Yeah I agree, that's why I don't get all these complains. Police system in game is raw, but making it GTA-like adds nothing to game.
The issue as I see it with the police system is that it is very poorly integrated into the game. Its basically as you say just a spawn in system with the intention of killing you. But it does nothing in regards to the story or immersion of the game, besides making it slightly worse. In GTA they patrol the streets whereas in CP they are stationary zombies or scripted events. But in general their sole purpose is to kill V, if you do something.
Given that you have a whole city with a lot of crime in it, gangs and gang wars etc. or even when V gets into a fight in the middle of the street with enemies the police is completely unresponsive, to me that breaks immersion a lot and makes the police pointless. Even if Night city is a corrupt place, the police should still actively try to enforce the law according to certain rules. They should patrol the streets, there should be dynamic events of the police getting into fights with gangs, maybe events like clearing out houses or raid buildings. Randomly stop people on the street or cars etc. you could see people get handcuffed or beaten up and taken away or whatever a police force AI in Night city would do.
The problem is that there is no AI to speak of when it comes to NPCs, so no one can behave outside of scripted events or in fights. So you can't have random hold ups or NPC robbing stores, dynamic gang wars or anything of the sort, that the police could react to.
So there is nothing to do for the police, there is no story getting triggered as a result of your behavior, like a long term wanted system, where bounty hunters can come after you or what other things could be done to make this system have an impact on the game.
CP as it is now, is only playable in one way in my opinion and that is as a lawful citizen where you avoid any contact with the police. And to me a lot of this comes down to how linear the game really is, it is not a well designed open world game in my opinion.
because game is not designed around police system, it's not main core of this game. also I think city is so huge that people really missed some interactions between NCPD and gangs, like executing gang members, shootouts etc. It's not hapenning on every street but it's in game.
Also I don't really get why gangs and NCPD are so important for some people... It's like you can ignore them outside quests, gigs, story and you will be fine. Core of story , and whole themes of story is not really centered around it. Would say it's pretty far from police vs criminals fantasy and this fantasy is not even possible to create in this universum, because police is "police".
To me its about believability and world building. And I don't disagree with you that there are stuff happening around the city with the police etc. But again these are scripted events and to me, that only goes so far, it doesn't help make the world feel alive.
Gangs and police is important in my opinion, and maybe even more important in CP, for the same reason that monsters etc. are important in TW3. All enemies in CP are gangs (humans) and robots. So you have a very limited amount of monster types in the game, so in order to make these feel interesting you have to give them some identity or role to play.
As you play CP, it very quickly gets to a point where gangs doesn't matter, whether your killing one gang or the other, its basically the same, there are a bit of variation with the animals and robots. But its more whether they do a lot of melee or not.
And to me it feels wrong, when gangs, included Araska and the police is everything there is in regards to enemies. You get missions from the fixers, they control different parts of the city. Yet, there is no consequence from killing them or working with certain ones over the others. So they end up being very generic enemies and at least for me, I didn't end up feeling that each part of the city were controlled or ruled by another gang and that it even mattered anyway, the only difference is that the graphic change and there is a new name tag. I didn't get the impression that these gangs were really at war with each other and if they were that I should care who were who, because again these are all scripted events and I have no influence on anything anyway.
Sort of like when you start the game and have to choose Corpo, street kid etc. I really thought about this, which would be cool and how I wanted my character to be etc. But also here you quickly figures out that it basically makes no difference anyway, those extra dialogs options and missions, I chose the one from the badlands, so I got a car I think, but already had 3-5 cars so that were pretty pointless.
I do agree with you that in regards to the story, its not really focused around the gangs or police etc. Which is also why I think it is not a well designed open world game, it would have been better off just as a linear action adventure game.
Also just want to add that if you look at the police system now and how you get the most out of CP, you either have to play as a lawful merc, which means that the police in general doesn't interfere with your game, unless you accidentally do something. But playing as a "GTA" style V, is completely pointless because the police is just not a fun, interesting or even functional mechanic in regards to that playstyle, which at least to me makes them irrelevant except as background props really.
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