You know that Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay video you were looking for? It’s finally here and it looks awfully, awfully good.
The 48-minute demo mostly mirrors what was shown behind closed doors at E3 earlier this year. It starts with the creation of your playable character, who goes by the name V, and two missions of grim and gritty goodness in the fictional burg of Night city. There’s also some censored and not-so-censored full-frontal nudity. So consider this your NSFW warning.
Our highlights reel (above) is family friendly, though!
The video’s narrator promises that developer CD Projekt Red is going for a seamless open-world experience without load times. We don’t see much of that in this demo—which mostly shows off combat, dialogue, and cybernetic upgrades—but a wide shot of Night City in the incongruously bright, California sunlight is certainly striking. It honestly makes me more excited to explore the sci-fi world than if all we saw was predictably rain-soaked neon.
But what’s really interesting is the social hierarchy shown between player and NPCs.
“I fucked you over, you fucked the gang over,” says one high-strung suit taking a nicotine vacation near the end of the video. “Somewhere at the start of this story, somebody fucked the corp.”
It really drives home that V is just a cog in the classist corporate machine. Albeit one with arm blades, robot eyes, and a “smart gun.” Hopefully CDPR can maintain that sense of danger in the final product.
Speaking of which, the video repeatedly points out this is not the finished game, and anything shown is subject to change. That’s not uncommon for this kind of footage. What is slightly uncommon is the video’s thoroughness—with multiple spoken and written reminders that, hey, the graphics might look different when Cyberpunk comes out. Which might have something to do with the developers catching so much (largely undeserved) flack for how their last game, The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt, looked when it launched.
Not that CD Projekt Red doesn’t deserve skepticism in other areas. Reportedly poor working conditions might only be compounded by regressive labor views among management. And whoever is running the company’s social media needs to chill the hell out. It’s possible those reactionary views won’t be reflected in the game’s story (which we still know precious little about). Then again, it’s possible they will be. The repeated controversies certainly make it worth wondering about.
In the meantime, at least we know a bit more about what sure to be a huge game… eventually. There’s still no projected release date for Cyberpunk 2077. So be sure to check back at ReadySet and Zam Video for more details as they come!
