Cyberpunk 2077

[Yora]

I think this game might be deserving it's own thread. This is a big one, and I think a very long one.

When I bought it for PS4 on a whim, I had no real idea what kind of game I would get. I saw the reveal trailer when it came out years ago. Which as prerendered a CGI trailer of course did not reveal anything about the game other than the planned art style the creators had in mind at that time. It's very generic looking cyberpunk, perhaps with a little bit of extra punk and California sunshine.
And I think this is the game's biggest problem, that was entirely self inflicted and avoidable, and now comes to bite the developers in the ass. Over the years I occasionally asked people who were hyped about it what the game is about and why all the excitement. And it always was just the same empty basics that I already knew. "A cyberpunk game, made by CD Project, with a Keanu Reeves gimmick." Which basically is just "People who made a game I really loved are making another game". I think the hype train for this game made it out to be everything to everyone, and it would do so more amazingly than anything else before. That's great to generate lots of preorders, but sets up expectations that nothing can ever meet. Entirely self-inflicted, and probably a cautious tale for years to come.

I looked at what people actually commented on why they rated the game as 0/10, and much of seems to come down to the game not being what they thought it would be. Which I never was clear about either. Is it like GTA? Is it like Far Cry? Is it like Borderlands? Is it like Horizon? Is it like Arkham? Is it like Saint's Row? It it like Bioshock?
25 hours into the game, I can now say it's a very pure RPG with a hearty helping of immersive sims. This is a game like Vampire Bloodlines, Knights of the Old Republic, and of course Witcher 3, with a good dose of Deus Ex. This is a game about story, characters, and setting. There are cars you can drive, lots of guns to loot and upgrade, many cybernetic powers to hack enemies in combat. But it's not an action shooter or driving game. People are correct: Driving is banal and combat is about as thrilling and dynamic as in Mass Effect 1. It's serviceable, but it's not great. And the game probably could have been enhanced by having those parts polished up a lot, but those are things that I think aren't really that important for what the game is trying to do.
It's not wrong to not enjoy the game when that's what you're looking for in a game. The mistake was that these people bought the game in the first place. Which could have been entirely avoidable by being more clear what the product actually is.

And after 25 hours, I think this game is really just amazing at what it wants to be. I said it's about story, characters, and setting, and in all these categories this game is indeed in the all time top tier. Unsurprisingly when you compare it to Witcher 3, and also a big part of why it reminds me of Bloodlines and the KotOR games. (And boy, where those games buggy, unfinished, and had terrible combat.) All the characters are great. Some people who seem like they are just around for a single quick mission turn out to come back later to become your new "gang" when things inevitably go south and you have nowhere else to turn to. NPC faces are pretty good, and I really love the animations during the dialog scenes. You don't get anything like staring at the blank faces in portrait mode like in Bethesda games. Of all the people who are working on the game, I think the character animators deserve the greatest praise. The important story characters all have distinctive individual body language that feels very natural. Walking behind Jackie while he's strutting down a hallway with his guns in his giant paws is just a first impression.
And I have to say in the entire game I've not come across a single case of bad voice acting. Not sure if it's all A+, but I don't think there's anything in the game that isn't at least a straight B. Many of the gangs speak in their own foreign languages, and I am pretty sure they got native speakers for all of them. When the Japanese gangs are talking among themselves, I am totally buying it. Those aren't British or American people who learned a bit of Japanese once and are now reading lines someone else translated for them. And if they are, that company got the best people for the job there are. It really shouldn't be something that noteworthy, but it wasn't that long ago that bad voice acting was the default assumption even for the most prestigious games.
Love the story. It's not just an excuse plot to get the player to different enemy bases and have some fun action there. Many of the minor side missions are basically that, but even then you get a phone call from one of the many agents (with great voice acting) who are giving you the basics and send you a text massage with details that lets you get in the mindeset that there's an actual larger story going on in which at some point someone needs a mercenary to take out a minor gang boss or destroy a drug lab. In addition, most places have computers where you can check the emails of the gangs, and it turns out that you have the same people appearing over and over again. Somewhere you see a client list of a gang and it mentions Woodman, and you think "hey, that was the owner of that messed up brothel I had a five minute conversation with some days ago". I also looked at the first impressions of various people on youtube, and it turns out that there are plenty of dialog options and such that appear only if you previously some completely unrelated side-missions. It's really a lot like Bloodlines in that regard, and I think gives the game good replay value in the future. But the game probably is more than long enough if you even play through it once. As I said, I am 25 hours in, and I've only been to maybe 20% of the entire city at the most.

Technically it's pretty rough. On PS4, I have a crash every three our four hours, but the game is good with auto-saves and I don't think I ever lost more than 5 minutes of progress. There's somewhat frequent graphic glitches like phones that keep floating in the air when an NPC is meant to drop it and pull a weapon, or a gun being invisible in the player's hand during cutscenes, or textures on object being stretched across the whole screen for a second. It's not pretty, but it doesn't interfere with playing the game. This is something that shouldn't happen, but it's also something that happens all the time everywhere anyway. I don't see it as something that is a problem with this game in particular.
It certainly would have done the game no harm if it had been released three or four months later, though it might have done harm to CD Project's liquidity. Who knows. (Though with GOG, I somewhat doubt that.)

There are really just two things I have problems with in this game, and the biggest one is the loot system. This game has way too much loot lying around everywhere, and almost all of it is useless junk. What did the developer think how a tense stealthy hostage rescue would be improved by having the player looking into every nook and cranny looking for crumpled burger wrappers and packs of chewing gum? Many of these levels are really well set up, but actively harmed by giving you 200 pieces of junk to vacuum up while you're trying to shot a path to the exit. This is just completely baffling. I think it becomes less of an issue when you realize that almost all places remain completely accessible when the job is done and you can do a leisurely sweep of the whole place after all the enemies are dead and the hostages put into the escape cars, but it still feels completely pointless. Why do something that actively hurts the game when it could be so easily improved by just not having it in the first place?
Another annoying side effect is that all the junk makes equipping your character and dismantling or selling the stuff that is junk so much slower and drawn out. It would have been easier if all Unity pistols are worse than all Lexington pistols, but no. The name of all weapons only affects the model that you see appearing in your hands when drawn. Stats for all weapon are completely random. You don't upgrade from a Unity to a Lexington, and then get excited when you find a Nue. Instead you go from a Unity to another Unity, then to a Lexington, back to another Unity, and on to a Nue.
Clothing also makes no sense. You can have ripped T-Shirts with better protection than a ballistic vest. And in one case I had identically looking and named Arasaka Tactical Shirts, with one being being a white "common" version and the other a green "uncommon" version. But stats are so random that the common one actually had a higher armor rating than the uncommon one (and no other stats). Gah! I hate it so much. These are things that should have been learned 10 years ago.

Another thing that bothered me somewhat early on was that enemies soak giant loads of damage. Which I think was because I first started with a really weak gun and poorly suited character stats, and then happened to try my luck with random street gangs that were actually pretty high level and meant to be approached later. By now I no longer see that happen and random street punks go down very quickly. I am also playing on Hard, so I can't really complain too much about it. Combat is still nothing amazing, but enemies being too easy is a lot better than taking forever and requiring several reloads.
However, I am very pleased that you actually can play this game using almost exclusively stealth. You can absolutely play this game like Thief or Metal Gear Solid, and I find it to be a lot of fun that way. I've taken out several medium to large bandit lairs without firing a single shot.
What I am still waiting for is to find access to more and more powerful combat hacks. Currently I can only equip two quick-hack modules which I use for making enemies' eyes go into reboot for five seconds or clear their cache so they forget that they just saw me and wanted to call alarm. (The game assumes that every single gangster or mercenary in the city has cybernetic brains with artificial eyes.) Usually I try to to silently take out all criminals silently and leave them unconscious for the police to pick up later. (Which the game says happens, but you never actually see. The only difference between lethal and nonlethal damage is the blood puddle under the body.) But since I've gotten more information on scavengers after seeing the first chop shop (no, they don't take apart stolen cars to sell as spare parts), I have made it my goal to find, craft, or upgrade a quickhack module that allows me to make heads explode. I know there's one that causes damage by overloading cybernetic brains. Until then, breaking every scavengers neck will have to do.

This game is really great at drawing me in. I often just keep waiting at traffic lights without really thinking, always look left and right before crossing the road (and got hit by cars when I didn't). And one time I caused a police search in the area I was in because I shot a ripdoctor dead just as he was running out the front door of his side-alley clinic. I had confronted him with proof that he wasn't forced to work with the scavengers in his basement, and when he walked over to his desk to show me something, he suddenly bolted out of the other door leading outside. It was a split second decisions to shot him like a dog in the street because he was really fast and I didn't think there would be a follow up quest to track him down. (He was just in a little room I almost missed after clearing out the scavenger lair). And I regret nothing! This is such a wonderful horrible city.

I am really confident that one year from now this game will be well established as a classic of the deep-depth story RPGs. But as one Nintendo guy once said, a delayed game will eventually be good, but a rushed game will forever have a tarnished reputation.

[Silly Name]

Honestly, I'm enjoying the crash from the sidelines. The game was massively over-hyped, and while I don't think it's all bad, it's pretty clear that it wasn't ready to release - not just on last gen consoles, but some things appear to be missing or only partially implemented regardless of what platform you're playing on. There's a lot of good stuff in there, but the various delays this year were a sign of things not being ready, and shareholders probably pushed for a Christmas release no matter what.

I don't know if, after several patches, it will be able to compete in the arena for "beloved classic". I don't like to make predictions of that sort, but I suspect enough people were left burned by the sorry state of Day 0 after the massive marketing campaign that it'll be a sore spot for many people in years to come (similar to No Man's Sky).

[Eldan]

I don't know, I'd call it one of the best games I have played in years.

[thethird]

I was actually hyped for the game. Even pre-ordered (well my family did as a gift for me).

I am playing it in ps4 and I must say I am not disappointed. I am in fact having a blast. It is a very good RPG. I have picked clean (well almost) of "yellow" side missions (the ones that have a fixer telling you about stuff happening) on the first area. I am more or less about 20 odd hours in.

As for the technical aspects I haven't had a crash nor any serious bug. For what is worth I disabled most of the graphical stuff (blurry depth of field? Film grain? Flashes? Camera stutter? No thanks) Only one line of subtitles sticking to the screen (which is not terrible). And well the fact that if you look at yourself in the mirror with a helmet you go bald (which is off-putting).

When it comes to your particular build Yora (I am doing pretty much the same). You can get the fry brain hack from the drive that you are given to pay the maelstrom scavengers at the beginning if you exhamine it (although it sounds like you missed it), alternatively some netrunners sell hacks. Speaking of netrunners T-bug left you a quest, if you go and do it you will get a netrunner that will sell you my favorite hack (ping, it pings enemies). Invest asap in an improvement to your operating system, a ripperdock can get you one that will increase your hack capacity (both in how many you can carry and how many you can use).

[Rynjin]

When it comes to your particular build Yora (I am doing pretty much the same). You can get the fry brain hack from the drive that you are given to pay the maelstrom scavengers at the beginning if you exhamine it (although it sounds like you missed it), alternatively some netrunners sell hacks. Speaking of netrunners T-bug left you a quest, if you go and do it you will get a netrunner that will sell you my favorite hack (ping, it pings enemies). Invest asap in an improvement to your operating system, a ripperdock can get you one that will increase your hack capacity (both in how many you can carry and how many you can use).

I also got it from a Side Job in act 2, so it's not completely missable.

Spoiler: Specifics

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It's a job you get from Sandra Dorsett (the woman you save from the scavs in the prologue) to retrieve her databank.

As for people not getting what they expected...I have to imagine they never watched any of the gameplay footage they released in 2018. They played 45 minutes of the game, covering the entire All Foods/Maelstrom quest that is largely unchanged in terms of visible gameplay from the release product; the only major exception is that they had to remove the wallrunning mechanic because they couldn't make it work properly.

[boj0]

I'm unfortunately stuck playing on a last gen console, so obviously I'm having a rougher go than the PC folks; but I will say that this is a game that I so desperately want to love, it has character, the story is fun, it captures the "Pink Mohawk" flavor of the genre just as well as Deus Ex captures "Black Trenchcoat". It comes across as a love child of GTA and Deus Ex HR, I want to play through multiple times already between the life paths and skill trees.

The game doesn't want me to play it however, I get about ~3 crashes a session, constant lagging, graphics and meshes not loading, enemies T posing in combat, and now a bug where my side gigs aren't completing. I can't finish missions...that's pretty damming in a game chock full of missions.

I am holding out for a No Man's Sky style comeback, maybe after I can find a next gen system; but as much as I like the game, I have to put it down until it's playable.

[Yora]

Say, is it just me, or does everything about Night City feel very 70s? 1970s that is.

I'm constantly thinking of Dirty Harry or Shaft, or some Charles Bronson movies.

[Squark]

So, I'm apparently a very lucky base-xbox one player, because the game runs fine for me. It's never crashed, It's only had 2 instances of stuttering in like, 10 hours, and the graphics are servicable - Not above average, but not the awful experience some people have gotten. I've run into a few bugs like V's hair disapearing when I looked in the mirror the first time (I think the game disliked her being in a hat), a sentry petrified in a T-pose, and a cactus stuck on my windshield spazzing out, but the only really annoying one is the poor resolution on in-game computer screens.

I'm enjoying the story, while the combat is fine. It's perhaps more number-based than it needs to be, but it works.

[sihnfahl]

This game has way too much loot lying around everywhere, and almost all of it is useless junk.

That's more for the crafting system and ensuring the player has a lot of materials to do things like craft ammunition (you'll never run out), saleable weapons that are worth a lot more than the items you looted, etc.

Another annoying side effect is that all the junk makes equipping your character and dismantling or selling the stuff that is junk so much slower and drawn out.

There's a single perk in the crafting tree that lets you automatically dismantle loot the moment they're picked up. That just leaves you with the options of selling or dismantling weapons and armor for money or crafting mats.

What I am still waiting for is to find access to more and more powerful combat hacks. Currently I can only equip two quick-hack modules which I use for making enemies' eyes go into reboot for five seconds or clear their cache so they forget that they just saw me and wanted to call alarm.

If you do side missions and the NCPD blue quests, you'll end up with some nice gear as well as a ton of money.

I haven't even left Act 1, and I have a legendary cyberdeck with Contagion and Overheat. Hack a camera from range, zoom around, mark enemies. Contagion does non-lethal damage and spreads to nearby enemies. With the quickhack mod for increased damage, you can knock out entire groups of enemies that are visible through cameras without ever exposing yourself. If there's just one left, overheat will knock them out faster.

If you really want a shooting time, you can also get Cripple, which locks up their legs and keeps them from moving. Easier to get headshots.

[druid91]

That's more for the crafting system and ensuring the player has a lot of materials to do things like craft ammunition (you'll never run out), saleable weapons that are worth a lot more than the items you looted, etc.


There's a single perk in the crafting tree that lets you automatically dismantle loot the moment they're picked up. That just leaves you with the options of selling or dismantling weapons and armor for money or crafting mats.


If you do side missions and the NCPD blue quests, you'll end up with some nice gear as well as a ton of money.

I haven't even left Act 1, and I have a legendary cyberdeck with Contagion and Overheat. Hack a camera from range, zoom around, mark enemies. Contagion does non-lethal damage and spreads to nearby enemies. With the quickhack mod for increased damage, you can knock out entire groups of enemies that are visible through cameras without ever exposing yourself. If there's just one left, overheat will knock them out faster.

If you really want a shooting time, you can also get Cripple, which locks up their legs and keeps them from moving. Easier to get headshots.

Downside of that, some loot is valuable on its own. More valuable sold then scrapped.

Scrapper scraps it anyway.

[Yora]

I just spend 25000 eddies to upgrade from my starting cyberdeck with 2 base ram, 4 buffer, and 2 slots to the Stephenson that Victor is selling with 8 base rim, 7 buffer, and 5 slots.
Now were're in business!!!

Spoiler

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I was hoping for maybe another point in ram, buffer, and slots. I've got 6, 3, and 3 instead.

Spoiler

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Totally worth a third of all the eddies I've been hoarding the entire game.

[sihnfahl]

Downside of that, some loot is valuable on its own. More valuable sold then scrapped.

Haven't found any 'valuable' junk items that are worth selling, so far. I can use the breakdown to craft more valuable items.

I just spend 25000 eddies to upgrade from my starting cyberdeck with 2 base ram, 4 buffer, and 2 slots to the Stephenson that Victor is selling with 8 base rim, 7 buffer, and 5 slots. Now were're in business!!!

That's the one I'm talking about. All you need are those two I talked about, and things are golden for stealth runs.

I also outfitted an assault rifle with a silencer, and got the eye mod that turns all weapons non-lethal via looting.

Spoiler

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It's great for a pacifist run, particularly on the quest where you run into a monk who was forcibly cybered by Maelstrom goons, and wants you to rescue his friend before he's modified ... without bloodshed. Even if they're Maelstrom and deserve a good headcoring.

[Wraith]

Like Silly Name, I'm watching the wreckage burn. I'm a big fan of Cyberpunk in general and I remember the original cinematic trailer that came out in 2012, it had a lot of promise and ticked a lot of boxes for 'things which I find appealing'.

Everything was ready to go, and I was waiting for the final litmus test which I refer to as the "Duke Nukem Forever Test" - was this really a game that had been in development for 8 years, or was it a game that was buggy and bad and problematic that had been passed from pillar-to-post for 8 years before a rushed hack-job was thrown out at the last minute?
Watching a few streams of it on launch week were the deciding factor as to whether or not I would bother upgrading my computer in order to play it, and I have to say... I probably won't.

The bugs are pretty bad. The unstable running is pretty bad. The controversy from CDPR about their practices and responses to complaints about some fundamental points is pretty bad. In short, aside from the concept of the game I haven't seen anything that I like and I don't think I want anything to do with it.

Say, is it just me, or does everything about Night City feel very 70s? 1970s that is.

I'm constantly thinking of Dirty Harry or Shaft, or some Charles Bronson movies.

I've seen that comment made before, and I have to say I think I agree. Cyberpunk was always the 1980's view of what life would be like in the 20X0's, and despite changing the name to 2077 it's STILL got the same aesthetic as what a 1980's artist thinks the future would be like, similar to movies like Bladerunner.

I like it, it's cool, and I would otherwise be happy to explore it, but (to quote the source I saw) it ain't Punk Rock - it's Classic Rock with neon lights pinned to it.

[druid91]

Yep! And once you start unlocking higher rank programs it gets silly strong fast. I've been playing a Netrunner and for like... Four levels now I rarely need to shoot people unless there's a crowd. Because you can just cripple movement, which also prevents attacks at higher ranks, and then short circuit, contagion, and overheat.

Synapse burnout is neat but honestly I found it underpowered. Then you get into stuff like making enemies kill themselves by hacking their arms. Or just knocking them out by resetting their cybernetics.

Or causing them to go berserk and become a cyber psycho.

Netrunners are basically wizards.

Also interesting, if you got Cyberpunk on steam, the bonus content has the old cyberpunk 2020 rulebook in it.

[DanswordMaia]

On ps4, the game looks just disgusting, blurry graphics , and low fps just make me cry blood.

[sihnfahl]

On ps4, the game looks just disgusting, blurry graphics , and low fps just make me cry blood.

I think their modifications to RED Engine didn't port to the consoles that well, cause similar issues are on the XBox series.

Witcher 3 utilized RE, and it didn't have as many issues on the consoles as CP2077 seems to have.

Definitely was rushed out, and it wasn't necessarily an unforeseen issue. It was one of the issues, IIRC, that led to delays.

[Chen]

Playing this on a new PC (seems if I upgrade every 5 years it coincides well with CD Projekt Red releases lol) and it’s gorgeous and pretty much crash free. First pass I’m playing as run inside and shoot everything build. Even replaced my cyberdeck with the cyberware to slow time instead. Note also, $45k for double jump is completely worth it and makes exploring even more fun.

Smart guns are hilariously overpowered particular the one “special” one you find. Even without that though a solid pistol and sniper rifle cover most needs.

Very much enjoying the quests since all of them except the random NCPD ones have some sort of backstory associated with them. Maybe about 1/2 through the main story and it’s decent too.

[Yora]

I found the merc jobs to be all at least somewhat interesting. You're always fighting against the same gangsters (about the only enemy type in the game), but when you go sneaky, each one is different because the environment is different and the number and placement of the gonks unique. Though I don't know if there's any variation if you have a guns blazing style.

I also have one very important question! Why does Night City have 20 hours of daylight? The night is already over at 3 in the morning. For a genre that is usually "always night", I'd have expected something more like 50/50. Especially for a city set in southern California, which even during the longest days of summer still has 8 hours of darkness. This really seems like a mistake, and should only take up 1kb of patch space.

Something that I found quite neat, though, is that they really didn't just change the name from Cyberpunk 2020 to 2077 because that name seems silly now. The game clearly seems to be following a timeline in which the world was already a cyberpunk world in the year 2020. It's obvious in the memories of Johnny Silverhand, but it's also consistent in some text files and radio chatter throughout the game.

[sihnfahl]

I found the merc jobs to be all at least somewhat interesting. You're always fighting against the same gangsters (about the only enemy type in the game), but when you go sneaky, each one is different because the environment is different and the number and placement of the gonks unique. Though I don't know if there's any variation if you have a guns blazing style.

There is.

Maelstrom acts like their name - they all start clustering and heading for a firefight. Grenades may figure heavily, depending on location. Even though they tend to be poor throwers and inevitably grenade themselves.

Animals rush in, and their melee people are no joke. I found myself emptying entire clips into their legs cause headshots weren't slowing them down. Mind you, it's a lot more fun with Cripple involved now.

Tyger Claws? So many cyber heads. Expect regular cyber-based attacks. They love hitting you with Overheat. Add in proper flanking and tactics...

Why does Night City have 20 hours of daylight?

Well, it doesn't seem to have a day night cycle as it is. There are always people moving around, regardless of hour.

That being said, lotta light pollution.

[druid91]

I found the merc jobs to be all at least somewhat interesting. You're always fighting against the same gangsters (about the only enemy type in the game), but when you go sneaky, each one is different because the environment is different and the number and placement of the gonks unique. Though I don't know if there's any variation if you have a guns blazing style.

I also have one very important question! Why does Night City have 20 hours of daylight? The night is already over at 3 in the morning. For a genre that is usually "always night", I'd have expected something more like 50/50. Especially for a city set in southern California, which even during the longest days of summer still has 8 hours of darkness. This really seems like a mistake, and should only take up 1kb of patch space.

Something that I found quite neat, though, is that they really didn't just change the name from Cyberpunk 2020 to 2077 because that name seems silly now. The game clearly seems to be following a timeline in which the world was already a cyberpunk world in the year 2020. It's obvious in the memories of Johnny Silverhand, but it's also consistent in some text files and radio chatter throughout the game.

Yep. I liked the timeline thing. The tech has also advanced to a degree from the original game. What with all the wireless connections everywhere.

[Yora]

There is.

Maelstrom acts like their name - they all start clustering and heading for a firefight. Grenades may figure heavily, depending on location. Even though they tend to be poor throwers and inevitably grenade themselves.

Animals rush in, and their melee people are no joke. I found myself emptying entire clips into their legs cause headshots weren't slowing them down. Mind you, it's a lot more fun with Cripple involved now.

Tyger Claws? So many cyber heads. Expect regular cyber-based attacks. They love hitting you with Overheat. Add in proper flanking and tactics...

That's cool. And now that you mention it, I did see these patterns when I fought them in big battles. There's obviously visuals too. Toaster faces look nothing like Tyger Claws with their anime hair and motorcycle suits. This will probably become more obvious once I get into other districts. (30 hours in and still only been to North Side, Little China, and Japantown.)

[Rynjin]

Probably just as well. Arroyo is ludicrously high level, as are the surrounding areas. It really makes you wonder how V and Jackie managed to survive growing up there.

[druid91]

Well, Jackie was part of the Valentino's. So the ludicrously high level gangsters were on his side.

I still remember getting into fights with them and just getting one-shotted.

[sihnfahl]

I still remember getting into fights with them and just getting one-shotted.

One of the things I do to increase survivability is to utilize scrap to upgrade my armors and such.

Beyond the XP for improving crafting (which can lead to some really fun ennie generation if you're willing to take the time), I've got a lot of armor for the level, and most shots just hit for pittances when I actually decide I want to fight...

Keep track of which items yield the most components per ennie spent. Prioritize purchasing them, then craft items that yield the most ennies per component consumed. (Reportedly, Nicola Blue for dismantling and pistols for crafting are the way to go...)

[Yora]

I still have no chance surviving against most Cyberpsychos. I managed to take down one at the docks pretty easily (because he mostly kept standing on top of a shipping container with a gun), and I think I might take another shot at the one who threw people off a building. But the one with the mantis blades and the glowstick ritual circle takes 80% of my health with a single hit. And there seems to be a speed upgrade and something that messes with my optics, so simply trying to stay at a safe distance just isn't working.
The game says the danger for all of them is "moderate", but since all the danger is in a single person and not spread among a dozen guys, there is no taking them out one by one.

(I still like them though. Finding that cooler with the body parts late at night was awesome. )

[sihnfahl]

And there seems to be a speed upgrade and something that messes with my optics, so simply trying to stay at a safe distance just isn't working.

Sandevistan. If you stay hidden before engaging, scan them and you'll see it.

I approach them with Cripple or Cyberware Malfunction equipped. It breaks the script for a moment when it tells them to accelerate and do the quick-step - slice combination. And at higher quality, CM will destroy the affected component until they're pretty much just a high-health enemy. Just need to dodge and get the occasional hit in to whittle health.

And a few do have 'reboot optics' as an option. That's cause they're melee builds, primarily, and RO is designed to allow a melee attacker to get into range against a shooter.

For example, the psycho in the warehouse that got corrupted by a bad BD chip someone had tried to hack - primarily melee, with a huge jump that lets her get to the upper levels should you try to use that to snipe from the walkway. I just whittled away at her between knockdowns and cripples (didn't have CM at the time). The only problem I had with that one was that I have the 'every weapon is non-lethal' mod, and I used a 300 damage epic shock baton for the knockout blows, and the game chat STILL went with 'yeah, I know she's dead, I was logged into our system...'

[GloatingSwine]

I still have no chance surviving against most Cyberpsychos. I managed to take down one at the docks pretty easily (because he mostly kept standing on top of a shipping container with a gun),

You want some hilarity?

That guy has no AI script other than run and cower if you jump up there with him. So you can just freely punch him into unconsciousness.

Ones that rely on melee can be offlined by getting out of their reach and hitting them with short circuit repeatedly.

[Yora]

Sandevistan. If you stay hidden before engaging, scan them and you'll see it.

I approach them with Cripple or Cyberware Malfunction equipped. It breaks the script for a moment when it tells them to accelerate and do the quick-step - slice combination. And at higher quality, CM will destroy the affected component until they're pretty much just a high-health enemy.

You can disable the implants that give them power? That's awesome!

I mean, it totally makes sense from a narrative perspective. But I've never thought that anyone would make this a game mechanic. (Though it's not really that different from shooting external weapons off robo-saurs in Horizon.)

I use Reboot Optics primarily to get double stealth takedowns when there's nothing suitable to use as a distraction and both enemies look at each other. Get as close behind one of them as possible, reboot the other one's eyes, then quickly take out the one with his back to you and circle around to get behind the blinded guy.

[sihnfahl]

I mean, it totally makes sense from a narrative perspective. But I've never thought that anyone would make this a game mechanic. (Though it's not really that different from shooting external weapons off robo-saurs in Horizon.)

Or just about any game where you can independently target their weapons to deny them the use.

It's a great mod find you can get very early on if you do the side job that involve ... I believe I got this one from a Tyger mission, doing heavy stealth that only had me pull the trigger on two people due to the fact they were on a floor where the cameras aren't controllable from downstairs, and the only way to see them is to open the door to the room those guys are in. And they're usually watching the door.

[Rynjin]

I have yet to find a Cyberpsycho that liberal application of Gorilla Fist to face hasn't been sble to solve.