Minor spoilers: Act 2 and narrative coherence / urgency

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I'm not really sure that the story (story coherence perhaps?) would have changed that much in a hub based design , I mean the story writing would have been the same.
Some of the complains that I see about underdeveloping VDBs (just to use the topic under discussion as example, could be other plotlines that people felt too open ended) I think are more rooted in the style of the source RPG and the base literature than in the open world vs hub based design.
Many times the protagonist is just a mr/mrs/miss nobody that get caught in something bigger and tries to survive/escape from that situation, with limited resources and visibility of what is going on in the background and under risk of being manipulated by one or other "power actor". In terms of the world as a whole nobody cares about them, even if by accident they are involved in some big world event.

Maybe the game would have benefitted by an actual journal written by V that as you progress the story unfolds and summarizes it?
Yes i think changes to the journal would go a long way.

There is something about the way the story doesn't quite hang together in a coherent way in act 2 that gets me, as if it needed one last look at the macro story arc level before they committed to it, just to make sure the central drivers of the plot were ringing at full volume and didn't get drowned out in background baggage. That is a common issue of many games (there are several passages in Witcher 3 that are utterly incoherent, for instance, like when they go to the Elf's lab and a lady elf is there, as if a strand has been underdeveloped to the point it simply doesn't make sense), but without a journal entry that you can pick up to remind you that "you are doing x because y happened and you need to get to z", CP feels more than usually adrift.

Don't get me wrong, these guys write fantastically. It's just a bit frustrating.
 

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This is kind of related but I found the act structure a bit oddly paced? Act 1 is the preparation for the heist, the heist itself and meeting Johnny. Act 2 throws most main missions your way and Act 3 is just... Nocturne OP55N1 and Mikoshi.

On one hand it does follow the three-act structure but on the other, it feels like the main story reached its climax too fast.
 
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Act 3 is just... Nocturne OP55N1 and Mikoshi.
If you only focus on main quest, yes :(
(There are many side quests launched in Act 3, They are optional but which would have found their place in the main quests line in many other games. CDPR choose to let us decide if they could be important or not, and for me, it's a good)
 

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If you only focus on main quest, yes :(
You're right that Act 3 is longer if you take side quests into consideration, but I specifically talked about the main storyline only, because I feel that the third act could have benefited from at least one more main quest.

I know that CDPR themselves said that the game's main story is going to be shorter than in TW3, but I didn't expect at all for Act 3 to start with the Point of No Return quest already available, as these kind of quests usually unlock later.

(There are many side quests launched in Act 3, They are optional but which would have found their place in the main quests line in many other games. CDPR choose to let us decide if they could be important or not, and for me, it's a good)
The problem here is that people who missed new side quests in Act 3 didn't do so because they deemed them not important enough to complete, but because they didn't know the game is going to have anything new, as the Point of No Return quests are usually introduced when the game has no new side quests to offer, and after all the notable characters are introduced.

People miss content on their 1st playthroughs all the time, but I don't think I ever saw people missing out quests to such an extent as they did with Cyberpunk's Act 3 quests and I think it's because Nocturne OP55N1 quest is made available too early.
 
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The problem here is that people who missed new side quests in Act 3 didn't do so because they deemed them not important enough to complete, but because they didn't know the game is going to have anything new, as the Point of No Return quests are usually introduced when the game has nothing new to offer, and after all the notable characters are introduced.

People miss content on their 1st playthroughs all the time, I missed Leliana entirely in my 1st Dragon Age: Origins playthrough, but I don't think I ever saw players missing out quests to such an extent as they did with Cyberpunk's Act 3 quests and I think it's because Nocturne OP55N1 is made available too early.
Fully agree ;)
Even though I haven't really felt it.
In all games i play, I still have a habit of doing all the side quests I can before the main quests (basically, the main quests when there is no more to do).
In my first playthrough, i had already doing everything's before seen the point of no return :)
(I admit I was a little disappointed to see it so early, but hey ... I would have been even with 20 hours of extra main quest)
 
They used three-act structure to form main storyline.
3-act-structure.jpg

Act 1 is coherent - V is closed in Watson, act 3 is ok.. but act 2...
Act 1 can take 6-10 hours, then act 2 can take lke 50 hours... Maybe if you're focused only on main storyline, it can work.
I don't know what is right balance here, because of nature of open-world games, there's so many distractions during act 2...and you can make quests in different orders...
 
I never really pay attention to that in reality.
In my first playtrought (and even now), i had just noticed "Act 1" (at one point). I don't really know when it appear on the screen. I couldn't even tell when it's displayed for act 2 and act 3 :(

For me what I retains is (even in my current playthrough - 109h) : "Act 1" is too short, "Act 2" is too short, "Act 3" is too short...
Crap, i need DLCs !
 
They used three-act structure to form main storyline.
View attachment 11217427
Act 1 is coherent - V is closed in Watson, act 3 is ok.. but act 2...
Act 1 can take 6-10 hours, then act 2 can take lke 50 hours... Maybe if you're focused only on main storyline, it can work.
I don't know what is right balance here, because of nature of open-world games, there's so many distractions during act 2...and you can make quests in different orders...
So I think you CAN make it work, just that with players getting distracted by the other quests, it's imperative to make sure the main story is communicated in such a way that the player's goals and where they are in that story are always clearly telegraphed, whatever else is going on.

Since the main story quests aren't going to be rewritten, one way better to anchor the player's main story quests might be to rethink how the journal presents information. Giving the journal Johnny's voice (I think??) is cool and immersive, but that's no good if the player then can't understand where he is in the story. Sometimes you have to break the immersion and just treat the player as a player.
 
Since the main story quests aren't going to be rewritten, one way better to anchor the player's main story quests might be to rethink how the journal presents information. Giving the journal Johnny's voice (I think??) is cool and immersive, but that's no good if the player then can't understand where he is in the story. Sometimes you have to break the immersion and just treat the player as a player.
Yep it's johnny (i think, seen how it's written and told).
Or some sort of "private journal" (don't how to said that...) where V tells a bit about what happened previously, what he chose to do/say and what he plans to do.
 
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