Somewhere between a high 8 and a low 9. There's a lot to take in from this game not only from its journey from launch to Phantom Liberty, but also the strange decisions made in presentation and gameplay.
The main story is fine. You can breeze past in pretty quickly, and it's strangely outdone by a lot of sidequests in the game. Judy's, Panam's, and Kerry's storylines provide a clearer understanding of game's themes, but the optionality of those quests and the shortness of the main questline end up hurting the pacing. I would have preferred if they were integrated into the main questline. There's some good set pieces in missions, but the real heart of the game are the characters. The game has a diverse set of well-written and memorable characters with their own connection with V. Each have something to add to the overall narrative of the game, and by the end of their storylines I felt they had influenced my character in some way. Romance is also an option for some of them, which is a cool addition but did not add much for me. The prerequisites for romance were a little odd for me, especially the lack of a bisexual option (Kerry Eurodyne is bisexual in the source material, but is made gay in the game). The text messaging system was nice and built a lot of personality for characters. V being pre-defined felt weird at times as the game tries to appear as a true rpg with choices, but most dialogue choices lead you down the same path with little difference. Fem V gives a really good performance along with other standouts with only the celebrity cameos feeling strange (excluding Idris Elba). Keanu gives an okay performance that hurts Johnny's character.
The gameplay is a bit mixed. Most encounters start you out in stealth and from there you can proceed to go gun's blazing, with occasional consequence based off combat approach. There are encounters that force you into different playstyles, especially boss encounters, which hurts role-playing. Night City does feel alive, full of areas with their own personality. There is a lot of content, albeit a lot of it is fluff that can be easily skipped.
The ends are pretty typical of what you would expect. The game struggles with reactivity in the end, with surprisingly little difference in epilogues for the main endings. This is especially true for non-romanced romance options (even ones not available), as they have the same ending regardless of your final choice, excluding 3 endings, two of which you are not "main" endings. Even so, there is a good emotional payoff by the time you reach the end credits, one that made me genuinely emotional. I won't remember anything about the gameplay, but the story and characters will stick with me for a long time.
The main story is fine. You can breeze past in pretty quickly, and it's strangely outdone by a lot of sidequests in the game. Judy's, Panam's, and Kerry's storylines provide a clearer understanding of game's themes, but the optionality of those quests and the shortness of the main questline end up hurting the pacing. I would have preferred if they were integrated into the main questline. There's some good set pieces in missions, but the real heart of the game are the characters. The game has a diverse set of well-written and memorable characters with their own connection with V. Each have something to add to the overall narrative of the game, and by the end of their storylines I felt they had influenced my character in some way. Romance is also an option for some of them, which is a cool addition but did not add much for me. The prerequisites for romance were a little odd for me, especially the lack of a bisexual option (Kerry Eurodyne is bisexual in the source material, but is made gay in the game). The text messaging system was nice and built a lot of personality for characters. V being pre-defined felt weird at times as the game tries to appear as a true rpg with choices, but most dialogue choices lead you down the same path with little difference. Fem V gives a really good performance along with other standouts with only the celebrity cameos feeling strange (excluding Idris Elba). Keanu gives an okay performance that hurts Johnny's character.
The gameplay is a bit mixed. Most encounters start you out in stealth and from there you can proceed to go gun's blazing, with occasional consequence based off combat approach. There are encounters that force you into different playstyles, especially boss encounters, which hurts role-playing. Night City does feel alive, full of areas with their own personality. There is a lot of content, albeit a lot of it is fluff that can be easily skipped.
The ends are pretty typical of what you would expect. The game struggles with reactivity in the end, with surprisingly little difference in epilogues for the main endings. This is especially true for non-romanced romance options (even ones not available), as they have the same ending regardless of your final choice, excluding 3 endings, two of which you are not "main" endings. Even so, there is a good emotional payoff by the time you reach the end credits, one that made me genuinely emotional. I won't remember anything about the gameplay, but the story and characters will stick with me for a long time.