CD Projekt RED just gave us our first glimpse of Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay.
In fact, the Polish studio shared a whopping 48 minutes of gameplay, all of which you can watch here, in up to 4k resolution, no less.
So what to make of this massive gameplay reveal? CDPR was quick to note that all the footage was pre-release and therefore anything and everything about it could potentially change before release (whenever that will be.)
Finished product or not, I still think we can take away quite a bit from the sprawling demo. Here are some rough impressions based on the Twitch stream and some perusing of the video in 4k afterwards.
The Good
Well, mostly everything was good. What stood out to me the most was the bustling Night City itself. Not just the quantity of NPCs in the crowd but the sheer variety of different character models. How many open-world cities have we meandered through in our gaming past? And out of these, how many have been peopled with such a diverse cast of extras? I think we've become so accustomed to this we barely notice it anymore, but watching the scene play out as V walked out into the city street...I was just blown away.
I'm also a fan of the character customization options, which look robust. It's a nice change from a fixed character like we had in The Witcher series, though I still love Geralt. Actually, I'd love a game set in The Witcher universe where you could fully customize your protagonist.
I love that you can play as a man or a woman and I love that the character you choose is going to look good. No Mass Effect: Andromeda here, though it does remind me of that series and being able to play as Shepard or Fem-Shep. I'll probably play this as Fem-V unless the male voice actor is way better. What can I say? Roleplaying games are for roleplaying.
The world and characters and systems of Cyberpunk 2077 all look fantastic from this 48 minute reveal. The ability to mod yourself with cybernetics is going to open up all kinds of character builds and gameplay variety. The sheer scope of Night City, a rich and detailed metropolis at once colorful and gritty, is enough to make you salivate.
And the vehicle gameplay also looks pretty great, though I guess you never know until you get your hands behind the wheel. Batman: Arkham Knight looked like it was going to have cool vehicular gameplay and I maintain to this day that the Batmobile ruined that game.
In any case, most everything we saw in this gameplay reveal was amazing.
So let's move on to . . . .
The Bad
I've lamented the fact that this game is in first-person for sometime now, and this trailer only makes me lament that much harder. Oh gnashing of teeth! Oh rending of garments!
Look at V! She's awesome. She's hot, she's a badass, she's got sweet hair and a cool jacket and we're only going to ever see this in cut-scenes. And isn't it a little weird to play in first-person and then have cut-scenes that show your avatar? Isn't that "immersion" killing. I put "immersion" in scare quotes because that's the buzz word every developer uses when they talk about why they chose first-person over third.
Here's my feeling on this: The only time to choose first-person over third-person is if you're really adamant about making a shooting game. There's just no doubt that first-person shooters make for more rewarding gameplay. Sure, I love a third-person shooter from time-to-time, but while Uncharted may have a better story than Call of Duty, the latter has much better shooting mechanics.
So if CDPR is going for a shooter-intensive game then maybe I can see this decision. The problem? From what we saw in the gameplay reveal the shooting doesn't look very good. It's insanely spongey, first of all. Every enemy is a bullet-sponge.
I'm not against the floating damage numbers (which you can almost certainly turn off) and the arcadey feel, but I don't like bullet-sponge shooters. It's what first turned me off to The Division. It's tedious and unrealistic and I simply loathe tedium in games. It's why I'm always a bit down on very grindy games like Monster Hunter or Destiny. I'm just more of a story-and-action type of guy. Give me a good story, awesome levels / open world and good combat and I'm a happy man.
(Note: Combat doesn't always have to be fast to be fun, either. Dark Souls was a pretty slow game as far as action games are concerned and remains one of my all-time favorites. I also love tactical turn-based stuff like XCOM. I also think that boss fights in shooters can work with higher health-bars. It's just when regular grunts take ten shots to kill it really annoys me.)
So I'm not thrilled by what we've seen of combat, and that puts a bit of a black mark on an otherwise amazing reveal.
Update: I forgot to mention this when I first published this piece, but I'm also not thrilled by the voice-acting. It's not all bad, but we have a few things going on that bug me:
- V's companion is a big Latino guy, and he talks like the stereotype of a Latino guy rather than, you know, actual Latino guys. I know this because I've known plenty and not a single one says the word "jaina" every other sentence. Tone it down.
- All the women seem to be trying too hard to sound tough, but they all end up just sounding the same. That tough voice, when used too much, can start to just sound stilted and flat.
- The risk with a "dark and gritty" world is that all the characters come across as badass and somber all the time, and there's no room for levity. I hope that's not the case in the full release.
The Ugly
Fortunately, other than some of these scary looking dudes, the game looks gorgeous. Nothing ugly here. Of course, it's all pre-release footage so take it with a grain of salt. CDPR stated explicitly that anything we saw yesterday could change by release, and it wouldn't be the first time we've seen downgrades (Dark Souls II, The Division, plenty of others . . . .)
Still, I'm mostly optimistic about this game. Yes, I wish I could stare at my avatar as I run around Night City. As much as I prefer first-person shooters, I really like my RPGs to be in third-person, and a TPS cover-based shooter would work just fine here. Hopefully it doesn't matter much once game is in hand. And yes, the shooting looks floaty and spongey and not great, but hopefully they'll tighten it up by release. I love The Witcher games despite not liking their combat mechanics very much, so I have faith that CDPR will deliver here on everything that matters.
Besides, as Game Director Adam Badowski said in a press release accompanying the new footage, "[T]his is probably not the same game you’ll see on your screen when we launch, we still decided to share this 48-minute video with you. This is how Cyberpunk 2077 looks today."
Oh, and as a side-note, of course we spent five minutes of the reveal staring at a passed out woman's bare breasts and that we also were told, in no uncertain terms, that this is a "mature" game. Nothing says mature like nudity in a video game! Not that I mind some skin, but it's always struck me as funny that nudity and/or swearing are what constitute "mature." I guess all the 14-year-old boys watching on Twitch yesterday were happy.
