Cyberpunk 2077 reviews are trickling in...

[Dan_D]

Here is my short summary of the game:

• I've finished the game in about 27 hours. Shorter than I expected, and much shorter than their 170 hours claim. Of course I didn't do all the optional activities. But I only left one main character arc hanging halfway through, I think I've exhausted all others.

You didn't touch the vast majority of the game if you "completed it" in under 27 hours. The fact is, a full completion of the game takes longer than that. You also can't get some endings (there are six) doing it the way you did.

• Bug wise it wasn't that bad, I didn't get any game breaking bugs - No I'm not saying they don't exist, I just got lucky, as I've encountered one literally 10 minutes into a new game while I was trying another origin story.

There are a lot of bugs in the game. I've had only a couple of quests with issues, but there are countless visual bugs. You didn't catch the vast majority of the visual glitches and other issues if you only played the game for 27 hours.

• Plenty of other bugs however, but they were far from ruining the experience, the game was enjoyable as is.

This, I would agree with. The fact of the matter is that despite the issues, they weren't show stoppers and I've enjoyed the game thoroughly in spite of the technical issues.

• I don't have much to complain about performance. 2080ti, 3700x 64GB (but you are more than fine with 32 possibly even 16). Played at 3840x1600 everything at ultra, DLSS - Quality, usually averaging about 45 fps, I expected worse.

This is in line with what I've experienced. I have an overclocked RTX 2080 Ti, 64GB of RAM and a 3950X. I run the game at 3440x1440 and get roughly the same FPS. It does shoot upwards to around 55FPS indoors, but typically sits at 45FPS on average.

• The FPS is pretty consistent, I know it might sound stupid to say but the game feels well optimized on the PC. The bugs I've seen are all asset and ui related

For the most part, yes.

• I think this game is meant to be played in HDR and with RT, if you aren't you are missing out. It looks stunning this way.

Indeed.

• The first few hours of the game I did not enjoy that much, it was a bit of a letdown.

I couldn't disagree more, but this is entirely subjective territory. I will say that repeating the initial "heist" section on subsequent plays would be potentially tiring. The vast majority of the city isn't open to you until this is completed.

• The best side missions only reveal themselves late in the game, almost at the point of no return. But some of them were really great. Too bad doing side gigs clashes with the narrative urgency of the game, so I did them sparingly.

Untrue, you can do these in any order provided you have sufficient gear or are careful / good enough to get through them.

• I fully expected to be able to continue side missions after finishing the main story. Sadly that is not the case, when the game ends all you get is the main menu. Of course you can reload your last save before the point of no return but that's just not the same. This is probably the biggest letdown of the game to me. IDK how will the expansions work then? They'll tie into the middle of the game further contradicting the urgency of the main story? But that's a question for another day.

It makes sense from a narrative perspective given the game's various endings. In some of them, continuation wouldn't be possible given the outcomes of those endings. You can load your previous open world checkpoint and the rewards earned during the ending are transferred back to your inventory. Well, the iconic ones anyway.

• I've seen 4 of the possible endings, and hated all of them so much that it killed my determination for a second playthrough.

I understand this. However, I disagree with you. I like a couple of them.

I want to try the remaining 1 or 2 endings and the origin stories before writing a full review.

Origin stories don't make much of a difference from what I can tell. You do get some slightly different dialog choices but for the most part its not a big deal.

 

[MadMummy76]

You didn't touch the vast majority of the game if you "completed it" in under 27 hours. The fact is, a full completion of the game takes longer than that. You also can't get some endings (there are six) doing it the way you did.

I didn't say checking out all 6 endings took 27 hours, finishing the main story did. After I've played all 6 endings and all 3 origin stories my total is about 40 hours.

There are a lot of bugs in the game. I've had only a couple of quests with issues, but there are countless visual bugs. You didn't catch the vast majority of the visual glitches and other issues if you only played the game for 27 hours.

What? What does playing 27 hours has to do with anything? I've encountered 99% of bugs in the first few hours of playing, after that I only saw the same bugs over and over again occur at different places.

I couldn't disagree more, but this is entirely subjective territory. I will say that repeating the initial "heist" section on subsequent plays would be potentially tiring. The vast majority of the city isn't open to you until this is completed.

That was my first impression of it, I only started really enjoying the game after the heist mission before that it felt small and underwhelming.

Untrue, you can do these in any order provided you have sufficient gear or are careful / good enough to get through them.

Many of the best side missions only arrived in my inbox shortly before I reached the last stop in the main story. It might have been different for you, because you did more activities or for whatever reason, but this is my experience, you don't know how it was like for me, I'm telling you. Yes you can do them in any order, but only after you receive them. All I've said is that they only become available when I was in arms reach of the finale.

It makes sense from a narrative perspective given the game's various endings. In some of them, continuation wouldn't be possible given the outcomes of those endings. You can load your previous open world checkpoint and the rewards earned during the ending are transferred back to your inventory. Well, the iconic ones anyway.

Yes most of the endings are incompatible with continuing the game after them, that's part of the reason why I don't like the endings. It's a waste to only have this city for one short story, and then abandon it entirely.

I understand this. However, I disagree with you. I like a couple of them.

After seeing all six all I can say is that they are all bad, just not equally bad. And by that I'm not saying they are necessarily badly written. I'm saying I hate the outcomes. Some of the bad endings I'd like, if I had some happy endings available to compensate for them. And some of the endings are too similar / almost the same. There are missed opportunities there.

Origin stories don't make much of a difference from what I can tell. You do get some slightly different dialog choices but for the most part its not a big deal.

I already linked my full review a few posts above there is my full assessment of the game including where I conclude that basically the origin story is just choosing the first mission, because after that everything is exactly the same.

 

[Dan_D]

I didn't say checking out all 6 endings took 27 hours, finishing the main story did. After I've played all 6 endings and all 3 origin stories my total is about 40 hours.

What I'm saying is, you didn't really see the whole game if that's how long you spent playing it. There are many good, interesting and enjoyable quests outside the main ones. CDPR really does know how to do the side quests better than anyone else. I know some of those do impact one of the endings I know of, so I won't get into that here. But, there is a lot of good material you wouldn't have experienced. But yes, the main story probably only takes about 25 to 30 hours.

What? What does playing 27 hours has to do with anything? I've encountered 99% of bugs in the first few hours of playing, after that I only saw the same bugs over and over again occur at different places.

As I said, 27 hours isn't enough to fully experience this game. There is a lot you wouldn't have done. Not only that, but that's not going to get you all the better weapons, gear, etc. Most of those are tied up in the organized crime quests as well as other side missions. I wasn't just thinking about bugs. Though the quest bugs you wouldn't encounter since you didn't do the vast majority of the quests. The main ones tended to work well. It's the side missions primarily that got ****ed up aside from a few that were mentioned and addressed in today's patch.

Many of the best side missions only arrived in my inbox shortly before I reached the last stop in the main story. It might have been different for you, because you did more activities or for whatever reason, but this is my experience, you don't know how it was like for me, I'm telling you. Yes you can do them in any order, but only after you receive them. All I've said is that they only become available when I was in arms reach of the finale.

As it turns out, there were some bugs were you wouldn't receive calls from NPC's and progress chains if certain conditions were met. I only became aware of this a couple hours ago. It's very possible that those were not triggered until late in the game. Specifically, Panam wasn't contacting you as often as she was supposed to. In my playthrough, I had wondered why she basically dropped out of the game after a certain point. I also missed some quests as it turns out, again probably for the same reason. I just didn't have this nearly as bad as you did.

Yes most of the endings are incompatible with continuing the game after them, that's part of the reason why I don't like the endings. It's a waste to only have this city for one short story, and then abandon it entirely.

I don't dislike all the endings, but I can see your point and even agree somewhat.

After seeing all six all I can say is that they are all bad, just not equally bad. And by that I'm not saying they are necessarily badly written. I'm saying I hate the outcomes. Some of the bad endings I'd like, if I had some happy endings available to compensate for them. And some of the endings are too similar / almost the same. There are missed opportunities there.

Already addressed.

I already linked my full review a few posts above there is my full assessment of the game including where I conclude that basically the origin story is just choosing the first mission, because after that everything is exactly the same.

The dialog is vastly different for each life path choice. But, that doesn't change anything else or affect the overall tone of the story in any of these cases. It has no bearing on endings, most relationships or the tone of other conversation choices. While that's unfortunate, it's expected as making these choices much more meaningful would be a technical nightmare to achieve. To CDPR's credit, its more impactful than the background choices in the Mass Effect games.

 

[MadMummy76]

What I'm saying is, you didn't really see the whole game if that's how long you spent playing it. There are many good, interesting and enjoyable quests outside the main ones. CDPR really does know how to do the side quests better than anyone else. I know some of those do impact one of the endings I know of, so I won't get into that here. But, there is a lot of good material you wouldn't have experienced. But yes, the main story probably only takes about 25 to 30 hours.

As I said, 27 hours isn't enough to fully experience this game. There is a lot you wouldn't have done. Not only that, but that's not going to get you all the better weapons, gear, etc. Most of those are tied up in the organized crime quests as well as other side missions. I wasn't just thinking about bugs. Though the quest bugs you wouldn't encounter since you didn't do the vast majority of the quests. The main ones tended to work well. It's the side missions primarily that got ****ed up aside from a few that were mentioned and addressed in today's patch.

So what do you think is an acceptable number? 40 60 100 hours? LOL Admit it, you are just gatekeeping. Since the main narrative of the game is of haste, I felt breaking my immersion every time I started doing something not even remotely related to it. So in a way if you go for total immersion you shouldn't even bother with any sidequests. That's why I thought that the game would continue after the end of the main story. Because that's the only way it makes sense to me to go on long wild goose chases. And I did do many of them regardless of my better judgement. But I literally had to force myself to not enter the elevator, and go on other missions at the end.

I'm planning to do another go at it, where I'll ignore the main story as much as possible and only focus on side missions, then we'll see how much I actually missed, but I suspect not that much. Unless there are tons of more missions I didn't get due to glitches.

Spoiler: I've finished these major sidequests

The entire Johnny Silverhand campaign, went to the drive in with Rogue, did the concert, the whole nine yards.
I also did the detective River part of things, saved the kid, uncovered the coverup at the club etc.
I finished the entire Panam line, otherwise I wouldn't even got the possibility of all six endings.
I wrapped up the Peralez story, that was a good one.
I also did Lizzy's PI job.
The only major sidequest that I couldn't do was Judy's takeover, as for some reason the quest disappeared from my journal before finishing it.

All this within that 27 hours.

As it turns out, there were some bugs were you wouldn't receive calls from NPC's and progress chains if certain conditions were met. I only became aware of this a couple hours ago. It's very possible that those were not triggered until late in the game. Specifically, Panam wasn't contacting you as often as she was supposed to. In my playthrough, I had wondered why she basically dropped out of the game after a certain point. I also missed some quests as it turns out, again probably for the same reason. I just didn't have this nearly as bad as you did.

I suspected as much

I don't dislike all the endings, but I can see your point and even agree somewhat.

I dislike that there are only bad endings. Not the endings themselves individually. These are all valid and acceptable endings, that I'd be fine with if there were 6 happy endings to unlock as well.

 

[Brian_B]

All this within that 27 hours

It’s your super fast computer

 

[MadMummy76]

What I feared has happened: Patch 1.05 broke the game for me. Not completely but enough that I don't want to play it in this state. Basically all shadows are gone, nothing casts or recieves shadows, everything looks completely flat, it looks like a game from 15 years ago.

 

[Armenius]

I'm glad they didn't focus on reflections, here. The global illumination and how light gets diffused is really the showcase in this game. It's an example of ray tracing done right.

 

[MadMummy76]

I'm glad they didn't focus on reflections, here. The global illumination and how light gets diffused is really the showcase in this game. It's an example of ray tracing done right.

And also HDR is done right in this game. In other titles it just made the image more saturated / burnt highlights, here it actually makes the lighting more realistic.

 

[FILERO]

Ive had a decent experience, feels like its an OK game if you brute force it on PC and overlook the occasional glitch.

 

[Dan_D]

And also HDR is done right in this game. In other titles it just made the image more saturated / burnt highlights, here it actually makes the lighting more realistic.

Not in my experience it isn't. I've tried it on a couple of displays and all the tuning in the world doesn't fix it. I can make the game look good at night, but then the day time is so bright I literally can't see anything. By default, the game's super washed out and ****ty looking in HDR. I have to enable it in Windows, then disable it once the game is going and set to HDR. Then it looks normal, except that its too bright in the day time unless I turn things down to the point where everything looks flat at night. I can't strike a balance between the two. My displays offer next to no configuration options with HDR enabled, and there certainly isn't anything I can do from the game's menu that I can see.

 

[Armenius]

Not in my experience it isn't. I've tried it on a couple of displays and all the tuning in the world doesn't fix it. I can make the game look good at night, but then the day time is so bright I literally can't see anything. By default, the game's super washed out and ****ty looking in HDR. I have to enable it in Windows, then disable it once the game is going and set to HDR. Then it looks normal, except that its too bright in the day time unless I turn things down to the point where everything looks flat at night. I can't strike a balance between the two. My displays offer next to no configuration options with HDR enabled, and there certainly isn't anything I can do from the game's menu that I can see.

This is not what my experience has been. What display are you playing the game on?

 

[Dan_D]

This is not what my experience has been. What display are you playing the game on?

• Samsung UNKU6300 40" TV
• Samsung KS8500 49" TV
• Acer Predator CG437K 43" Monitor (HDR1000, G-Sync, 120Hz, etc.)

 

[Armenius]

• Samsung UNKU6300 40" TV
• Samsung KS8500 49" TV
• Acer Predator CG437K 43" Monitor (HDR1000, G-Sync, 120Hz, etc.)

KU6300 - Does not have any local dimming. Fully dims the the screen and plays with contrast to make bright objects appear brighter to the eye. Loses color definition with HDR turned on in HDR content. I had one of these myself in 49" flavor and this was my experience.

KS8500 - Only has 6 edge dimming zones that light horizontally. Will cause severe bloom around bright objects that can overpower the rest of the image.

CG437K - Has no local dimming feature despite having the VESA HDR1000 advertising. The screen does, in fact, approach that maximum brightness but ultimately suffers from the same image issues as the KU6300.

The two displays I've played the game on are a LG C8 OLED and ASUS PG27UQ, and the game looks fantastic on both with HDR.

 

[MadMummy76]

Not in my experience it isn't. I've tried it on a couple of displays and all the tuning in the world doesn't fix it. I can make the game look good at night, but then the day time is so bright I literally can't see anything. By default, the game's super washed out and ****ty looking in HDR. I have to enable it in Windows, then disable it once the game is going and set to HDR. Then it looks normal, except that its too bright in the day time unless I turn things down to the point where everything looks flat at night. I can't strike a balance between the two. My displays offer next to no configuration options with HDR enabled, and there certainly isn't anything I can do from the game's menu that I can see.

For me this is the first game where I can actually turn on HDR on PC without it looking like a gimmick with oversaturated or washed out colors. This game looks perfect in HDR. Yes, you have to turn on HDR in windows, that's a problem with many games. That problem was even patched into some games that didn't require it before, so even if it is super annoying that seems to be the intended behavior by microsoft. The game menu offers some settings for HDR but I didn't really have to change anything. There are also two different HDR modes, I'm using HDR10 PQ.

But my monitor is fake HDR, it recieves HDR signal and alters the image, but it does not have the brightness or contrast to meet any real HDR standard. But to me that's a good thing. If it was any brighter I'd get a suntan.

 

[Dan_D]

For me this is the first game where I can actually turn on HDR on PC without it looking like a gimmick with oversaturated or washed out colors. This game looks perfect in HDR. Yes, you have to turn on HDR in windows, that's a problem with many games. That problem was even patched into some games that didn't require it before, so even if it is super annoying that seems to be the intended behavior by microsoft. The game menu offers some settings for HDR but I didn't really have to change anything. There are also two different HDR modes, I'm using HDR10 PQ.

But my monitor is fake HDR, it recieves HDR signal and alters the image, but it does not have the brightness or contrast to meet any real HDR standard. But to me that's a good thing. If it was any brighter I'd get a suntan.

Destiny 2 remains the only game that's ever looked good in HDR on any of my displays.