Was CP too ambitious?

[Mobster100]

More and more it just seems to me that CDPRs ambition for CP is helt back by time. Maybe they didn't know how much time a project like this would really need.

I still look at things that they original talked about and think that, if they had managed to pull that off, then CP would have been absolutely amazing. And I have no doubt that the time to realize this project was greatly underestimated. And I think its fairly obvious when one look closer at CP, a lot of things are not especially fleshed out. But more like, "Ok its working now, but still need to add this, this and this." and in the end, most likely due to lack of time, they simply didn't get around to do it.

I think a good example is the mini map when you drive, I don't believe that anyone at CDPR when play testing it, wouldn't agree that this were needed and didn't miss 80% of the roads where they should have made a turn.

 

[Draconifors]

One post went way too far into real-world politics, and was deleted.

Real-world politics are against the forum rules, so please steer clear of them.

 

[Notserious80]

I kinda agree with the cant be too ambitious but you have too temper it with a reality check. i kinda think one of the biggest mistakes they did was showing off the "gameplay" as early as 2018. I rewatched it yesterday and the attention too small things is amazing, just the way V checks her mag before entering the appartment and small things like that makes it look way more realistic. the gfx isent as good as ingame now (atleast not with maxed settings) true but the small things in animations/atmosphere really makes it pop (also seems theres no stopping too loot all the ashtrays/cash lying around...).

Also the npc when exiting too meet jackie is clearly handmade for demo, think most of the AI is just custom in that gameplay demo. The "nightvision" (scanmode?) demonstrated and the UI looks better too imo. Too me it looks like a better game overall and i think it influensed my expectations way too much. I get that games changes during development but you expect it too get better not worse unless it was entirely handcrafted with what they thought they could pull off.

 

[Mobster100]

I kinda agree with the cant be too ambitious but you have too temper it with a reality check. i kinda think one of the biggest mistakes they did was showing off the "gameplay" as early as 2018. I rewatched it yesterday and the attention too small things is amazing, just the way V checks her mag before entering the appartment and small things like that makes it look way more realistic. the gfx isent as good as ingame now (atleast not with maxed settings) true but the small things in animations/atmosphere really makes it pop (also seems theres no stopping too loot all the ashtrays/cash lying around...).

Also the npc when exiting too meet jackie is clearly handmade for demo, think most of the AI is just custom in that gameplay demo. The "nightvision" (scanmode?) demonstrated and the UI looks better too imo. Too me it looks like a better game overall and i think it influensed my expectations way too much. I get that games changes during development but you expect it too get better not worse unless it was entirely handcrafted with what they thought they could pull off.

Completely agree, I think what they showed in all their trailers and what the developers talked about in interviews etc. That was what they wanted to make. But I think the deadline and time pressure simply forced them to keep cutting down things, to where most of them are as basic as they can be. And most the effort going into NC and the quests.

When you look at the whole BD thing, you have a fairly long introduction to how to use it. Yet its hardly used in the game, but also when it is used, its pretty half assed And honestly is not a fun feature in the game as it is now, for the first playthrough and the first time you see it, you think "This could be cool" with how you have to solve different puzzles and switch between the different layers to figure out what is going on etc. And also just how this whole BD could be used.

But I think already after the second one (including the tutorial) I knew it was not going to be the case. And I just did them, by watching the initial video, then scrolled all the way back and just fast forwarded through it to get all the hotspots. Im almost 100% sure, that they had much bigger plans with these than what is in the game, because it seems weird to put so much effort and thoughts into something, which is completely meaningless and not exciting in anyway. Because as they are now, I would personally prefer that they had just been cutscenes.

 

[CTPhipps]

I still look at things that they original talked about and think that, if they had managed to pull that off, then CP would have been absolutely amazing.

Honestly, I'm not sure what people mean when they say this. What bothered me about the game was the bugs and crashes. Wall-running and monowire hacking not being in the game isn't what hurt the game for me.

What is it you refer to that's missing?

 

[EngryEngineer]

I don't think it was a matter of ambition. When undertaking a project at this scale, being ambitious, even "too ambitious" is necessary if you want to make it great. You can't figure out how far you can go until you fail to get there. The problem was communication and management of expectations. Until a thing is set in stone don't market it. It doesn't matter what you are creating, if it is something that takes this much work even if you want to do something, have planned to do it, and can do it, doesn't mean you are going to keep it that way when you start putting all the other pieces in place.

 

[CTPhipps]

I think "too ambitious" is very good if you can't deliver what you want. Being too ambitious is indeed an INCREDIBLY BAD thing if it means you utterly fail to achieve your goals and would have been better to achieve things.

 

[Mobster100]

What is it you refer to that's missing?

To avoid having to make a long post.

I would tell you to watch the video in the OP, that covers some of it.

 

[CTPhipps]

To avoid having to make a long post.

I would tell you to watch the video in the OP, that covers some of it.

Ah

 

[Mobster100]

I don't think it was a matter of ambition. When undertaking a project at this scale, being ambitious, even "too ambitious" is necessary if you want to make it great. You can't figure out how far you can go until you fail to get there. The problem was communication and management of expectations. Until a thing is set in stone don't market it. It doesn't matter what you are creating, if it is something that takes this much work even if you want to do something, have planned to do it, and can do it, doesn't mean you are going to keep it that way when you start putting all the other pieces in place.

Maybe that was the issue, they marketed their ambitions as if they were true rather than the actual game.

 

[robzhe]

I think it's too early to say. A lot of us are frustrated at the lack of changes since the game launched but we have very little idea of what CDPR have planned for the game at this point. If they stick with it and are determined enough I still think it could turn out to be one of the best games of this generation for a lot of gamers.

There's always going to be some stuff that people aren't happy about once they're done but I'm sure there's people that still have issues with TW3 too. The biggest problem I think they've faced has been going from a fantasy setting to modern/sci-fi, and one of the most notable things are the vehicles. I remember first seeing a van speeding down the street in early footage and thought the movement of it stuck out as a potential problem more than anything else (with it being quite floaty/unrealistic/janky.) To get vehicles to look realistic in motion though and also handle well when using them must be a really difficult thing to do from scratch. If they release a sequel or two and have more experience maybe that area will show one of the biggest signs of progression.

Another main issue at the moment might be our collective lack of patience, as long as CDPR stick with it for long enough I think it could work out fine eventually. I'd like it if they could communicate via twitter/etc, a bit more though. I totally understand the silence in the first few months but now that we're well past that I don't think it should be a big problem letting us know how updates/dlc are going a bit more before release.

 

[whatever_idk_man]

I don't think it was too ambitious, but I do think the expectations was way to high and that's because of the marketing. There's some things that the game doesn't have, and may never have, and if it came out with some of it, then it wouldn't have been so controversial being viewed as the company habitually lying to the consumer's. For me the three stand outs are, Each Decision Matters/Life Path, NCP Life Cycles, and A Immersed World. Having 2 of those or even one would have been better and isn't overly ambitious.

With Each Decision Matters/Life Path, theirs been so many games that promise that and don't live up to it and are forgiving cuz overall, the game does what it can, and most people understand. The different Life Paths doesn't even matter and If it was just this and some other minor things the game would have got that slack like others.

As to NCP Life Cycles, you could argue that it may be to ambitious until you look at a game that came out Literally a month before called Watch Dogs Legion. It did exactly what they said and relatively pulled it off. Every NPC has a life cycle and connections. Cyberpunk NPCs disappear and reappear right next to you with the same 4-5 duplicates walking back and forth with no real sense of a life.

And for A Immersed World. A.I and physics weren't finished. Them themselves boasted the most immersal lived in world being very aware of the comparisons to Red Dead 2 back in 2018. Not just Red Dead 2 but many open world games in the past decade pulled off a better job. Whether it's NPCs interacting with the player, with each other, or with the world. Some basic things were not there and when I played the game on ps5 after the 1.2 patch, it's a fun game and overall enjoyable story, but the world itself still felt empty/dead while exploring. The activities in the world didn't have a variety that could brake up the experience of exploring the world, while they are some side quest that do and the side character missions were great, beyond that, the world was very constrictive. No sitting at bars (beyond mission related), dancing with people at a club, karaoke, previewing wardrobe at clothing stores, hair cuts, tattoos, mini games beyond that one gun range and other shooter one. I wouldn't call these basic things in a lot of open worlds ambitious. The A.I and physics weren't finished on top of not being immersed and lived in.

They're some things that the game doesn't have, and may never have. They overpromised, but many of the promises are one's that are seen in other recent and older games and while not being able to deliver some of those things would have been understandable, not delivering any on top of it being a bugged out mess is not. [...]

Short answer No. They didn't listen to the Dev team and give them enough time while also putting them in crunch for a unreasonable amount of time for a unreachable release date. Horrible Mismanagement.

 

[Mobster100]

I think it's too early to say. A lot of us are frustrated at the lack of changes since the game launched but we have very little idea of what CDPR have planned for the game at this point. If they stick with it and are determined enough I still think it could turn out to be one of the best games of this generation for a lot of gamers.

Yes and no, I think it depends on a lot of things. Especially the expansions and the direction they will taking.

One of the massive issues is that V is pretty much dead as it is now. Even if some of the expansions make you continue trying to find a cure, you still have a lot of endings which might be difficult to bring into something meaningful for all of them, especially the suicide one. Also because they somehow need to respect whatever choice the players made.

And im not sure how exciting an expansion will be playing V in a earlier stage of her/his life knowing that you will eventually die anyway, it sort of remove all tension from the game and also makes it kind of weird, because we know V is going to survive at least to the end of the original game. So the game would be sort of like the Star wars Solo movie, they can't really build any tensions in regard to putting the player in life or dead situations, because we know that V is not going to die anyway.

Alternatively, they have to introduce a new character or let you play one of the others more established one. But not only is it rough introducing a new character in an expansion and make people care, but also its sort of weird playing one of the established one.

Also I don't think an expansion following the original design is going to do all that well to be honest. Because I think a lot of people realized towards the end of CP, that there are some serious flaws in the game mechanics, especially with the combat system and the economy etc.

Furthermore, if the expansion also doesn't hold a lot of branching options, they are going to get heat from that as well big time, because despite what some people claim, it was one of their biggest promises with CP, and it simply didn't deliver here. They also have the whole lifepath that is extremely poorly integrated into the game.

Then they could make it so you play Silverhand, but honestly, I don't think this character is loved enough for people to care playing him and he is to well established for it anyway. Meaning it would be silly to give him gorilla arms etc.

They have said that these bigger expansions are going to work sort of like they did in TW3, but the huge difference is, that Geralt weren't killed in the original game, they had a fairly good combat system and underlaying systems in general in the TW3 universe, so they simply had to create a new and interesting story based on what they already had. And lets be honest, they manage it and did a very good job at that. But im not convinced that it will go that easy with CP, because the foundation is not even close to being as solid as that of TW3.

I think their best chance is to rework CP, to make it more of an open world / sandbox experience than it currently is, because at the moment, I don't think there is a whole lot of replayability in the game, except as a shooter game, which can be fun, but the story is not exciting the second time in my opinion at least. And even if they made it more of a sandbox game, im not sure it will work to well either, due to how the story plays out. I mean V is pretty much a wasted character now as I see it.

At least, with the current knowledge of CP, im not convinced that these expansions are going to be all that good to be honest. It much easier at least to see how expansions for TW3 had the potential to be massive successes.

I remember first seeing a van speeding down the street in early footage and thought the movement of it stuck out as a potential problem more than anything else (with it being quite floaty/unrealistic/janky.)

Im pretty sure that was faked. At least based on the Bloomberg article with interviews from developers, most of the stuff in that 48 minute video were created solely for that video alone, at least from how I understood it. Again, I think what they showed was their ambition rather than the actual game, and they wanted to see peoples reaction to it, to see if they should go for something like that.

Another main issue at the moment might be our collective lack of patience, as long as CDPR stick with it for long enough I think it could work out fine eventually. I'd like it if they could communicate via twitter/etc, a bit more though. I totally understand the silence in the first few months but now that we're well past that I don't think it should be a big problem letting us know how updates/dlc are going a bit more before release.

I could imagine that this have a lot to do with the potential lawsuits going on and because there are so many bugs and missing features in the game that its way to early to even talk about expansions.

[...]

 

[motox73]

far worse than in TW3, I at least don't recall having any major issues with them.

So do you think that CP was to ambitious? And if so why? Why do you think there is such a huge difference between the NPC AI in CP compared to TW3? And again, all those things which are not linked to it being a FP game?

Ambition is exactly what this game lacks

 

[robzhe]

Yes and no, I think it depends on a lot of things. Especially the expansions and the direction they will taking.

One of the massive issues is that V is pretty much dead as it is now. Even if some of the expansions make you continue trying to find a cure, you still have a lot of endings which might be difficult to bring into something meaningful for all of them, especially the suicide one. Also because they somehow need to respect whatever choice the players made.

And im not sure how exciting an expansion will be playing V in a earlier stage of her/his life knowing that you will eventually die anyway, it sort of remove all tension from the game and also makes it kind of weird, because we know V is going to survive at least to the end of the original game. So the game would be sort of like the Star wars Solo movie, they can't really build any tensions in regard to putting the player in life or dead situations, because we know that V is not going to die anyway.

Alternatively, they have to introduce a new character or let you play one of the others more established one. But not only is it rough introducing a new character in an expansion and make people care, but also its sort of weird playing one of the established one.

Also I don't think an expansion following the original design is going to do all that well to be honest. Because I think a lot of people realized towards the end of CP, that there are some serious flaws in the game mechanics, especially with the combat system and the economy etc.

Furthermore, if the expansion also doesn't hold a lot of branching options, they are going to get heat from that as well big time, because despite what some people claim, it was one of their biggest promises with CP, and it simply didn't deliver here. They also have the whole lifepath that is extremely poorly integrated into the game.

Then they could make it so you play Silverhand, but honestly, I don't think this character is loved enough for people to care playing him and he is to well established for it anyway. Meaning it would be silly to give him gorilla arms etc.

They have said that these bigger expansions are going to work sort of like they did in TW3, but the huge difference is, that Geralt weren't killed in the original game, they had a fairly good combat system and underlaying systems in general in the TW3 universe, so they simply had to create a new and interesting story based on what they already had. And lets be honest, they manage it and did a very good job at that. But im not convinced that it will go that easy with CP, because the foundation is not even close to being as solid as that of TW3.

I think their best chance is to rework CP, to make it more of an open world / sandbox experience than it currently is, because at the moment, I don't think there is a whole lot of replayability in the game, except as a shooter game, which can be fun, but the story is not exciting the second time in my opinion at least. And even if they made it more of a sandbox game, im not sure it will work to well either, due to how the story plays out. I mean V is pretty much a wasted character now as I see it.

At least, with the current knowledge of CP, im not convinced that these expansions are going to be all that good to be honest. It much easier at least to see how expansions for TW3 had the potential to be massive successes.


Im pretty sure that was faked. At least based on the Bloomberg article with interviews from developers, most of the stuff in that 48 minute video were created solely for that video alone, at least from how I understood it. Again, I think what they showed was their ambition rather than the actual game, and they wanted to see peoples reaction to it, to see if they should go for something like that.


I could imagine that this have a lot to do with the potential lawsuits going on and because there are so many bugs and missing features in the game that its way to early to even talk about expansions.

It could be that a lot of what you say is right and I know there's still plenty of issues the game has at the moment. I don't have a lot of problems with the game as it is though, so expansions that allow you to play in more areas along with some other general improvements to the game and more additions to the story are something that I think could make the game a lot more complete.

Obviously at the moment we're kind of in two camps. One being mostly fine with what we have as long as there's some improvements to that and bug fixes, along with the expansions adding more to the city/story, then another that thinks the game fell way short of what was expected. Maybe that's also due to a lot of us (the first camp) drifting off to an extent before the game was released so as to avoid a lot of the hype, which was clearly as we can now see not helpful in several ways by the time the game had been released.

Maybe it's me being too over optimistic as well, but I get the sense with what we have now that we're not seeing the full picture of what CDPR had in mind for this game and that by the time it's complete some things will make a lot more sense and/or work better.

I'm not sure how much of the original demo was faked either but I still get a sense that a lot of problems are due to the modern/sci-fi setting being new to them. You could be right to some extent with the ambition part though in the sense that they did manage to create an amazing city, for me the best city I've ever seen in a game by far, but when it came to actually getting consoles like the PS4 to allow that city to be played in serious problems arrived. If I could look back and think one thing could have been changed for the better it'd be that they gave the game more time before release, and also release the original demo two years later. The wait between that first E3 when we got to see the game and release wasn't easy to deal with at times.

That's partly a fault of the gaming industry as a whole though for me, because in 2020 this should never have been the first proper open world cyberpunk game, it should've been adding to what we already had! If that'd been the case maybe the hype wouldn't have got so out of control too.

 

[Mobster100]

Maybe it's me being too over optimistic as well, but I get the sense with what we have now that we're not seeing the full picture of what CDPR had in mind for this game and that by the time it's complete some things will make a lot more sense and/or work better.

I completely agree, I think CDPR wanted to make CP as they showed in that demo, obviously with minor changes here and there, but overall what they told and showed was their original intention. But something went wrong and it was not what we got. And im also fully behind expansions, as long as they make sense from a story perspective.

Maybe CDPR have a cool idea and these will be nothing like we think, time will tell.

I'm not sure how much of the original demo was faked either but I still get a sense that a lot of problems are due to the modern/sci-fi setting being new to them.

Personally I don't really mind, if the demo was faked or not, or if what they said during all of those interviews weren't possible at the time, but were simply their ambitions for the game. But I do think that it forces them to deliver it then, otherwise I don't think its unfair to say that they were straight up lying or doing some very dodgy marketing. Because it is simply not ok, to sell a product based on wishful thinking.

And even if they deliver it, it was not a good move from them in general, but at least they did make what they said they would. But they shouldn't marketing or hype their products based on something that is not possible at launch.

You could be right to some extent with the ambition part though in the sense that they did manage to create an amazing city, for me the best city I've ever seen in a game by far

Agree, NC is really cool.

If I could look back and think one thing could have been changed for the better it'd be that they gave the game more time before release, and also release the original demo two years later. The wait between that first E3 when we got to see the game and release wasn't easy to deal with at times.

Depending on where CDPR takes CP. I think they should have made a video or interview after the gameplay video and all the interviews, as the hype started to built to the extremes, where they came clean or what to say, really making people/fans know which things were actually possible, instead of trying to keep up the illusion and throw more fuel on the fire, so to speak. And I agree, they should have stuck to not giving a release date, but simply stuck to the "When its ready" people had already accepted this, the release date didn't do them anything good.

That's partly a fault of the gaming industry as a whole though for me, because in 2020 this should never have been the first proper open world cyberpunk game, it should've been adding to what we already had! If that'd been the case maybe the hype wouldn't have got so out of control too.

I think they underestimated the task, thinking that they could "easily" pull off a type of GTA, CP kind of game, including all the other genres that are mixed into it.

 

[CTPhipps]

One of the massive issues is that V is pretty much dead as it is now. Even if some of the expansions make you continue trying to find a cure, you still have a lot of endings which might be difficult to bring into something meaningful for all of them, especially the suicide one. Also because they somehow need to respect whatever choice the players made.

Let me take another "professional writing" stab at it:

"V wakes up in an Arasaka lab after Suicide/All Other Endings, confused"

Doctor: Ah, glad you're awake.

V: How am I alive? I Killed Myself/Was with Panam/At Afterlife/Gave Up to Johnny Silverhand.

Doctor: oh, you fool, the Brain Chip was recording your Engram the entire time. We finally recovered it from your corpse and implanted it into this new body.

V: I'm dead?

Doctor: I suppose that's a question for philosophers. You are, however, now our perfect test subject to reverse engineer the chip.

 

[LeKill3rFou]

Doctor: I suppose that's a question for philosophers. You are, however, now our perfect test subject to reverse engineer the chip.

That would be hilarious honestly

 

[Mobster100]

Let me take another "professional writing" stab at it:

"V wakes up in an Arasaka lab after Suicide/All Other Endings, confused"

Doctor: Ah, glad you're awake.

V: How am I alive? I Killed Myself/Was with Panam/At Afterlife/Gave Up to Johnny Silverhand.

Doctor: oh, you fool, the Brain Chip was recording your Engram the entire time. We finally recovered it from your corpse and implanted it into this new body.

V: I'm dead?

Doctor: I suppose that's a question for philosophers. You are, however, now our perfect test subject to reverse engineer the chip.

Would be kind of funny, but also completely ruin the original story

 

[CTPhipps]

Would be kind of funny, but also completely ruin the original story

Honestly, the whole point of the story was that it was a wild goose chase in the beginning wasn't it? It was kind of an enormous RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK storyline where Indy goes to elaborate lengths to rescue the Ark only to note that as a literal weapon of God, it was going to never be useful to the Nazis save as an oven they burned their hand on.

V could never save themselves so discovering they were never in danger is kind of their Kafka-esque karmic reward.