4.5/5 ★ – sirvalkyerie's review of Cyberpunk 2077.

Cyberpunk is a weird experience. In most ways. It's a great game in a mediocre package or maybe a mediocre game in a great package. Either way still filled with bugs. But the game itself is infinitely memorable for reasons good and bad. It's also absolutely worth the time for any gamer, bugs or no bugs. And it's very, very deserving of a sequel and continued exploration of the universe and city that CD Projekt Red has brought to gaming. The game is off-balance. Night City is exceptional, teeming with life and character and lore. It's immersive and gorgeous and vibrant. In comparison to a game like Starfield, Cyberpunk 2077 is flooding with character and cool shit and immersion and lore and is just a joy to exist within. But it's also an absolute fucking chore to navigate. The driving in Cyberpunk is easily the worst driving of any GTA-clone I've ever played and it's among the worst driving of any game I've ever played. It's god awful. Walking is fine but the city is gigantic and it's almost never worth hoofing it. Not to mention the city is multiple layers, which is very cool but can make navigation a pain in certain respects as the map doesn't well delineate these level changes at a glance. A lot of the city design is pretty tremendous for the immersive nature of it but also makes getting around a pain. Big fences or barriers prevent you from making cool motorcycle jumps or flipping your car down off the highway onto a lower level. These are the things that give the GTA series so much charm and replayability. A real freedom of movement that Cyberpunk only sometimes manages to emulate. It really doesn't help that the driving is so bad, a point I could never possibly over emphasize, that it feels like the city and the cars are actively fighting against you. Maybe there's a meta narrative here that's too clever for me to give anyone any credit for. However, the combat is actually easily the best of any GTA clone. And honestly, the combat is pretty good for any first person RPG. The amount of choices you're given to confront any situation according to your preferred skillset is astounding. All varieties of gear and attributes and skills to tackle any scene stealthily, loud and abrasive, melee or ranged, far ranged or close ranged. It's engaging, deep, responsive and impressive. The combat is a real highlight and while there are more meta or better optimized and unbalanced combat approaches, the game still affords you the freedom to approach it how you'd like. You may feel that freedom betrayed in certain situations (like the Adam Smasher fight in particular) but for the most part the game lets you choose how to take it on. This even extends to narrative choices. The Cyberpunk narrative is a little weak and the suspension of disbelief is supremely hard to maintain. But most missions and gigs give you a lot of latitude in how you'd like to resolve them. Sometimes opening up new quest chains or breaking others. Changing the way characters in the world respond to you or how events play out later, even if they're only reported in little lore dumps. It's still cool to see a game allow you such leeway to impact it how you see fit. I wasn't a big fan of the way Johnny or Reed or Panam were written. Wasn't a big fan of V either. But there are standout stories and characters still. Judy is easily the game's highlight and the story with her, V, Evelyn and Dexter DeShawn is the game's best bit. Shame you don't get more mileage out of it. Rogue is the character with the most general interest and intrigue and compelling story and the V-Johnny story is at its peak when intersecting with Rogue. Misty and Vik are lovely but really only play bit parts, but are still really good. Jackie is clearly a highlight and being able to call him during gameplay to tell him what you've been up to is also a very sweet touch. Mr. Hands is the only fixer, besides Rogue, with a compelling story surrounding him. The game just can't maintain a consistent rhythm. Things are either pretty engaging or a little flat. The Kerry storyline feels kind of off-kilter and stapled onto the rest while the River Ward storyline is downright bizarre and the romance option feels like it came entirely out of nowhere. For the most part, the story is fine. The macro story tracks alright even though figuring out the actual timeline and pacing is impossible. Most of the story endings also play out solid although I really didn't care for the 'good ending' (The Star). The rest all landed pretty well. Should you choose the suicide ending, which I think felt actually pretty fitting, the phone call you get from Judy is hauntingly powerful and one of the most impactful moments I've ever had in gaming. That's how the whole game sorta goes. Some hard to buy story beats, some forgettable moments, a few bad moments, and then some truly fantastic ones. It's not unusual in most games, certainly the GTA games, that Cyberpunk is clearly a new take on, have unbalanced moments themselves too. Cyberpunk could be an all-time great achievement in gaming if the story was more consistent. If the writing was a bit better. It's still got a more gorgeous city, a more immersive game world, a better sound track and better combat than anything in the GTA-genre, the progenitors included. But the bugs really, really hold it back. The game, even now well after the release of Phantom Liberty, is still riddled with game crashing and game breaking bugs. Busted animations, CTDs, busted graphics, cars that just appear out of nowhere. Being sent to desktop or having to reload older saves was a frequent occurrence the entire time. I can only imagine how bad it actually was on release, and I've got no reason to think any of the reports were ever overdramatic. The game is still wall-to-wall buggy as hell even in the DLC areas. Cyberpunk is good. Really good even. A game of the year contender in most years if it wasn't so filled with bugs and glitches. But the terrible driving, shoddy map design and inconsistent story really hold it back from being an all-timer. Obviously easier said than done, but if CDPR can fix the bad and keep the good a sequel will have truly unlimited potential. But certainly no one's lining up to preorder it. CDPR has a lot to prove but despite Cyberpunk's flaws it still manages to be so good that people should maintain some cautious optimism for the eventual opportunity to revisit Night City.