I think both of these inclinations coincide to a homeostatic framework: a more reactive "world". We want Night City to feel a little more dangerous, but we still want it an accessible wonderland. The brutal answer to the former is to just increase enemy npc detection range. I haven't seen mods for that, but lately I have been playing with a difficulty scaling mod, that simply levels all enemies to player's current level. It goes a long ways towards making a casually sprint through the corners a bit more deadly. Another way to make travel more immersive is to cut out fast travel and force taxi/train service. I've been fooling around with a Metro System mod, which makes a fantastically thematic dimension to V losing their car to Delamane after the prologue. Going to the trouble of learning NC's "lines" is frustrating, but in a good way, and could be enhanced by dealing with whichever gang controls a station in Japan Town, Pacifica, Heywood, etc.
I don’t mind the idea of NPCs picking fights with my character. What I don’t want is for it to become intrusive. I found the mercenaries in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey very irritating. In terms of gangs/organisations, I’d like to see a branching storyline where the character can become affiliated with a group of the player’s choosing. This could then have wider implications for multiplayer. If the game stays in Night City, then it has to be open up to make it feel new. I want to be able to enter more buildings and access things like the subway. Also, more options for character customisation. I’d like ripperdocs to be able to mod the character in much more extreme and permanent ways (with resulting benefits and drawbacks). I’d like to explore the idea of losing humanity to mods, like we saw in Edgerunners.
Huh, weird, doing a gig and the game stole my katana! It just unequipped and vanished it from my inventory. Meanwhile, just before that, I got the Corpo Plaza apartment. It's damn cool. Was expecting Johnny to start complaining about it.
Yeah, I was thinking about that during a recent gameplay - "Wow, I've been ruining pretty much everything that the Tyger Claws have been doing, you would think that they would be at least going 'It's him! Get him!' when I'm walking by them"
One answer: they deserve it all, and they know it. Why? Because they're the Tyger Claws, they got every last bullet coming to them . . . strange, incoherent, anime, and very Cyberpunk 2077 . . .
Concept art for the Arasaka Supercarrier "Kujira" which escorts Saburo and Hanako Arasaka to Night City for their confrontation with Yorinobu: Expectations vs Reality: what Kujira looks like up-close in-game:
Finishing up stuff: Sweer Dreams - oh, it's a "you lose all your stuff" quest. Can these be consigned to the deepest level of gaming hell? This one is worse than most as it makes it very hard to recover your gear and cash. There's also a lot of enemies including a heavy gunner! This was a terribly designed and awful quest to play. Killing in the Name was also rubbish. Due to the sheer lack of visual cues for what it asked you to do. The ending was pretty funny. Endgame stuff: Spoiler This was a very weird endgame structure where you decide stuff but it's not that clear as to when and what you have decided. Went the Johnny and Rogue route. It had an excellent build-up followed by a bad bait-and-switch. You go from thinking you'll take out Arasaka's air defence with missiles to instant shot down. What follows is standard run through corridors on a kill run, it's nothing special. You get to the end and Smasher shows up, kills Rogue and so starts an absolutely rubbish final boss fight. It is irredeemably bad. Also has a near OHKO attack too. Oh, you were doing melee? Well, you're screwed here then. Fortunately I don't specialise to that degree, was good with guns too. Nor was defeating him satisfying - he was your usual, unimaginative endgame obstacle. Johnny gave V his body back in a confusing sequence. Then it does this weird railroading of an ending where V has signed onto a suicide mission. Why? Because the game says so, that's why. Ditto for V being blocked from leaving with Panam. Oh and it strips V of all his cash and inventory. It was rubbish. A bad oay-off to what it was supposed to conclude. I wouldn't be surprised if the DLC undoes the six months ro live bollocks too. So just over 60 hours later, got to the end. It's a very strange, oddly truncated main campaign that doesn't match up to much of the side content, which mostly pays off better too. Also, all the choices in the game? Most of them really don't amount to much, it is not a branching narrative except in a very basic sense. The short version? I don't think I've ever seen a game where the game world is so well designed, but the quest material for it falls so short if being worthy of it.
Spoiler The post-final battle ending depends on what route you choose. You're not really being 'stripped' of your stuff or agency, it's more of a closing cinematic where you're walking around. If you want to 'continue' playing Cyberpunk 2077, it takes you to right outside the exclusive club where you meet the other Arasaka clanmember. The ideal route? Ask for the help of the Nomads (assuming you became friends with them). Instead of Rogue, it's the head of the clan that dies - and PanAm becomes the new head. You ride off into the sunset out of Night City, and there's an optimistic "ain't giving up yet, got some promising leads" where there's still hope you can beat this, especially with Johnny gone from your body. If your love interest was PanAm or Judy, they go with you. The route you took I did the first time, and it's super depressing, isn't it? (And the DLC is likely to be a 'pre-ending' DLC, not an extension on the ending). Going out in a blaze of glory - although it's probably the most 'cyberpunk' genre ending (I will say, though, that the quintessential cyberpunk novel, Neuromancer, does have a happy ending). However - there is a way to save Rogue, and that's to get a 'secret' ending where you get Johnny's friendship up to a level that you can unlock an 'impossible mission' ending where you just ****ing storm Arasaka HQ single-handedly. The ending is the same, except Rogue is alive in the end. The truly most depressing ending is just killing yourself - the game ends immediately, and the credits have your friends and love interests alternate with messages of grief and rage. Never could bring myself to do it, even just to see it. Finally, the lamest ending is agreeing to work with Arasaka (or one faction). In the end, you're still going to die, but they give you the option of either living out your final days or getting uploaded into SoulKiller like Johnny, only willingly. Oh, and Johnny abandons you immediately if you choose this route. You can also, for the Assault/Nomad endings, choose to give your body to Johnny. You head off to the AI realm with Alt, and he goes and lives in anonymity in your former body. Like I said before, the DLC is likely to be a 'pre-final battle' set of missions. It indicated it's unlocking a new section of the city, where the story DLC is presumably set. Also, if you didn't discover this, you can get a cat in the game - Nibbles.
Spoiler I can't say I liked Saul, but I didn't dislike him enough to want him dead. So instead I fed Rogue to Smasher and wanted to mix the endings, but the game says no. I couldn't see any reason for the block here. The "secret ending" is one I'll watch on YouTube as its one you have to do without any respawns - like I've any chance of doing that. Will have to go looking for the cat.
I got distracted going back to the old Deus Ex franchise, but I will continue my latest Cyberpunk run eventually. Part of the fun for me is just exploring every nook and cranny. Spoiler With Saul, it's more of a bittersweet ending - I don't know how far you got with the Nomad storyline, but he and PanAm eventually do make up, and she becomes the head of the Clan. It's more like Saul going out the way he wants - in the height of battle. The Nomads score pretty good, because they steal as much as they can from Arasaka in your raid. And getting there... well, it's pretty awesome. I recommend trying it. Rogue's death, on the other hand, is just tragic. And yeah, your ending is locked by whatever choice you make on the roof.
Oh, I finished Panam's quest - the tank is fun. Looks to still be some pieces to find. Will give the other routes a try at some point. Plus I now know the way to deal with Smasher is to kite him.
Can’t wait to give it another play when it comes out. Again when I played it like a month ago it was night and day since launch. Similar to Fallout 76 in that much of the bugs were fixed. Although I did like Cyberpunks story more.
The original version of Deus Ex:Human Revolution was way worse - the game encourages you to do a 'stealth' route, giving substantial XP bonuses for sneaking without getting detected... and then, the first boss battle is with a ****ing tank in what's basically an open arena. I, and a lot of other players, struggled with that. The developers eventually went back and redid all the boss battles to allow you to use all different builds to win (for instance, I just did the first one, and now there's some turrets locked in a room that you can get control of and just mow the dude down, if you're a hacking expert)
Yep, that was quite the infamous news story a few years back. Almost as bad as SE axing the Mankind Divided sequel that would have finished the trilogy.
Still, I think there's a lesson here: some games are terrible on release, but they can improve. Having said that, there's always games like Deus Ex 2: Invisible War which are unsalvagable (and I don't plan on playing ever again, including this Deus Ex run)
Huh, so that's how you find the gigs.... Clearly I am not done with this yet. In technical and formal terms, the gigs could be termed the game's optional busywork except the way each is executed tends to be anything but. And I have loads to do. Kind of funny if it's a stealth one, as my V's idea of stealth is leaving bodies everywhere, sometimes with heads and/or arms still attached. And there's no way this won't ever be funny: "Not happy about this V, it was supposed to be quiet." Job completed....A few seconds later: "V! You completed all my gigs! Have a free sweet ****ing car, choom!"
OK, now I'm done: - All gigs done - All Tarot cards got - All vehicles got - Finished Kerry's quests - Done all endings bar the secret one - Not touching the racing Ending stuff: Spoiler Strange as it may sound, the suicide ending isn't the darkest one. In a way it might even help prevent suicides with how it plays out. Going with Arasaka though? That one is dark. You betray everyone but Takemura and Arasaka is better than ever. The Johnny ending is interesting. Doing the finale with Panam and the Aldecanoes was the best option but.... The "talk to the nomads" bit was really badly indicated, the symbols did not indicate who to talk to. And then they, somehow, screwed up a tank fight. I had hits but the indicated health bar did not change, then the tank blew up! It was the first tank with a gun that was useless against flying drones too. Awful. After that? It got a whole lot better. Taking out Smasher third time around was a lot easier. Really liked the finale of the escape over the border too. Also did a quest with Blue Moon that was terrible, as it was very easy to lose track of her and the map didn't help. So, just under 80 hours later, how would I play it now? Might not go for Legendary items because the resouce drain for upgrading is very high. Although they do have more mod slots. Far more interested now than I was in the upcoming expansion.
Damn, only 80 hours still seems like an impressive time for total completion. I’m curious, now that you’ve finished it, how did it live up to the expectations set in that original gameplay demo from years back?
Well, that requires me being able to remember it! The stuff I didn't do was the races and punch-ups, though did kill one of the fighters during a gig. The Gigs are probably the slice of gameplay that suffers most from player assumption. There's just under 70 of them and, by appearance, look your standard open world busywork. While the categories of gig repeated, each specific one was different and distinct. That's unusual but also makes for a great experience. True, some had truly stupid stealth / no-kill requirements, but overall they were very good. The biggest surprise for me was that the katana was so fun to use. It became my primary weapon.
Damn… I really just walk around and waste time in video games. Lmao. I’m at like 76 hours and I’m barely halfway through the main story.
I think you can easily spend a lot of time just exploring Night City and responding to the dynamic events, if you're inclined to. It is a very well put together game world. It's also one with a very European design. Why? Roundabouts. US cities don't have those, it's all grid layouts and crossroads. Night City is far messier.
At this point I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to finish my vr play through, it’s too easy to just start aimlessly vibing. Like, I’ll load it up, then just sit in the Japan Town apartment and drink a cup of tea for ten minutes looking at all the details and listening to the radio lol.
Yea I realize that I love the game world and can spend a lot of time in it doing random stuff or plotting or falling too deep into a role playing element. Only games to do that to me before were Mass Effect 2, AC black flag, and AC origins.
