Hey, chooms! Load up your quickhacks, call one of the fixers, and hit the streets of Night City! That’s right, we’re diving into the rise and fall and rise and fall and rise again of an RPG game that is actually pretty good now almost two years after its release. We didn’t get the refund when it was offered back in 2020 and now, after the game’s botched release and various subsequent patches, we’re finally ready to talk about it. This is the “Cyberpunk 2077” episode!
“Cyberpunk 2077” was announced all the way back in 2012 and was lauded as something that would revolutionize gaming. Did it? Eh. Not really. It had one of, if not the worst, releases in gaming history and completely destroyed the public’s faith in its then-beloved developer, CD Projekt Red. It was a metaphoric dumpster fire. The promise of something amazing turned to game-breaking bugs and blue console crash screens across the globe… unless you had a powerful enough PC, of course. NDAs, embargoes, blatant lying from the developers… the game got taken from the Playstation Store because it literally didn’t work. It sucked. But hey… it’s pretty good now! Seriously.
In this episode, we break down the production and history of this game, explore what the hell actually happened with its horrible release, talk about how it affected CDPR’s credibility, discuss how it changed things in the world of game development, and revisit that horrible post-release period where nothing in the game worked at all. It was the biggest fumble of the bag ever and yet, somehow, they managed to turn this game around and release something pretty damn awesome on next-gen consoles. The world-building, the lore, the gameplay, the excellent story, the customization… all really good. And fun to play. This leads to us talking about what we like about the game, the various fixes CDPR made, the amazing depth and insane amount of writing in this game, the various characters and themes of the game, and some of our favourite whacky side missions. We also gush about how much we love Night City and the art direction in the world of “Cyberpunk”.
We then take some time to chat about the state of game development in general, explain why we’re ok with the story of “No Man’s Sky” and not what happened with “Cyberpunk”, and think about the future of CDPR, and more. We round it out with some ranting about Pusha T’s new album “It’s Almost Dry”, Vince Staple’s new album “Ramona Park Broke My Heart”, and the latest album from You, Me, and Everyone We Know, “Something Heavy”. Plus, PALMREADER finally saw “The Batman” and “Spider-Man: No Way Home” and tells the world which he liked more. We talk a bit about leftist Batman, Colin Farrell as the Penguin, Catwoman being hot in every movie, revisiting "Community", and Otis lets y’all know about some comedy shows and TWO movie premiers he's got coming up. Tap in.
We’ll be back next week!
STREAM “THESE THINGS HAPPEN” by ANXIETY WEEKEND:
https://soundcloud.com/cemetery_sound/anxiety-weekend-these-things-happen?utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
STREAM “WHEN I FEEL THE LIGHT” by ANXIETY WEEKEND:
https://soundcloud.com/cemetery_sound/anxiety-weekend-when-i-feel-the-light?utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
STREAM “HOOK THE BARBER 50/WENDIGO” by DR. MEATSSS:
https://soundcloud.com/cemetery_sound/sets/dr-meatsss-hook-the-barber-50wendigo?utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
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