It’s June 2019#

Keanu Reeves was giving a presentation on Cyberpunk 2077 on E3. This specific presentation became very famous for the “You’re breathtaking” meme, but lately I’ve been playing cyberpunk and I caught myself thinking of what Keanu was saying at the time:

The feeling […] of walking the streets of the future. It’s really going to be breathtaking - Keanu Reeves

Of course, Keanu is breathtaking as well.

Then in early 2020 when Cyberpunk actually launched I played entirely, endured quite a few bugs and bad performance, but the game was enjoyable. Now almost 6 years later I’m playing again, the game has definitely changed for the better, but I changed too.

Alternative#

During these 6 years, I became more alternative. What’s alternative anyway? According to Oxford:

relating to behavior that is considered unconventional and is often seen as a challenge to traditional norms.

I switched to Linux, I started listening to Twenty One Pilots, stopped using (most) social networks, but perhaps the biggest alternative behavior I got is mild hate toward cars and car centric culture.

Specifically I delayed getting my driver’s license for 5 years because I didn’t want to drive, and since getting my license I haven’t driven a car. I’m lucky to live in a central enough region that I can do everything with my bike. And since I started biking around, my mood got better, I probably got healthier in some invisible way, and I also noticed how bad car centric culture is overall.

Same old mistakes#

Not to get too distracted talking about cars, but 6 years later that Keanu Reeves quote jumped on my brain again. Because when he told us about the feeling of walking the streets of the future I noticed that cyberpunk’s Night City is a car centric city. Of course it would be, it’s based on real mega cities such as São Paulo and others. I have been to São Paulo a few times and I can assure you it’s really bad, a city totally designed for cars and not for people.

Now this is where it gets controversial to me. The game is very realistic in it’s depiction of a cyberpunk city, so realistic in fact that I can’t appreciate the graphical details and world building because I’m busy driving a car around from point A to B. As they say, realism doesn’t always equal fun.

In other words, they made a game so detailed and pretty that many current gen PCs still struggle to run at a stable FPS, but between missions you can’t really appreciate all the details because you are stuck driving a car around.

And while I’m criticizing the game for being too realistic, it’s only because in my current play through I’m prioritizing walking to places, and it is breathtaking. For instance in GTA V I don’t mind driving around, because Los Santos is detailed in a very macro way.

Conclusion#

In the end, maybe it’s about how each player plays the game, but I’d love if future releases could give some attention to alternative methods and allow the players to experience the world better. This critique is similar to people who don’t use fast travel because they want to be immersed in the world, with the difference that fast travel is a conscious design decision while car centric design in game is more like a design “pattern” ingrained in our culture. We always benefit from more alternatives.