Night City from Cyberpunk 2077 seems at first glance like a kind of futuristic Disneyland for adults, a place of pleasure, consumption, and excess. However, there are various aspects where the dystopia shines through the garish veneer of the city, which we want to show you in this list.
There is hardly a better way to describe daily life in Night City than with “Stan, the Man,” the radio host of the morning news from Night City, who welcomes players in front of the home screen in Cyberpunk 2077 with fresh news of the day:
Good morning, Night City!
Yesterday’s corpse lottery ended with a solid and robust number of thirty! Ten of them in Heywood – thanks to the unabated gang wars! One cop is dead, so you’re all probably screwed, because the NCPD is NOT going to let this slide.
In Santo Domingo, there was another power outage. The netrunners are back at work, drilling holes in the power grid. Meanwhile, the trauma team is scraping cyberpsycho victims off the sidewalk in Westbrook. And in Pacifica … Well … Pacifica is still Pacifica.
That’s it for me, Stan! Join me for another day in our city of dreams!
This “city of dreams” seems at first glance to many to be a city full of endless possibilities, decadence, and hedonism. Colorful neon signs full of absurd purchasing options, body modifications for superhuman powers, and a backdrop of sounds ranging from excited advertising calls to lascivious moans.
Night City seems like a playground of excess where the player wants to let loose. Those who make a name for themselves and gain wealth can have a lot of fun. However, a large part of the regular residents would view it quite differently.
In the book “The World of Cyberpunk 2077”, which is written like a kind of “Night City Times” from the real world of the game, the editor Thompson writes the following about society in 2077: “Modern society has a rigid class system. Forget the three-tier model. Upper, middle, and lower class? That might have existed at the beginning of the century. Today we only have two classes – upper and lower class.”
Therefore, there are those who have power in Night City, which includes not only corporations but also the big names of the resistance movement, in the form of fixers and Edgerunners. However, there are also countless and mostly people who are simply trying to survive in a world not made for them. And why Night City can be seen more as a nightmare than a “city of dreams” we want to bring to you in this list.
An overloaded city with too little livable space
Night City is extremely overcrowded and compact, which is why the city is known for its vertical buildings and infrastructure due to its density. The city consists of several levels with streets, buildings, and air traffic to make use of the space even above the ground.
No matter where you are in Night City, instead of a horizon in the distance, you find this at the end of a skyscraper in the sky (if it’s not blocked by streets, flying transports, or screens).
The massive and gigantic residential blocks, called megabuildings, are also a sign of this space shortage. V from the game and David from the anime Edgerunners live in these blocks, which you have to navigate through unsightly and dangerous alleys. These complexes can house thousands of apartments, with the lower, cheaper living units consisting of overcrowded single rooms, while the upper floors house luxurious penthouses. All units are, of course, also equipped with wall-mounted vending machines, so you can buy packaged food in your cozy home at any time … and speaking of food …
