Recent reviews by Mental Breakdance

nice game

Night City, soundtrack and characters are all beautiful and memorable. But,

-Most of the things they promised are not in the game, even the ones they showed weeks before the release. The game has too much cut content (both mechanics and storywise) that one can realize without seeing the trailers/demos beforehand. For more details: https://www.reddit.com/r/cyberpunkgame/comments/kcve8s/promised_but_missing_feature_list_will_update/ (not my post)

-It has many bugs, balance issues, and a non-existent AI for driving, pedestrians, and police (you would think it was from a test build of the game and the devs forgot to add the real thing).

-In combat, it seems like the game doesn't even try to make you take different approaches. That is mostly because of the dumb enemy AI which doesn't try to flank you or take cover. They only shoot, walk sideways, or sometimes get stuck behind a box while dashing towards you. As a netrunner, you can get behind cover and spam your hacks till everyone is neutralized and the enemy wouldn't be able to do anything effective to counter this.

-Killing or not, it doesn't make any difference. The gangs do not react to your actions (things like sending men after you in the streets, not letting you in their turf, etc.). There are no random encounters, just specific located events/gigs that you choose to go for. Do you remember the dangerous Pacifica that you need an armored car to travel through? You can walk free of danger just by staying away a couple of meters from predefined events on the map. Nobody comes for you, you go for them.

-There is no meaningful fame system in a game one tries to be "the legend" of Night City. Street Cred is just a level system exclusively for unlocking new items at vendors. Nobody reacts to your Street Cred.

-Lifepaths only give you extra flavor dialog options that change nothing other than just one or two encounters.

-The only choices that matter is the ones you make at the end of the game. Every other endgame variable is determined by whether doing or not doing the linear side-quests. Every playthrough is the same till the last mission.

I'll cut it here.

this game does not deserve a recommendation or any awards at all because of all the false promises and the "not ready" state of the game at launch.