruited by Dexter DeShawn to steal the Relic from Yorinobu Arasaka for Evelyn Parker. During The Heist at Konpeki Plaza, Jackie was fatally wounded. Although he and V managed to escape the hotel, Jackie succumbed to his wounds in the Delamain Cab before it arrived at the No-Tell Motel for the meetup with Dexter. V decided where Delamain should transport his remains.


 * Mama Welles called V and mentioned his family and friends were conducting a traditional ofrenda to mourn his loss. Guests include Viktor Vektor, Padre, several Valentinos, and Misty if V insists that she should attend in spite of Jackie's mother's opinion. V can choose to speak at the ofrenda. When the ceremony concludes, Jackie's mother presents V with the key to Jackie's beloved ARCH motorcycle as a parting gift. After The Heist you can find Jackie interred in the Columbarium in the south part of North Oak. The epitaph on his tomb reads: "Good night, sweet prince."


 * After Jackie's body was delivered to Viktor Vektor, Arasaka paid him a visit and took it from him. Takemura revealed later to V that Arasaka used Soulkiller to find out more about the heist. Few engrams were meant to learn more about the Relic's true nature. Visiting Mikoshi with Hanako Arasaka, V can ask to talk to Jackie's engram, but quickly realizes that it is just data pretending to be human. Later, a vision of Jackie appears to V in a nightmare, where he tries to give V the relic chip just before waking up.


 * After V brought Alt into the Arasaka Tower computers, she destroyed Mikoshi and had Jackie's engram together with many others fuse with the image of her to become an even more powerful AI. After V connects to Mikoshi, shortly before joining with Johnny and Alt in cyberspace, Jackie's engram appears on a simulation of the rooftop of Misty's Esoterica. After talking to him for a short while, V quickly realizes that it is not really him, but just an algorithm, and bids a final farewell.

Associated Quests

 * The Nomad
 * The Streetkid
 * The Corpo-Rat
 * Practice Makes Perfect
 * The Rescue
 * The Ripperdoc
 * The Ride
 * The Pickup
 * The Heist
 * Totalimmortal (as simulated construct; dependent)
 * Changes (as simulated construct; dependent)
 * Where is My Mind? (in a dream)

Development
Jackie played a major role in the Cyberpunk 2077 48-minute gameplay reveal, serving as V's partner on the mission Breaking Through, wherein V is tasked with rescuing Sandra Dorsett from the Scavengers before they harvest her body. In the gameplay reveal Jackie had a car which V could drive.

In the 2019 E3 cinematic trailer Jackie accompanies V on a mission from Dex to steal a special cybernetic augmentation chip. Although the chip is successfully retrieved, V essentially botches the mission by drawing too much attention to the theft and Jackie is presumably killed in the ensuing firefight, leaving V heartbroken and wracked with guilt.

In a recent #REDstreams livestream, senior quest designer Patrick Mills noted that in a very early version of the game's story, Jackie was originally supposed to be an annoyance towards the player, and was the original cause for The Heist featured in the prologue failing.