Cyberpunk Review – PlayStation 4 (Played on PlayStation 5)
Editor’s Note: As stated above, Twinfinite played a PS4 copy of Cyberpunk 2077 on PS5 hardware. As a result, our experience is likely to have been markedly different from those attempting to play the game on PS4.
Other staff members have reported serious performance issues on previous console generation hardware that are still very problematic at the time of publishing. If you’re reading this you should consider this review a look into how Cyberpunk 2077 plays when played on hardware that is able to properly run it.
This review and the score the follows only considers the Cyberpunk 2077 experience playing on PS5. It is our recommendation that you avoid playing Cyberpunk 2077 on last-gen hardware entirely until updates are made to improve performance.
The memory of watching Cyberpunk 2077’s first gameplay presentation at E3 2018 is one I’ve thought of frequently over the past few weeks. Vertical slices so often promise a level of perfection rarely achieved in the final product, but what had intrigued me back then wasn’t so much what I had seen of Night City’s tremendous scale and density but the glue I hoped would hold it all together.
The reality, though, is that while Night City’s dystopian labyrinth of dingy streets and towering skyscrapers deliver a breathtaking spectacle, it too often feels as though it’s held together with string and tape.
Even when it’s firing on all cylinders, it never truly exists and reacts in the way I’d hoped as the next big open-world from CD Projekt Red, the master craftsmen behind The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.
If you expected a truly next-generation open-world design, this sadly isn’t it. Night City is more of a carefully organized stage, rather than a living, breathing habitat — a grand facade best absorbed from the periphery, not to be examined too closely lest you accidentally see behind the curtain.
And yet, I’ve still been extremely impressed by much of what Cyberpunk 2077 has to offer. Putting the disastrous, even scandalous, situation surrounding its launch aside, there’s no doubt in my mind that judged as an overall experience, it’s a great RPG that thrills and delights far more than it frustrates.
Cyberpunk 2077 begins as it ends, by placing a key decision in the hands of the player. There are three “life paths” to consider in choosing a backstory for its main protagonist, V. Each of these kickstarts Cyberpunk 2077’s story in a completely different location and, importantly, sets the tone for what sort of responses V is able to muster for the rest of the game.
As a “corpo,” for example, a unique set of dialog options allow V to chime in with insight into the shady, oppressive corporate world dominating Night City.
Raging against the machine, so to speak, is a central theme of the plot no matter which you choose, but I appreciated having control over V’s own motivations for bringing it down and the repercussions of my decision popping up throughout the rest of the story.
The main thrust of V’s plight is teed up over the course of a fairly lengthy prologue. At its climax, V is forced to insert a valuable “relic” chip into their mind to save it from destruction, but the chip holds more than binary data.
As it turns out, it’s actually a construct, a digitally preserved personality, of a terrorist named Johnny Silverhand (Keanu Reeves) who died half a century earlier. Now, V’s plight is not only to deliver the data to its benefactors but find a way to remove the chip from his mind without killing himself in the process.
Of course, Silverhand, now very much alive and lamenting life under the thumb of corporate overlords, has his own ideas. Slowly but surely, he and V’s disparate thoughts become ever more fused together, and his running commentary of events begin to influence V’s personality and decision-making.
The changing dynamic of this relationship forms a core pillar of the story and ends dramatically regardless of which of the game’s five different endings one experiences.
Surprisingly, it doesn’t take all that long to see it through, either, at just 25 or so hours.
Finishing the “side gigs,” however, doubles that number comfortably; and actually, not only do these optional adventures arguably feature more interesting stories but their characters also become intertwined in the main story if you want them to. In that sense, the overarching plot can sprawl in different directions beyond the scope of what’s necessary to “finish” the game.
Further, the side characters you meet during these missions are brilliantly written and add the sort of emotional resonance one often needs to become truly immersed in a story.
Characters such as the vivacious Panam, for example, are introduced as part of the main questline, but there’s a lengthy and entirely optional side quest that further develops her character, offers a chance at romance, and even the option to involve her in the main story later down the track.
Rogue Amendiares, the hardline “Fixer,” and River Ward, the hardworking detective, are yet more examples of other terrific characters brought to life in huge, fascinating questlines that feel weighty and important in the context of the main story.
My only issue with Cyberpunk 2077’s narrative qualities is that for a game named after the genre itself, there’s too little examination of important themes like transhumanism and existentialism.
They’re alluded to, certainly, but only as a catalyst for the game’s aesthetic, and by skipping out on putting those themes under the microscope properly, Cyberpunk 2077 sometimes feels more like a pastiche of the genre without the substance.
There’s certainly no shortage of lingo to constantly remind you Cyberpunk 2077 is inspired by tropes of the genre, though. Between “cyberdecks,” “ICE,” “choombas,” “flatlining,” and “preem” fashion styles like Neokitch and Entropism, there’s an awful lot of jargon to absorb in quick order.
There’s an attitude to the dialog that screams 1980s punk; the abbreviated words, choppy sentences, and bizarre slang is a signature of the rebellious, angsty dystopian sci-fi popular during the era.
But it does feel a little dated at times, and there’s definitely an element of cheese to proceedings. I can’t help but wonder whether somebody who hasn’t read or watched cyberpunk fiction would appreciate it.