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

[Fenix]

I don't know whether you're trolling or not, but I do actually partly agree. It all seems rosy in hindsight, but at the time, having lived through System Shock and System Shock 2, Deus Ex seemed rather contrived by comparison, with respect to the fact that the different paths were much more rigidly and obviously laid out, so the virtual world had a contrived, plasticky feeling to it that SS and SS2 never had, even though their worlds were pretty contrived too - just somehow they'd managed to disguise it better, whereas Deus Ex put its gamey-game side on its sleeve ("here's the stealth path, here's the straight assault path, here's the techie path" - I cant even remember now what the options were, but you know what I mean). IOW, it was less a question of discovering your path than choosing from a selection. And that felt like decline tbh. To be charitable, it was probably a function of the fact that they were trying to depict a much bigger world, so to avoid the player getting hopelessly lost, they had to flag everything with honking great pointers.

Yeah, you are rigth. When I plaed it first time, after played SS2, I was dissapointed. But DE's strenghth is in other fields, it's a story, plot, characters, details. And prediction of course, made by accident.

I am in love with Keanu. Going to write him a love letter, anyone know his address?

Just do it. I would write it too, if only I knew what to say...

 

[Tyranicon]

Lol.

 

[Caim]

I've seen several videos so far about how OP the pistol can be. Is this true just for the pistol build, or does every weapon type have their own broken build?

 

[rashiakas]

zillions of dps yet cant hit shit. fucking consolefag.

 

[janior]

 

[Tyranicon]

I've seen several videos so far about how OP the pistol can be. Is this true just for the pistol build, or does every weapon type have their own broken build?

Pretty much most weapons and builds can get very strong if you stack the right perks. I stuck mostly with pistols and even without glitches they can get overpowered, especially if you nail those headshots.

The only downright horrible build is anything to do with knife throwing because it's bugged.

 

[Gastrick]

This is the quality Cyberpunk review that we need. He makes many interesting points that I never even considered. And he even made it before the game was released as well.

 

[janior]

itsagood review

 

[Child of Malkav]

I've seen several videos so far about how OP the pistol can be. Is this true just for the pistol build, or does every weapon type have their own broken build?

It doesn't matter what weapon you use.
All you need to do is stack crit chance mods and crit damage mods on top of picking the damage increase perks from the perk trees.
That is literally all.
But yes, handguns have the most damage perks of any category and that's why they obliterate so much.

 

[Fenix]

It's not really a virtue. It's a compromise which was first made in System Shock if memory serves me.

Well, actually not? SS has voiced dialogues. At least in final release.
Also, reading wiki about SS - they initially made those logs you could find for one reason - to not break immersion with dialogues, which was the case they felt for previous game - Ultima Underworld, where dialogues were like separate game by itself, disconnected from immersion to the game world.
So, it was not just for the sake of economy or somehting - this decision was suported by rest of design.
They felt dialogues were breaking immersion, so they did next game where you have no live NPC at all, thus only text-voiced logs.
That's probbaly why it doesn't work so well for CP2077.

The removal of dialogs was an attempt by the team to make the game more "integrated" than Ultima Underworld. They sought to "put [players] in fiction and not allow for its violation"[6], so they tried to erase the distinction between plot and exploration

 

[Goldschmidt]

Since all beta testers worldwide now got a piece of the pie, can anyone of you tell me if cybercock satisfied your needs?

Is this a buy or no buy?

Is this a rpg?

Is this better than Path of Exile?

Is this better than sex?

 

[AwesomeButton]

Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk share the "all you're doing is going from map marker to map marker checking off boxes and picking up random crap" design philosophy

Not necessearily. Witcher 3 allows you to hide undiscovered landmarks. Cyberpunk doesn't allow you to do the same.

Only difference is Cyberpunk's side content has less story and dialog choice than Witcher 3's did. So when you see someone acting like there's a huge difference between the two this is what they're focused on. Witcher 3 is a storyfag game through and through and Cyberpunk failed to excel as much at storyfagging.

To rephrase, both are interactive movies but Witcher 3 is the better done interactive movie.

Well this one is actually pretty easy to asspull into ingame universe logic. Like text is cheaper to store than audio right? Maybe all phone devices come with speech recognition and a mandatory writer that stores all your calls which are then logged on your phone and kept for your own safety.

When I wrote "someone decided" I meant someone in the CP77 production team.

I just did one where after, ahem, "arresting" the gang I heard muffled cries for help coming from a nearby container, I opened it, bunch of people came tumbling out making thankful noises, but there was one dead girl left in there, and on her person was a text exchange between her and her mother, with her asking mum for help, and her mum showing a touching faith that the police would find her. Then on one of the gangsters there was a callous note talking about shifting product.

I admit this was one of the better ones, and it made sense for the backstory to be served as text.

 

[DalekFlay]

Not necessearily. Witcher 3 allows you to hide undiscovered landmarks. Cyberpunk doesn't allow you to do the same.

Whether you hide the markers or not, exploring will only get you more random loot. Every location of real interest is one a quest takes you to. Every person of any interest to talk to, a quest takes you to. Cyberpunk is the same, only worse in that the quests themselves are also spawned by a map marker 90% of the time.

 

[Turjan]

I've seen several videos so far about how OP the pistol can be. Is this true just for the pistol build, or does every weapon type have their own broken build?

It doesn't matter what weapon you use.
All you need to do is stack crit chance mods and crit damage mods on top of picking the damage increase perks from the perk trees.
That is literally all.
But yes, handguns have the most damage perks of any category and that's why they obliterate so much.

Handguns are definitely the darlings in this game. Most stackable perks and by far the most iconic weapons.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Not necessearily. Witcher 3 allows you to hide undiscovered landmarks. Cyberpunk doesn't allow you to do the same.

Whether you hide the markers or not, exploring will only get you more random loot. Every location of real interest is one a quest takes you to. Every person of any interest to talk to, a quest takes you to. Cyberpunk is the same, only worse in that the quests themselves are also spawned by a map marker 90% of the time.

There is more variety from one Witcher 3 set piece combat to another than there is between two back alley gangsta squads in CP77.

The context of the battlefield stands out more because you usually encounter the monsters in a forest, whereas Night City is already full of colorful stuff all around you. Also, Witcher 3 has a much greater enemy variety, obviously in outlook but also in AI and tactics than CP77 has.

 

[ADULF HITLOR FAN KLUB]

Cyberpunk 2077 just keeps on giving.

I haven't been this entertained by a video game for quite some time, not gonna lie.

 

[DalekFlay]

There is more variety from one Witcher 3 set piece combat to another than there is between two back alley gangsta squads in CP77.

The context of the battlefield stands out more because you usually encounter the monsters in a forest, whereas Night City is already full of colorful stuff all around you. Also, Witcher 3 has a much greater enemy variety, obviously in outlook but also in AI and tactics than CP77 has.

I'd agree with most of that. Cyberpunk is certainly extremely repetitive late game because you're so powerful (on "hard") that everything dies in one shot, and every encounter is similar, so you're just walking around clicking things. I guess Witcher's combat and encounters are more varied by default.

I don't think it's wrong to point out how similar the two games are when it comes to basic game structure and design though, and chuckling when people act like Cyberpunk is SUCH decline from TW3. That's more the thing I'm rolling my eyes at, rather than saying there's no reason to prefer one or the other. I prefer Cyberpunk I guess because the setting and stealth gameplay are more in my wheelhouse, but if people prefer medieval fantasy and melee combat, or like Witcher 3's greater story content, it's all good. I am laser focused on refuting the idea this game's core design philosophy is any different. The people who made Witcher 3 made a very Witcher 3 style game in a different setting with different combat.

 

[toro]

Lol.

Incompetent developers.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I don't think it's wrong to point out how similar the two games are when it comes to basic game structure and design though, and chuckling when people act like Cyberpunk is SUCH decline from TW3.

I agree, and that's not my objection. My big lament is for those parts of the game that remain unfinished, not the gamey parts but the interactive movie parts.

Imagine the gigs and "NCPD subcon" work would track the player's street cred better and only unlock work in portions. Also the street cred gain could be rebalanced so you don't max it out by cleaning two neighborhoods. I would remove "Assault in progress" completely and leave only "Suspected Organized Crime Activity", because I can't abide the player feeling like he has "cleaned" the city of crime. I would also implement V's reputation with each fixer so that the fixer entrusts more dangerous and lucrative gigs to V as V proves himself/herself.

Gig introduction should have been delivered through dialogues such as those for monster hunts in Witcher 3, with a possibility to accept/decline/haggle. This would have presented an opportunity to flesh out both V's character and the characters of fixers via dialogue and acting. I am willing to bet these things were planned but never implemented, and it's more than likely they will never be implemented. I regret that game could have been a really big deal and become a new yardstick for the genre of "open world pew-pew interactive movie" but with so many compromises done on the quality of the content, it's out of the question.

 

[res11]

Not necessearily. Witcher 3 allows you to hide undiscovered landmarks. Cyberpunk doesn't allow you to do the same.

Whether you hide the markers or not, exploring will only get you more random loot. Every location of real interest is one a quest takes you to. Every person of any interest to talk to, a quest takes you to. Cyberpunk is the same, only worse in that the quests themselves are also spawned by a map marker 90% of the time.

There is more variety from one Witcher 3 set piece combat to another than there is between two back alley gangsta squads in CP77.

The context of the battlefield stands out more because you usually encounter the monsters in a forest, whereas Night City is already full of colorful stuff all around you. Also, Witcher 3 has a much greater enemy variety, obviously in outlook but also in AI and tactics than CP77 has.

This is completely different from my experience in TW3. Yes there was a lot of enemy variety and I appreciate how they designed a large number of unique beasts, but they all fought essentially the same way. Every fight was just crafting a different shade of oil and then spamming quen and igni.

 

[DalekFlay]

Gig introduction should have been delivered through dialogues such as those for monster hunts in Witcher 3, with a possibility to accept/decline/haggle. This would have presented an opportunity to flesh out both V's character and the characters of fixers via dialogue and acting. I am willing to bet these things were planned but never implemented, and it's more than likely they will never be implemented. I regret that game could have been a really big deal and become a new yardstick for the genre of "open world pew-pew interactive movie" but with so many compromises done on the quality of the content, it's out of the question.

I think the game's... I don't know the right word, presentation? Immersion? Drive?... would have been greatly improved if you went to the fixers themselves to get jobs, and maybe met the client, and had some more dialog with personality defining choices. I think a ton of people who lapped up The Witcher 3 like chocolate milk but find this game's "roleplaying" disappointing would be complaining a lot less if that were the case. I don't even think it would have taken that much more time and effort compared to what they did, and with a fast travel hub right outside it wouldn't have added much tedious traveling either.

 

[Immortal]

B-b-b-but guys.. Muh Eurojank though..
You don't need it to work or be playable.

 

[Heroic Liberator]

 

[AwesomeButton]

This is completely different from my experience in TW3. Yes there was a lot of enemy variety and I appreciate how they designed a large number of unique beasts, but they all fought essentially the same way. Every fight was just crafting a different shade of oil and then spamming quen and igni.

True, in Vanilla on Normal, I can't say I did anything more complex than wildly clicking and trying to keep the enemy I want to hit in the center of the screen, so the targeting switches to him. There is of course the Yrden for Noon/Nightwraiths. Still, enemies had sometimes complex animations which you had to counter or evade on time, and now when I play with a rebalance mod that vastly increases enemy attacks' damage, I can appreciate the variety.

in games 90% of the experience is illusion, and a developer usuallly throws a huge amount of work into providing an illusion of some kind - illusion of variety, illusion of danger, illusion of uncertainty. Just remember zombies in Thief, how difficult it used to be to tell their state or how suspicious they were of you. That's why the ideal audience for a game is an impressionable teen.

 

[Immortal]

I think the game's... I don't know the right word, presentation? Immersion? Drive?... would have been greatly improved if you went to the fixers themselves to get jobs, and maybe met the client, and had some more dialog with personality defining choices. I think a ton of people who lapped up The Witcher 3 like chocolate milk but find this game's "roleplaying" disappointing would be complaining a lot less if that were the case. I don't even think it would have taken that much more time and effort compared to what they did, and with a fast travel hub right outside it wouldn't have added much tedious traveling either.

I mean, in my mind it feels pretty clear this was the original intention, along with the rest of the game being far more reactive / interactive.. The remnants of cut content are showing all throughout the game.

In your example, consider the fact that all Fixers have actual locations in the world that show up on your map but when you visit you just get the canned "called them on cellphone" dialogue options. Did they cut them because they thought it was tedious to visit? or because it was too much work to animate them? (They have procedural animation tools so I doubt it)

I'm not sure where they drew the line in the sand but there are so many unfinished concepts (Functioning Subway system, bars and clubs that have zero purpose other than to dance in, ect) in this game which is maybe the most depressing of all, coupled with all the false promises they made for the last two years.