CD Projekt's Cyberpunk 2077 Update 2.0 + Phantom Liberty Expansion Thread

[Necroscope]

Jim Sterling's take on CP:

That overgrown eunuch Jim Sterling reminds me of a good old friend of mine from primary school. He was disgusting and funny as hell (unlike Sterling) - once he accidentally dyed his hair red and told our teacher that now he looks like a red pig (the teacher was an ugly redhead).

 

[gurugeorge]

Speaking of minimaps, one thing that really annoys me - you should only get the red enemy dot and enemy facing cone on the minimap when enemies are out of LOS when you have the right cyber skillz. It shouldn't be something you have out of the box. Having it by default for anybody makes a nonsense of the whole idea of pinging to track enemies.

It's fine to have that in a standard shooter, but it should be something you have to work for in a game like this.

 

[Ezeekiel]

Holy shit, they need to do something about the AI and sniper rifle.
Just stand nearby an enemy camp, and start sharpshooting everyone. They all stay in position, no movement, only becoming slightly alert and wondering what's going on. But they don't run. They don't move. They hardly look for you.

It's coincidentally just like ME Andromeda...

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Found a full listing of all the radio tracks here.

Pacific Dreams:

Flatlander Woman – Lithium[1]
written by: SLG
performed by: SLG
published by: MOST

Flatlander Woman – Slag
written by: SLG
performed by: SLG
published by: MOST

The Dirge:

Laputan Machine – Warning Shots
written by: Konrad Abramowicz (AKA Konrad OldMoney)
performed by: Konrad OldMoney, feat. Perry Porter, Cidro Onetoo
published by: Konrad Abramowicz (AKA Konrad OldMoney)

 

[bloodlover]

Tbh games like Fallout 3/NV, Tomb Raider Angel of Darkness, Skyrim, Ass Creed Unity were all much buggier than CP on release and the backlash was not so hard.

Everyone expected this to be the best game of the decade, it was bound to disappoint and piss people off whether it was buggy or not, shit on console or not.

TW3 was arguably the best AAA RPG in recent years, so CP2077 with the inevitable GOTY edition will have to be godlike in order to surpass it. Highly doubt it. Although, I can't wait for more fixes to come so everyone and their mom can stop bitching about the game.

 

[RobotSquirrel]

Whoops I forgot Deus Ex had such big overlay boxes for characters. I might have to change that in my code LOL mine are much smaller than this.
Laputan Machine and Flatlander Woman sound like really awesome band names tbh.

I'd also suggest
Agent Orange - Lemon Lime
The Skullgunz - Adequate.

 

[Bad Sector]

So after 119 hours (according to game, but most likely a bit more than that in reality since it doesn't seem to track reloads) and 11 days later, i finished Cyberpunk 2077 while trying to play as much as i could see. Overall i had fun with it (i wouldn't play a game for almost 120 hours if i didn't), though it had its bumps.

Now a disclaimer - i really like cyberpunk (and scifi in general) games so back when CD Projekt RED released this image alongside a call for developers i applied to them and ended up working on the engine and tools for Witcher 3 (though i left after the game was released). Ironically i never actually saw much of CP2077 since the team was in a different part of the building and i was occupied with requests from the W3 team. But i was looking forward to the game even after i left CDPR.

So i do have a bit of bias towards the game. Having said that, i did buy it with my own money and at a full price, so i do get to make some comments about it :-P - which i'm going to split into three parts. Most of that stuff have already been mentioned by others so it isn't like i have any unique view.

Things i liked

1. The visuals, presentation (especially the cyberspace parts) and overall game style was my favorite part of the game.
2. Most of the writing and characters, especially in side missions.
3. The music - sometimes i was just driving around the city just to listen to the songs in the in-game radios.
4. Being able to create a character that starts as a weakling barely able to beat one enemy and ends up way overpowered by combining crafting, mods, implants, etc.
5. The merc gigs - while i wasn't a fan of how i was picking them up, i liked them more than the monster quests in Witcher 3.

Things i wasn't a fan of

1. The bugs - i didn't have any of the big issues i read people mention online nor encountered any gamebreaking bug and in the entire time i was playing the game i only got a single crash, but there were several minor bugs like visual glitches, physics "exploding" when i picked up something, etc. The two most annoying bugs were not being able to pick up some items that somehow fell "through" the ground and in a couple of quests not being able to make a goal disappear even though i completed it (though i could still finish the quest, i didn't had any quest bug out to become unfinishable).
2. The main story - the concept was interesting and everything started well but outside of being curious where it'll all lead, by the end i wasn't that interested in it. I found the sidestories/sidequests more interesting (though there wasn't as much intertwining as in Witcher 3, at least as far as i could notice).
3. The NCPD gigs (i do not remember how they're called in game) - sure, i did all of them because in general i wanted to see as much as i could, but honestly they felt like someone sprayed them over the map with some sort of random story generator and doing all of them maxed out my character's level very soon. I do not think they were necessary as the merc gigs already provided a lot of side content (and XP).
4. The main character's voice actress (i played a female V) - most of the time i found her a bit too emotional sounding for what was going on in the screen (or really what she was saying). Sometimes she sounded like she was about to cry just by talking to someone. Which felt a bit weird especially since...
5. ...i could mow down a lot of people with barely any consequence and indeed pretty much every quest, gig or even just driving around the city ended up with lots of dead characters without even anyone mentioning it, yet V was getting overly emotional whenever some named NPC's death (or similar) was invovled. I think people nowadays call that "Ludonarrative Ignorance" - ie. the narrative ignoring what is going on in the game :-P.

Things i disliked

1. Keanu. Yeah, i know he was the main marketing force behind the game but honestly i just didn't like his voice acting at all as it barely had any emotion (yes this is the exact opposite issue i had with V :-P though in V's case it merely annoyed me a little) and i could barely 'read' him (aside from when he got angry because he raised his voice at around 105% :-P). TBH i do not care about voice acting that much in general, but he was supposed to be a big deal. But personally i'd liked someone closer to Smiling Jack from VtMB voice-wise.
2. Random NPC interaction is basically non-existant. Witcher 3 didn't have the best NPC interaction either but at least they seemed to have some routine instead of just standing there and sometimes they even commented on you. NPCs in CP2077 feel more like an evolution of the random birds and animals that are around you in Witcher 3 but barely serve any purpose (and even in Witcher 3 killing the animals gives you meat and stuff, in CP2077 killing some random NPCs all it gives you is physics explosions from cops spawning around you without checking if there is a physics object at their spawn spot :-P). Also everyone on edge all the time which doesn't seem like a good idea in a city where someone can 'flatline' you for looking at them the wrong way :-P.
3. Not much choosing and consequencing. In Witcher 3 every other discussion and action had me thinking 'now, whose life did i just screw up?' and while that was a bit tiring after a while, CP2077 felt like there wasn't much in terms of consequences. Perhaps there are (i may need to do a second playthrough with different character build and choices to see) but it just never felt like it.
4. On a similar note, lack of factions. Or actually, lack of *meaningful* interaction with the existing factions (gangs) - i was killing everyone with a little triangle above their head (ie. NPCs that weren't just evolved Witcher 3 animals) yet it didn't affect anything with their factions even through the game keeps track of them. Contrast this with something like New Vegas which not only keeps track of my actions towards the game's factions but keeps separate track for positive and negative actions.
5. Driving physics. Some cars are impossible to drive as they have no traction with the road, tend to spin around way too fast, etc. The only vehicle i found usable was the motorcycle but that was largely because it was small enough to not crash on everything all the time. TBH i think that physics in general are a bit broken, especially outside the city, but driving was the biggest issue for me.

I had more thoughts while playing the game but that is all i can come up with now and i wanted to keep the ratio at 5:5:5 for arbitrary reasons :-P.

Cyberpunk 2077 isn't exactly what i expected but i still had fun playing it. I hope CDPR fixes the issues the game has (at least stability wise) and the negative reception it got wont dissuade any other developers from making cyberpunk themed games. I want more first (and third) person ARPGs in cyberpunk worlds.

 

[Zer0wing]

CP2077 would be a vastly better game if it didn't force you straight into the main quest chain.

For example, the early part of the game is the same as the lifepaths, except you stay on those paths. Different apartments for Nomad, Corpo, Street Kid V. Instead of meeting Jackie and getting booted out into the montage scene, you start off with a few simple jobs for your lifepath. Just one or two missions would do, not something that even requires that much effort. Meanwhile, Jackie calls/meets with you and talks about how there's a big gig he's setting up. During this time you can free roam and pick up sidequests.

Then you meet Dexter. And then you enter the main quest.

This would be more than enough to give the illusion that the lifepaths meant something, and also allow the player to explore and grow a connection to V.

But nope, montage.

That's logical and it was in the game until someone from Adam's buttbudies decided to cut the beginning to free some gameplay time and bring the player closer to Keanu Reeves.

 

[Parsimonious cook]

The main character's voice actress (i played a female V) - most of the time i found her a bit too emotional sounding for what was going on in the screen (or really what she was saying).

Dunno man, I guess they were going for maximum realism or something.

 

[Zer0wing]

I don't think that glassdoor is representitive that much of CDPR internals, maybe as a perspective of an outsider. I think the internals should be described by polish people.
https://www.gowork.pl/opinie_czytaj...i6-LS06x2uuXE4GmAQfQrUcbf21fjKsMnl8cvRGx__QYY
https://www.absolvent.pl/pracodawcy/profil-cd-projekt-red/opinie

TL;DR - despite the flawless marketing and flashy CGI promos, internally it's not that great, many contractors scold the company for unfinished stuff left for them to work with, fucking up deadlines en masse. The workers themselves aren't pleased with the formed working pipeline.

 

[Cyberarmy]

On a similar note, lack of factions. Or actually, lack of *meaningful* interaction with the existing factions (gangs) - i was killing everyone with a little triangle above their head (ie. NPCs that weren't just evolved Witcher 3 animals) yet it didn't affect anything with their factions even through the game keeps track of them. Contrast this with something like New Vegas which not only keeps track of my actions towards the game's factions but keeps separate track for positive and negative actions.

This is the worst part for me. We already have gangs, fixers and corps yet we didn't get a proper "reputation" system...

 

[Robber Baron]

yet we didn't get a proper "reputation" system...

And what would that reputation system change if there's no faction based specific content? Who shoots you on sight and who doesn't?

 

[Zer0wing]

And what would that reputation system change if there's no faction based specific content? Who shoot you on sight and who dont?

It is implied. I think that say, Wakako should raise an eyebrow when V slaughters and messes with Tyger Claws' plans, for example. I think that fixers should be a lot more proactive than they are in the game.

 

[warpig]

And I actually liked his old videos

Well he made some good analysis on actual videogame stuff back in the day.

you need some fat fuck to analyze games for you?

 

[Quillon]

Was it posted here before? Development timeline from some guy who's uncle works at nintendo.

Spoiler

I don't find this shit believable. If there were that much turn over & lead problems there would be dozens of ex-devs trying to shit on the game in the past years but all we have is the 1 original story from around 2017 which is like this one and a few of these that seem educated guesses based on the original story :/ And some things are obvious; you don't need have worked at CDPR to guess that the game had a drastic vision change between 2012 to debut trailer.

 

[zioburosky13]

Lol, sorry if this has been posted already. The drama goes on, the corpowar is near, guns of December:

https://www.videogameschronicle.com...criticising-sony-for-removing-cyberpunk-2077/

CD Projekt Red boss likes tweets criticising Sony for removing Cyberpunk 2077
LIKED MESSAGES ALSO ASK WHY SONY HADN’T TAKEN SIMILAR ACTION AGAINST MARVEL’S AVENGERS

Adam Badowski, CD Projekt Red’s studio head, liked tweets on Friday criticising Sony for its decision to pull Cyberpunk 2077 from the PlayStation Store.

Badowski, who is also Cyberpunk 2077’s game director, liked a total of seven replies to Sony’s announcement that Cyberpunk 2077 had been pulled from the PlayStation Store and full refunds offered to customers who purchased the game. [UPDATE: The likes have now been removed.]

Sony announced the unexpected move on Friday, following a turbulent week for CD Projekt Red centred around criticism of Cyberpunk 2077’s performance on last-gen consoles.

One message liked by the studio head called Sony’s decision “ridiculous”. “The game is playable and is actually a great game insofar as I know,” it reads. “Why not wait until they release some patches, updates, etc?”

Another user wrote: “Pulling the game from the store? that’s a cute ‘I am angry at a couple of refunds’ policy. The game works, but this been blown waayyyyy out of proportion by media needing some clicks.”

A third message liked by Badowski even criticised Marvel’s Avengers – another game which experienced a troubled launch – and asked why Sony hadn’t taken similar action against the Square Enix title.

“This is interesting, @PlayAvengers came out in a worse state then @CyberpunkGame and you guys did nothing. Avengers is effectively dead on all platforms making online play non existent, on top of bad code. Where are all those peoples refunds? They’re next right.”

Another message liked by Badowski encouraged Cyberpunk 2077 owners not to refund the game: “I’m telling everyone that bought the game. Don’t return it. CDPR will fix the mistakes. All of the Witcher games were ass when they first came out and look at them now.”

Officially, CD Projekt Red has said that the decision to remove Cyberpunk 2077 from sale on the PlayStation Store came following joint discussions with Sony. “We are working hard to bring Cyberpunk 2077 back to PlayStation Store as soon as possible,” it said this week.

TIMELINE: CYBERPUNK'S TROUBLED LAUNCH

• Dec 10: Console criticised at release
• Dec 10: PS4 version 'unacceptable'
• Dec 10: Game 'has epilepsy triggers'
• Dec 14: CDPR promises patches
• Dec 15: Gamestop declines refunds
• Dec 16: Founders 'lose $1 billion'
• Dec 18: Sony pulls Cyberpunk
• Dec 18: Xbox issues refunds
• Dec 19: Patch makes '60+ fixes'

However, the founder of games publisher No More Robots speculated on Friday that Sony’s action could have come in retaliation to CD Projekt’s recommendation that PS4 players seek refunds, which he said was against its policy.

“It’s very likely that the day CD Projekt started telling people to go ask for refunds, Sony were immediately in touch with them saying ‘we need to take your game off the store if you’re telling people to get refunds’, and CDPR have then slowly, reluctantly, agreed,” wrote No More Robots founder Mike Rose.

“I don’t know this for certain, of course, but it’s the likely turn of events. The big no-no here is CDPR telling players to a. Go against PS policy, and b. Overwhelming PS Support, without talking to PlayStation first.”

Earlier this week, CDPR released a statement claiming it would help those seeking a refund and encouraging customers to contact Sony and Microsoft.

Shortly after the statement was issued, many users reported that their Cyberpunk 2077 refund requests were being denied by PlayStation and Xbox. CD Projekt then revealed that it had no special agreement in place with Sony or Microsoft for Cyberpunk 2077 refunds.

On Friday, Microsoft announced it was expanding its refund policy to offer refunds to all users who purchased a digital version of Cyberpunk 2077.

Cyberpunk 2077 remains for sale on the Microsoft Store, but with a new notice warning of performance issues on last-gen consoles.

Cyberpunk 2077’s troubled launch has resulted in CD Projekt shares tumbling over the past week and wiping over $1 billion off the wealth of the company’s founders.

Conspiracy hamsters say Sony wants to clear it's huge chunk of PS 4 inventory to make lost of the possible revenue of selling PS 5 which it's out of stock everywhere hence they would not let a powerful PC port run on the PS 4 with mediocre result jeopardizing their schemes. *Tin foil hat protocol initiated*

 

[Robber Baron]

It is implied. I think that say, Wakako should raise an eyebrow when V slaughters and messes with Tyger Claws' plans, for example. I think that fixers should be a lot more proactive than they are in the game.

Unless there're faction specific campaigns and story integration of faction rep all it would've done, in the current state of the game, is gate some content from the player without it making coherent narrative

 

[Cyberarmy]

yet we didn't get a proper "reputation" system...

And what would that reputation system change if there's no faction based specific content? Who shoots you on sight and who doesn't?

I was trying to tell that we need faction specific content...

 

[Robber Baron]

I was trying to tell that we need faction specific content...

Hey maybe in multiplayer

 

[Druid Ardun]

I feel like they reset the whole development just to shove in Keanu Reeves.

 

[Xeon]

Is there anything related to the Megabuilding Administrator? I saw in the computer talking about me not paying my rent and I have their number but no one picks up when I call.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I feel this is a key difference between how Cyberpunk and Witcher 3 handled the side content, in W3 it just seemed better integrated, there often seemed to be a little bit of story to go along with it and it kept things interesting, but here... regardless of the content of the text message, it just felt like the outcome was going to be the same every time.

I'm almost done clearing Northside of side content, and I'm even more convinced that these quests were meant to be interconnected but were turned into Outposts in order to save resources and time during the production phase. They just scream that they needed to be reduced in number and consolidated into bigger "gigs". The contrast in complexity of the heist preparation vs the gigs, as well as the pre-release talk from CDPR of seamless transfer between main quest and sidequests points to the same. I suspect that what all those exclamation marks on the map present is not even the first pass state of the side content. It was simply unfinished stuff that was converted from the initial vision to Far Cry outposts. That's the biggest loss of all, because it will probably never be returned to the original vision. The most I imagine CDPR will do is to break down these "gigs" in more granular portions which will be gated by main quest progression or street cred level.

Lmao, isn't this the same issue that Skyrim had at launch? It was called memory leak or something. The more you played the game the bigger the save file became, increasing the possibility of getting the file corrupted. I think it's the same shit.

The video starts with the flat out wrong statement, that it's solely the file size that causes the error. In reality it's specific actions which cause the error, namely the overloading of the inventory beyond the limit of what the variable in the savegame can contain. Then, having already mislead his audience, the guy goes on lamenting how he may have directed people into behavior that corrupts their savegames. By coincidence this is true - because he did make a video teaching them "the trick" for infinite money. And he did it for the retards' clicks because clicks are money.

It's quite normal for a save file to grow up to and beyond the arbitrary size of 8 MB in an open world game, because this savegame has to contain the state of the whole world with as much accuracy as possible, which cyberpunk doesn't manage to do either - like storing data about the facing of enemies.

Conspiracy hamsters say Sony wants to clear it's huge chunk of PS 4 inventory to make lost of the possible revenue of selling PS 5 which it's out of stock everywhere hence they would not let a powerful PC port run on the PS 4 with mediocre result jeopardizing their schemes. *Tin foil hat protocol initiated*

This may have been the case if MS had followed suit and delisted CP77 as well. But thinking from Sony's position, I wouldn't like a situation where my competitor is offering something and I'm not. CDPR's uncoordinated move of "offering" refunds with other people's money was just bad business ethics imo.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I feel like they reset the whole development just to shove in Keanu Reeves.

From what it looks like, Keanu Reaves' entering the scene may have been the official start of production

 

[True Ukrainian]

I feel like they reset the whole development just to shove in Keanu Reeves.

Some reports claim that Keanu wanted a bigger role for himself when he consented to come onboard the project and there was a rewrite to accommodate him.

 

[hivemind]

didn't know he was a method actor