Cyberpunk 2077: Bug Ridden Masterpiece
Cyberpunk 2077 is an open-world first-person role-playing game developed by CD Projekt Red and released on December 10th, 2020. After 8 years in development, the game has finally been released and the hype built up has been insane, to say the least. Let’s discuss the story, you play as a man called “V” and you have the choice of three backstories. Nomad, the people who live in the deserts of Night City. Streetkid, people who’ve been living on the streets and know all the slang and gangs. And my personal choice, Corpo, a big businessman in a giant corporation who usually uses money and other people to handle their dirty work. Each of these decisions will influence the prologue and future dialogue choices may have unique interactions based on your backstory. For instance, if I were to talk to someone and they wanted to hire a corporation for some help I could tell that person that that decision may not be wise because of my backstory as a Corpo. With backstory selected, you then create a character and then after that are thrown into the game until you eventually meet your best friend Jackie and then explore the world that is Cyberpunk.
The backstory behind Cyberpunk is that cybernetics has become all the rage and pretty much everyone has them. However, most people are basically controlled by these big corporations that have tons of power and money and cybernetics that blow everyone else out of the park. This usually leads those who are poor to suffer and those at the top to keep getting more money and power. This has led to massive amounts of crime and you will usually encounter a gunfight between gangs and police which you can also participate in. Next, let's talk about visuals.
The game is nothing short of beautiful, you can tell that everything in the city is handcrafted and detail was put first and foremost when making this city. The attention to detail is insane and every different area in the city really feels unique. The many different cybernetic parts displayed on people and the different attires for gangs, civilians, and cops are all so very well done. All the weapons look fantastic and vehicles are also really well made and drive quite well.
Discussing guns, the combat is not the best it could be. Early on in the game it really felt like enemies were just bullet sponges and were taking forever to kill. This may be because I was playing on the hard difficulty but it still felt like I should’ve been doing more. As I started to level up and pick more combat-focused perks with high damage weapons like sniper rifles it started to become better. However, this is when you start to realize that the AI is completely dumb. They either push you with no regard for their lives or sit and wait for you for hours on end. If they do push you they just usually get funneled through doorways as they walk in 1 by 1. Sometimes they don’t even shoot at you. They might just end up standing there looking around and not notice you or end up in a t-pose and get stuck.
Even with those flaws though, I still find combat pretty fun at the moment. I also know that a lot of things will be fixed in future updates as the game only just came out. There is a lot of bugs and I mean a lot. T-posing people, people gliding across the ground, all civilians disappearing, quests not registering, items falling the ground, items not being able to be picked up, and the list goes on. However, even will all those flaws, the game is extremely enjoyable. Combat is fun most of the time, the story is fantastic and so are all the characters, driving is extremely good, cybernetics and hacking are cool additions, and the art is fantastic. Give the game a few weeks and I know it will be completely patched and the game will be highly praised then. I give the game a 9/10 and potentially a 10/10 when all the issues are fixed.
