If you don’t mind, I’ll address your comments one at a time.
60% of the gameplay being cut:
No functioning Police AI
This isn't evidence of something being cut, but rather not functioning properly or simply being designed poorly. CDPR didn't cut police AI. Rather, this is an example of the game's state of polish or lack thereof.
No Functioning Rep system (street cred is just another XP bar)
It functions as it gates what weapons, cyberware and other things you can acquire. It also serves as a trigger for what vehicles and quests open up in the game. Again, this is not evidence of 60% of the game's content being cut. I would agree this could have been used differently, or in a better way, but instead a lot of what you think street cred would be used for is actually gated by attribute scores.
This was never promised. If you are talking about the flathead, this was cut due to the overlap with netrunner builds and being largely redundant and overpowered. This is an example of CDPR being overly transparent biting them in the ***.
Incorrect. How stories branch and the consequences and later events that tie to the quests may not be as divergent as people wanted, but video games like Mass Effect always provide the illusion of choice. Even when you have choices that change certain questlines, eventually everything has to converge on the same point. It's a technical limitation. I'll grant you this one somewhat partially, but I don't know if I'd agree that CDPR failed to deliver on this. What we were shown in gameplay footage ahead of time is what we got in that quests like the Maelstrom hideout can play out very differently and do impact other quests later on.
I only vaguely remember something like this even being mentioned ahead of time.
This is flat out incorrect. We were told right after the first footage of the aerocar was shown that these were automated and we would never be able to fly them. CDPR has been very transparent about this.
I'll grant you this one. I don't recall the system being promised as an upgrade system as much as a cosmetic customization system which was showcased early on and then actually dropped.
No living city AI routines
True, but this isn't really content in the sense that this isn't something which would have increased the length of the game. It does impact immersion somewhat, but even the way it is now Cyberpunk's NPC's are far more diverse and numerous than those of any other open world games I've ever played. I'll grant you this was a case where CDPR over promised and way under delivered.
No cybernetic augmentation cutscenes after your first Aug
In a sense this isn't true. Your first visit to Viktor's clinic has quite a bit of this, albeit nothing as gruesome as getting a pair of Mantis blades installed or something like that.
Limited partner choice/lack of unscripted social interactions
I don't recall CDPR giving us an exact number of romance options. That being said, I'd agree with you in that our choices are very limited. You have one choice for a gay male, one lesbian and one option for a straight male and a straight female. That's it. Of course, this can be fixed slightly by modifying the game as can be evidenced with male V romancing Judy through a console command.
Does it? Because I don't think it does. You've provided next to no evidence that the game is missing 60% of its content. Flyable ships were never promised. I consider the missions and story lines content. I'm less concerned with how many apartments I can buy as I won't hang out in them. I think this is the crap the Cyberpunk life simulator crowd was expecting and didn't get despite there being very little from CDPR leading us to believe that this is what the game would be. Again, there are missing features as you pointed out but even if you were correct about all these things it wouldn't amount to 60% of the game missing.
Did you actually play it? There is 130+ hours there easily. Buying apartments, car customization etc. would all be great features but they hardly amount to over half the game missing.
Just because CDPR says the leaks aren’t true doesn’t mean the leaks aren’t true.
There is next to no evidence that CDPR is lying.
The pen and paper TRPG Shadowrun is exceptionally relevant. Many of the gameplay elements from Shadowrun have a direct gameplay mechanic in CyberPunk. Missing play style options is disappointing.
How so, because I don't think it is. First off, ****ing forget Shadowrun. That's not Cyberpunk. What's missing in the game that's in the source material for the Cyberpunk pen and paper RPG? That's really all that matters.
Giving a false sense of urgency to an open world game is a mistake as well.
It really isn't. Creating tension through a sense of urgency is what makes stories feel important. Creating a sense of urgency in a game type that obviously doesn't really enforce a sense of urgency tells you that the writers did their jobs right. It's hardly a mistake though. One of the biggest problems with open world games is their lack of narrative focus and their generic and direction less gameplay. Cyberpunk avoids this fantastically.
All this being said, I really like the game. I wanted a Fallout or Deus Ex game and that’s about what I got. My gaming experience has been relatively bug free but I can’t shake the feeling that there are things missing.
There are things that were cut, but again cut content and cut features are normal parts of game development. CDPR's only mistake is being overly transparent about that. Other developers aren't so transparent and for this very reason. It leads to whining when feature creep inevitably leads to the game being scaled back to meet launch deadlines, budgetary constraints and technical limitations. For example, it sounds great to have AI routines for NPC's where you could theoretically stalk them and figure out what's going on in their virtual lives.
There are two problems: 1.) That's creepy. 2.) It's something that CDPR would have had to spend a **** ton of time coding and something that ultimately, the game doesn't need. Yes, it would add something to immersion but ultimately it was a huge time sync and technical challenge with little to no pay off in terms of the game's narrative and gameplay.
