MeinMMO editor Caro followed the official release of Cyberpunk 2077 only through memes and further jokes. Back then, she could not imagine that the game would soon become one of her favorite games. After several playthroughs, she notes that it feels like coming home each time.
Cyberpunk 2077 was for me in 2020 nothing more than a meme. Everything I knew about the game consisted only of poor performance, exploding cars, broken character animations, and a stunning Keanu Reeves. I knew nothing about the story, the lore, or the evil hidden behind Night City’s shiny facade.
A couple of years later, however, I was reminded of it again due to a friend’s recommendation. Cyberpunk 2077 was not only finally playable but also – in her words – really “extremely cool”. She urged me to give the game a chance.
And what can I say? My friend was right. The game not only ran flawlessly after several saving patches… I was immediately captivated.
Here you can see the trailer for the city of dreams, which has not let go of me since my first visit:
Night City swallowed me whole and I haven’t found a way out yet
Because I only played Cyberpunk 2077 late, I was able to fully immerse myself in the gaming experience that players were promised at release. I quickly asked myself a question: Am I glad I waited so long or disappointed that I didn’t give the game a chance earlier?
While I fell in love with the story and its themes almost immediately, with the level design of the missions and also V as my protagonist – it was mainly the little things that made the game feel so alive for me.
These are the details that you hardly notice unless you’re explicitly looking for them. But it’s precisely these that make a place not just a level in a game engine, but a restaurant, a temple, a nightclub – a city.
The songs on the radio (which are actually absolute bangers), the fully equipped kitchens of a snack bar, an inconspicuous irrigation system for the remaining few trees: Such things show that someone cares about the city, that normal people go to work, that there is culture, and that Night City is alive. And you find plenty of such things. Walking through the city with an open eye is definitely worth it. The design tells its own story.
The immersion I experienced in Cyberpunk 2077 is something I haven’t been able to compare with any other game, no matter how much I love other favorites.
Cyberpunk 2077 is a game where I forgo fast travel, and instead of making a quick jump, I’m willing to take the damn subway, put the controller down, and look out the window during the ride. V is indeed a mercenary, but also a resident of the city, which slowly but surely became another home for me. And with every playthrough, this feeling grew.
A new start feels like coming home
Although I started late, I have since gone through a solid number of playthroughs that I wouldn’t justify in every single-player game. Instead of becoming a little more boring each time because I already know everything, it does the opposite for me.
Every new run feels like coming home. I feel a bit like my street kid V, who left Night City to find a better life in Atlanta but ended up back in the “city of dreams” because one cannot escape it. That’s how all the unfinished games I left behind must have felt, while I ended up returning to Night City again.
In the intro with Jackie, I see familiar faces like Misty and Victor, I drive through the city with Padre, which I know so well and always look forward to what awaits me. To the emotions, the disturbing gigs and fates, the relationships. And to my development from a walking corpse to the absolutely over-equipped Edgerunner, whom nothing can stop, not even Adam Smasher.
The graphics in Cyberpunk 2077 are impressive, but what is really important to me in single-player games with a strong story is immersion. I would like to particularly commend the team at CD Projekt Red, especially its concept artists, environment, and narrative designers at this point.
Because this love for detail and the storytelling they carry through Night City and its locations becomes evident already in the early stages of development and built me a second home.
Of course, worldbuilding and sleek design alone do not create a flawless masterpiece – but it matters a lot. God-playing corporations, the dystopia of a corrupted humanity, and the human-made danger of wild AIs, which could become a kind of Lovecraftian cyber-entity bringing about the complete downfall of their creators. That tastes good.
Through Cyberpunk 2077 I realized: Better late than never. I am glad that I gave a chance to the origin of “Wake the F*ck Up, Samurai” memes and other shitposts and at the same time discovered one of my absolute favorite games that moves and emotionally challenges me every time I revisit it.
The world in 2077 and the city of Night City are always presented in the media of the game, be it songs or advertisements, as a kind of shiny metropolis of hedonism and excess. However, one should not forget the evil behind the facade and how terrible life in Night City actually is: 5 things in Cyberpunk 2077 that prove Night City is not “the city of dreams”
