The_Constable
1 review liked by The_Constable
Cyberpunk 2077
2020
You play as V, a merc with a past of your choice, who takes up a job that lands them into Night City. With your partner Jackie, you take on jobs, upgrade your gear, and run with the philosophy of "Go big or go home." However, one botched job leads Jackie to his death and your internal computers infected with a rockstar of the past named Johnny Silverhand. Johnny, to his chagrin, wants to take over V's entire brain and body but there's a catch where they can both perish from this infection. Now with a new brain buddy and a purpose to make it big for himself again, V takes on jobs in Night City and hopefully finds a solution/cure before his brain fries.
On paper, this concept is slick and has a lot of charm. Hell, even in execution quite a few story missions are handled with care when it comes to how the characters act and react to what they're given. Jackie's fun non-chalant attitude outside of work mixed with his on-edge persona when in the middle of gunfights is one of my favorites. Johnny's asshole attitude mixed with genuine bouts of sympathy/humor make him far more endearing than he really should be.
However, this is about where my praise ends and the rest of the game winds up being the most by-the-books open world game of having so much space but only a few things to do repeated across the entire map. What should feel like a fleshed out bustling city of people and crime moreso feels like a kid's playground where half the jungle gyms are broken and everyone there is just completely zoned out. The little personality given to NPCs only happens in very specific zones of the map where two or more NPCs are given a dialogue to 'spice things up' and make things feel more interesting than it actually is.
The gameplay itself is very standard first person shooter affair which doesn't really do anything wrong or right, just enough that it works. Really the worst of it is how unbalanced the game tends to be where you can perk into a couple skills (I went Street Brawler for melee combat) and completely trounce enemies multiple levels above you. Much of the elemental/substats of weapons feel pointless as it's better to go with something that has an overall higher DPS count. Given seeing how effective these stat payoffs are is pretty difficult with how flashy, fast, and difficult to read combat can be at almost any given time. Health bars and damage numbers being far too difficult to read in most cases.
Really this game's biggest crime for me is being an open world game with a lack of bite that the cyberpunk genre usually lends itself when tackling issues of transhumanism, capitalism and the ongoing arms race of technology. It tries to tackle some parts of this in some of its sidequests (and it does a good job more often than not). However it just doesn't take itself seriously in a way that it should, instead having characters who just act edgy and cool for the sake of being edgy and cool because THAT'S cyberpunk, apparently. The sheer amount of gross-out humor, over the top sexualization in the in-game ads, and nonchalant violence feels so out of tune and childish that half the time I feel like some edgy teen made this and it teeters a lot for me between very charming and just plain unfitting.
Also the game rewards you for working with the law, but you can't go against that otherwise you are a wanted criminal and can get shot down for it. The morality aspect is incredibly stupid and wish it wasn't tacked on as it is with being a cop-helper is rewarding but being a criminal is punishing. Despite the fact all you do is a lot of criminal actions in a fairly lawless city run by corrupt corps and law forces. It's so tonedeaf and off-kilter from what this game is that it restricts any level of freedom for the player instead just offering an illusion of freedom, choice, and morality, and instead just railroading them into obeying a system that you actively go against anyways despite it being a punishment.
The game's a mess, but one that's enjoyable if you don't think too hard about it. If you're actively looking for a good cyberpunk game, I'd recommend the Shadowrun games or even the Cyberpunk TTRPG. Grab some friends, get some drinks, snag some paper, and write down your character because it's going to offer a lot more interaction than this game does.
On paper, this concept is slick and has a lot of charm. Hell, even in execution quite a few story missions are handled with care when it comes to how the characters act and react to what they're given. Jackie's fun non-chalant attitude outside of work mixed with his on-edge persona when in the middle of gunfights is one of my favorites. Johnny's asshole attitude mixed with genuine bouts of sympathy/humor make him far more endearing than he really should be.
However, this is about where my praise ends and the rest of the game winds up being the most by-the-books open world game of having so much space but only a few things to do repeated across the entire map. What should feel like a fleshed out bustling city of people and crime moreso feels like a kid's playground where half the jungle gyms are broken and everyone there is just completely zoned out. The little personality given to NPCs only happens in very specific zones of the map where two or more NPCs are given a dialogue to 'spice things up' and make things feel more interesting than it actually is.
The gameplay itself is very standard first person shooter affair which doesn't really do anything wrong or right, just enough that it works. Really the worst of it is how unbalanced the game tends to be where you can perk into a couple skills (I went Street Brawler for melee combat) and completely trounce enemies multiple levels above you. Much of the elemental/substats of weapons feel pointless as it's better to go with something that has an overall higher DPS count. Given seeing how effective these stat payoffs are is pretty difficult with how flashy, fast, and difficult to read combat can be at almost any given time. Health bars and damage numbers being far too difficult to read in most cases.
Really this game's biggest crime for me is being an open world game with a lack of bite that the cyberpunk genre usually lends itself when tackling issues of transhumanism, capitalism and the ongoing arms race of technology. It tries to tackle some parts of this in some of its sidequests (and it does a good job more often than not). However it just doesn't take itself seriously in a way that it should, instead having characters who just act edgy and cool for the sake of being edgy and cool because THAT'S cyberpunk, apparently. The sheer amount of gross-out humor, over the top sexualization in the in-game ads, and nonchalant violence feels so out of tune and childish that half the time I feel like some edgy teen made this and it teeters a lot for me between very charming and just plain unfitting.
Also the game rewards you for working with the law, but you can't go against that otherwise you are a wanted criminal and can get shot down for it. The morality aspect is incredibly stupid and wish it wasn't tacked on as it is with being a cop-helper is rewarding but being a criminal is punishing. Despite the fact all you do is a lot of criminal actions in a fairly lawless city run by corrupt corps and law forces. It's so tonedeaf and off-kilter from what this game is that it restricts any level of freedom for the player instead just offering an illusion of freedom, choice, and morality, and instead just railroading them into obeying a system that you actively go against anyways despite it being a punishment.
The game's a mess, but one that's enjoyable if you don't think too hard about it. If you're actively looking for a good cyberpunk game, I'd recommend the Shadowrun games or even the Cyberpunk TTRPG. Grab some friends, get some drinks, snag some paper, and write down your character because it's going to offer a lot more interaction than this game does.