When Cyberpunk 2077 went live in December 2020, there were many reasons to be excited about the game. It was made by CD Projekt Red who made The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt which won Game of the Year in 2016. Keanu Reeves voice acts as one of the main characters in the storyline. It brought comics and stories from the 1980s, 90s, and today to life. Netflix also released an animated series called Cyberpunk Edgerunners to go along with the game’s release, just to name a few reasons to be excited. Unfortunately, upon the game’s release, all of this was overshadowed by the game’s performance, which was riddled with glitches and bugs, so much so that it was nearly unplayable.
To put this in perspective, there was a peak player base of 830K players on Steam in December 2020. In January 2021, it was down to 225K players, and in February, it was 47K Players and continuing to drop dramatically. It was arguably one of the worst game releases in gaming history due to the huge hype surrounding the game just to be released with so many issues.
However, all of that has changed now. There are very few known issues in Cyberpunk 2077 now because it has all been fixed. Players are slowly beginning to return to the game after nearly two years to give it another try without the bugs and glitches. Many of the players who have come back are now able to experience what all the hype was about in late 2020, a technology-enhanced, dystopian, open-world solo Role-playing game (RPG) with a story that is interesting and full of twists and turns.
Without giving too much away, the game is set in future America (2077) in Night City. Technology has progressed to a point where it is casually implanted in the human body to enhance human abilities. Capitalism has taken over society. Major corporations run every aspect of government and are willing to sacrifice countless human lives to achieve their goals. This is where the player comes in. We play a character named V, and we use the corporations’ own technology and tools against them to achieve our goals. However, something goes wrong on a mission, and now all of your goals have to be put aside just to find a way to save your own life.
The gameplay is a lot like Grand Theft Auto 5 (GTA5) if it were set 50+ years in the future. The player can run or drive around completing missions, or they can pick fights with random people and get into fights with the cops. The mission system is robust, with dozens of side missions as well as in-depth story missions that deal with the main story, as explained above. Due to the nature of the game, the main story is more about watching the story and understanding the dialog than actually playing. That being said, much of the dialog gives the player choices, and depending on what is chosen, the story changes, which also changes how the rest of the game will play out.
How a player decides to enjoy the game is up to them, if they want to make enemies of everyone, that is an option, but on the flip side, players can also surround themselves with allies and gain more influence in Night City.
If you are interested, the Netflix animated series Cyberpunk Edgerunners is like a sneak peek into the game Cyberpunk 2077. Just like the game, the series starts out slow but becomes more interesting as the episodes progress. There are multiple parallels between the game and the series. Please be aware that the game and series is explicit with nudity, profanity, and death, but if that is not an issue, definitely take a look at the series.
The end of the year is an important time for the gaming industry. It is generally when new games and content are released across the gaming industry, which is no different for Cyberpunk 2077. CD Projekt Red has announced that it will release DLC in November 2022 for Cyberpunk that will be on the level of Witcher 3’s Blood and Wine DLC. Blood and Wine is known across the gaming industry as the largest and best DLCs to ever be released in any game, so if the new Cyberpunk 2077 DLC, Phantom Liberty, can live up to that standard, players are in for a treat.
