It's pretty similar to what we actually saw in the game, with one major change--there is a woman on Mars that announces the arrival of the Traveler. Was she literally the Speaker for the Travel?

I just saw this on reddit. Never heard about this before, or seen anything about it, but it's neat to see.

Video link.

Interesting. The astronauts exit their craft and walk along Mars like in the final version, but here they don’t just encounter that strange woman (who, it should be noted, isn’t wearing a spacesuit and seems fine) but she is near and possibly the survivor of a wrecked space ship! That’s quite the change!

The story of the Ares One (the astronaut ship that met the Traveler on Mars) is really interesting and perhaps farther reaching than one would think (the Ares One might have brought the early core of Rasputin to Mars). The guns they had were mentioned twice that I can recall...

We carried rifles. They made us heavier and slower and probably less safe.

(Ghost Fragment: Human 3)

One more thing. They've given us guns and renamed us. Something about needing to be ready for the worst.

(Hardy’s Control)

...but now I wonder if maybe they were left over from a late story change or something similar?