This trailer certainly takes a turn
The theme for the entirety of Rage 2‘s launch trailer is turning back the clock, mostly in a “Wait, how did we get here?!” kind of way. It’s very 80s schlock which is good but expected.
Then Rage 2 turns the clock back even farther — to 2011 and the original Rage. “Lame Ending! That’s all I get? A cutscene of some ground shaking?” writes a dissatisfied player. Then the clock keeps rewinding. Before, he bought Rage, before he was born, before his parents were married, before da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. It rewinds until it can’t rewind anymore, all the way back to a cat licking a lollipop.
This may read like a Joe Rogan DMT-fueled dreamscape, and, to be honest, I can’t be certain it isn’t. It’s batshit bananas. But, between all that nonsense and the excellent Doom-looking action, I can’t remember a launch trailer that did a better job of making me want to actually play the game.