I have been part of the hype train of Cyberpunk 2077 since its announcement in 2012. In 2019, there was a writing contest online where the topic was about why Cyberpunk 2077 is going to change the world of gaming forever. The winner will get a pre-order copy of the game. Shamelessly, I wrote down everything that I could think of when it comes to a new kind of open-world action RPG based on what CD Projekt Red has told us leading up to its delayed release to December 10, 2020.
A few months have passed since the writing contest, and I got an email saying I won it. I thought it was a scam at first until I found a pre-ordered copy of Cyberpunk 2077 waiting in my Steam library. I was so happy, and I could hardly wait until its release in 2020.
Unfortunately, I cannot vouch for what I wrote down in that writing contest.
First Impression on Cyberpunk 2077
So there I was on December 10, 2020, very excited to open Cyberpunk 2077. My PC runs on an MSI GTX 1660 Ti, Intel i7-7700, 16 GB of RAM, and 2 TB of SSD. Overall, the game was running smoothly at high settings under 1080p resolutions. However, there were some occasional frame dips here and there, but I was fine with that since I know there will be upcoming patches to its optimization. What I WAS NOT okay with is the unbelievable amount of bugs. And they’re not just any bugs, they’re game-breaking bugs.
Look, I’m all for bugs really, and I can tolerate those since they can make the game funny and even better at times. I even did love Skyrim when it first came out because of its messy bugs, but I wasn’t hyped about the game. But if you’ve waited eight years with the claim of the developer saying they’ll release it “when it’s ready” and you trust those words, it’s a different topic.
Over-Promised Yet Delivered on Most Areas
While I may not have praised this game as a sort of second coming of Jesus Christ, I did expect CDPR to live up to their promises. These include diversified weapons, gameplay similar to Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Mankind divided, and the world of Night City as a living breathing universe. Add to that are entering multiple buildings, interacting with all the stores and vendors, people noticing your fashion (even if you go butt naked).
Sadly, none of these ever came to blossom.
And then there’s the combat and driving. Both are stiff; that’s all I can say. And what’s up with the melee mechanics, though? Enemies are bullet sponges; you can’t even know what level they are, so you’re practically messed up if you think you can raid a territory only to die in just two hits. Other than that, weapons are loot-em-ups with different tiers and the ammo count is oddly scarce. As for the driving, well, let’s just say it’s so floaty, especially if you are used to GTA 4 and 5’s driving system.
However, what they did nail very hard is the story. The voice acting is amazing, the narration makes sense, the pacing is consistent, and the sarcasm of Johnny Silverhand. While I did expect the game to have more choices and your decisions ultimately changing the balance of the city, it was quite linear. I wasn’t able to shoot certain NPCs and get away with them just because I wanted to like in Deus Ex, and the first act all ended in the same way. Moreover, most of the dialogues (emphasis on MOST) in the game do not affect the story at all.
Final Thoughts
Yet, in the end, I did have a good time with the game mainly because of the story and the beauty. However, the NPCs, the textures, the optimization, just about everything else besides the stories and side missions really need some big improvements. Right now, the game is dying. But if I were to predict its state six months to two years from now, I would say it would have been what it should have back on December 10, 2020.
