Cyberpunk 2077 (No Spoilers) Discussion Thread

I hope not, I think I have grown tired of the Bioware-esque type companion style, personally I prefer playing more of a lone wolf type character both from a gameplay and a narrative perspective, and after playing the Witcher series I kind of get the feeling that the whole companion thing kind of hampers the storytelling and character development.

I mean the Witcher games don't really have companions in the traditional sense, you do have companions in a sense that there are recurring characters that appear throughout the games that you help out and they help you out in return in certain sections but for the most part Geralt goes it alone which allows other characters in the story to do their own thing and have more of an impact on the story. In Bioware games the characters do get a little hamstrung as the characters that have the most effort put into their writing are the ones that are constantly acompanying your character, however because you need these characters in your party they are generally more limited in how they can effect the overall plot beyond agreeing or disagreeing with your actions then falling back in line, you can't really have too many companions make major plot moves like betrayal or self sacrifice because this limits the number of available companions (which in most later Bioware games the number of companions is already somewhat limited to begin with) and since combat is usually balanced around a full party with varied roles losing key members of your party can put you at a disadvantage.

Personally I hope they don't go with a lone wolf protagonist.

The idea of someone who somehow is a jack of all trades uber-special snowflake that can accomplish missions all on their own while the tabletop version of this game requires players to have a team with assorted skill sets and talents to cover each of the bases just doesn't feel very Cyberpunk to me. I mean we have Deus Ex for lone wolfing, this game should be about co-ordinated team tactics. None of the other characters need to have fully fleshed out backstories and campaign spanning arcs either; they're all private contractors anyway so a Solo or Med Tech coming in to help on a particular job and then leaving immediately after is pretty par for the course in this universe.

I like the party to be a part of that atmosphere. I really like companionship and teamwork. Soloing is boring and I don't want to play a lone wolf. Plenty of games let you do it, but I appreciate the ones that are different and want more of them on the market. If I want to play a solo Ubermensch who turns the interactable rocks over to pick up feathers and what-not for 100 hours there is a gazillion games to chose from already.

So, if Cyberpunk = Witcher 3, then, well, sorry CDPR, darling, we were not meant to be.

Based on the way they explained the ethos of Cyberpunk, I'm not sure a party based approach would even fit. It's supposed to be about a lone anti-hero/hero's accent to power. Personally, I wouldn't want a party. We have other games for that and I just like the idea of me against the system. I'm certain there will be important relationships and sections where a companion joins you, as there were in The Witcher. As for the classes, there's almost no chance they'd ditch those. That's the whole point of the PnP game. But I wouldn't be surprised if they limited them. 9 separate classes is alot to design for, and knowing CDPR, they're going to want story specific paths for each class. I doubt they'd have a fixed gender either. 

What the hell are you talking about? I never said turn the game into Wolfenstein and if you are spending the whole game turning over rocks and picking up feathers then the problem isn't the lack of companions and banter but the core fundamentals of the game itself, not every game has mission design like Dragon Age Inquisition or Mass Effect Andromeda.

I do not like long OW games with solo fixed leads. If Cyberpunk is like that, I won’t play it. If it is not at least in one aspect, I will. I hope this clarifies things.

I am talking about OW games like Prey, FO4, and Inquisition. Inquisition did permit me a degree of customization and the party composition, but I found it ultimately trying, because OW was so long and enforced, and the companions only talked in the stronghold (very rarely in the OW that lasted for hours and hours). Andromeda’s design was way better because companions chatted a lot in the world, and nothing forced you to do the OW (like the blessed power points did in Inquisition).

In Assassin’s Creed I do not like the fixed lead and collecting BS, but the upside is that the games are short, and the collecting is not enforced in most cases, plus the lead characters switch between games, so if you do not like Assassin A, it’s only 30 hours, then you can try Assassin B. Also, cowls help, because they make the character more anonymous in the world, so you do not have to stare at the face you do not love and be endlessly reminded that you did not make him. And I that respect even bare bones customization, even changing hair colour, skin colour and eye colour and hairstyles that do not impact facial animations do help me.

I feel that a 100 hours or more long game with enforced OW and a fixed lead will absolutely not be up my alley. If they do put in mechanisms to bypass the 100 hours, and you can just do the main story in 30 or so hours, without dying every two minutes, okay then. Or if I can create a character I really want to play.... or if there is a recuuring character/companion that is extremely appealing to me personally with whom I can forge an interesting relationship and who fights by my side often.

In short, I have to like something about the game to play it. Just like every other player, I am sure.

I am not painting all games with the same brush, I am patiently explaining the features I did not like, and what games I liked and did not like on the balance of features and why. By the way imo most AC missions are actually pretty cool. The collectatrons I did not like are a sideline. I liked Altair’s monologues, but not Ezio’s.

If the features I like are advertised for Cyberpunk, and REALLY appeal to me, I will try the game. If not, then not. So far all I can say is that setting is okay with me. Other thing I have heard -the length of the game and the artwork they showed- was not appealing to me personally.

Literally everything else is unclear.

I am really trying to be as clear and precise as I can be to stop confusing you into making broad extrapolations.

If you actually have something you are trying to tell me, why don’t you just do? Because to me all those walls of text start to appear as a mask of a stereotypical Witcher fan statement “you should play Witcher 3, dumbass that does not know shit” is that what you are wanting to say? If that’s so, I would like to emphasize that I will not be bullied into buying a product and putting my time into something I do not like.

I'm not calling for ultra specific table top rules to be implemented, just that the game adhere to that sense of teamwork necessary to pull of those runs in both Cyberpunk and Shadowrun. 

A Shadowrun game were you never have to cover your decker while they're grabbing the paydata, or you never have an ally mage or rigger running overwatch for you because everything is revolving around one character won't feel very Shadowrun.

I don't think I want to see the game turn into a Deus Ex clone, however if it does share a lot of elements with Deus Ex I can't say I would be complaining either.

That said we have no idea what direction they are going to be going with here, while I am not opposed to games that feature party based gameplay I think if they were to go that route I would prefer something more of an over the top view type game with more strategy elements, from everything I have heard so far I get the impression the game is going to be more of a 3rd person/1st person type deal.