Cyberpunk 2077

Like many, I trusted that CD Projekt RED would deliver on these promises (I still do,). The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt (released in 2015) had a "shotty" launch; filled with bugs and glitches that took away from the overall immersion of the game. Months after it's release, most if not all of it's issues were fixed and The Witcher 3 is acclaimed to be one of the greatest games of this generation. It's success solidified CD Projekt RED as serious game developer.

Posted on January 10, 2013, CD Projekt RED released the first teaser for Cyberpunk 2077. It depicts a news broadcast of Night City Police Department responding to a street massacre by a CyberPsycho armed with Mantis Blade (more on those later). The pre-generated graphics displayed in the trailer are top-notch; showcasing a high level of detail in the modeling, realistic subsurface scattering, and amazing light refraction and reflection, among other impressive virtues. Impressive is an understatement.

This post was followed by radio-silence until an Official Trailer for Cyberpunk 2077 was published on June 10, 2018 during E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo) 2018. A private gameplay demo was shown exclusively at E3 2018 to certain game developers and Journalist. CD Projekt fans asked for it to be made public; CD Projekt retorted with a 48 minute gameplay walkthrough published on August 27, 2018.

This gameplay reveal showed fans a myriad of gameplay integrations they could look forward to in Cyberpunk 2077. Highlights from this was dynamically scripted AI, meaning that every NPC the player encountered would have their own daily routine and would act realistically to external stimuli; also remembering the player. Also, NPC interaction was promised to be flushed out and interpersonal; one point CD Projekt made was that the player could start a conversation with any NPC, build a relationship and invite said NPC to "V's Apartment" for intercourse.

Going back to memory, if the player assaulted an NPC, said NPC could have gang affiliation; sending his friends on a hit against the player. Only one instance of this was shown in the gameplay trailer; V and Jackie are blocked by a van filled with Scavengers, who pursue and shoot at them.

Rather than dismantle and make heated statements against CD Projekt and their promises for Cyberpunk 2077, I'm going to write this review more like a color piece. I have a personal policy that I abide by to where I don't review anything unless it's completed and I have cleared it at least once. The latter happened.

At the time of writing, I personally have 84 hours 33 minutes clocked in one playthrough of Cyberpunk 2077. That's more than fair enough to make an "objective claim" to the quality of this title.

Cyberpunk isn't new; the first publication of "Cyberpunk" was released January 1, 1988. Dubbed "Cyberpunk: The Roleplaying Game of the Dark Future;" it's a tabletop roleplaying game, much like Dungeons and Dragons. Cyberpunk has nine "Roles" which acts as it's class system. Rockerboy, Solo, Netrunner, Techie, Media, Cops, Corporate, Fixer and Nomad.

Given the amount of variety of ways to play, each session of Cyberpunk had countless possibilities. Talk your way out of a shitty situation, slice your foes to ribbons, commit corporate espionage; the choice truly belonged to the player.