First lemme say that before hearing this 1st person news, this game was gonna the game that made me forsake all other games and human relations till death do us part. Hearing the 1st person news turned the game from living inside my soul, to just a game I'll most likely get...
I'm a neon cyberpunk guy through and through and it's always been my favourite genre of anything - books, movies, games..) So having
my favourite game studio develop my favourite kind of game was just... no words... I'm also that guys who's NEVER played a single FP game because I find it so, SO strange to have my character personified by a slight left to right screen sway and disembodied voice. A lot of people feel it's more immersive and I get that, but I've always found the opposite is true - seeing my character on the screen rather than what he/she/it sees always gives me more of sense of identifying to that character. And that's going into field of view issues.
In short,
I love the setting and idea of this game and I waaayyyy prefer 3rd person (hate 1st person?)
Now, CDPR are an amazing studio and if there was ever a game that could convince of a FP view experience, it would be them. I'm sure they have good reasons for going for FP view. Things like hacking into terminals, NPCs brains, or optical enhancements like using infrared or VR/AR/thermal goggles in game, information overlays are all good things to have in 1st person and could be easier to implement in that view as well. They would all fit perfectly in the lore of a cyberpunk world and is something that the devs have hinted to with "augmentations"... Kyle Rowley also mentioned a desire to really make us see all the love and detail that has gone into this universe and yes, a lot of people feel the FP mode is more immersive so that makes sense.
The thing is,
none of this is broken by giving the player the option to switch to 3rd person view and back to 1st whenever they want. You're walking around exploring/walking/driving/flying... in 3rd person. As soon as you've got any kind of interaction come up (like talking to NPCs or a hack, or remote pilot of an machine...) either the cam snaps to 1st for you or you can choose to control it yourself. Would this be such an issue?
As for making us pay attention to detail and getting a sense of immersion, TW3 was 3rd person and I spent so much time just walking - WALKING!! - slowly around enjoying the sounds, details, random bits of dialogue between NPCs... all the love and craft that went into this game... If it was 3rd person, I would 100% still do the same here, probably even more than in TW3.
So please, PLEASE CDPR, just give us the option to switch and leave us the responsibility to play this game right, experience the world in all its' glory and see all the things INCLUDING THE AMAZING AND CUSTOMISABLE CHARACTER DESIGNS!!!
Sorry for the long winded post. I've never been so passionate about a game to this extend and so felt I needed to say my piece.