I know there have been other discussions on 1st vs 3rd person mainly focused on gameplay however I feel the devs intention gets completely lost in the noise.
Of course this is purely an assumption on my part but having followed the development and consumed every piece of detail and interview prior to launch, this is my takeaway. I think at a certain point the devs found they had to choose between Utility and immersion and they chose immersion. That's not to say one was completely ignored, it was more a matter of what the priority should be.
1st person allows you to appreciate the "cyberpunk" experience/world and this is evident by the sheer amount of detail that went into this game. Just take a moment to look around your environment. Anyone who was exposed to the "Cyberpunk" genre way before this game would likely prefer that perspective because it's something they've been waiting for...to BE in that world. Of course that leaves the rest who were drawn to the game for combat/gameplay and the visuals and the world is purely secondary, they would most certainly prefer 3rd person. This is however first and foremost a story driven game, that results in a clash in ideologies among the gamers because CDPR is trying to cast a wide net to appeal to both. When you consider it's origins, it's easy to understand why immersion was so important as well.
If the devs went with 3rd person then it would have been at the sacrifice of immersion. And I'm sure ppl will say you can do both and the game can be immersive in 3rd person. To which I'll say no you cannot, at least not right now. Maybe 1 or 2 generations further down the console line. PC players can probably do it now but we know we aren't the majority. A cyberpunk world is heavily reliant on visual storytelling and of course this is also a very dialogue heavy game...you will lose that immersion in 3rd person. It was easy to do this in Witcher 3 because outside of towns it's really just trees and dirt roads, nothing to be taken in by. Furthermore it's not condensed and while you would see more in 3rd person you simultaneously see less detail and everything eventually starts to look the same.
All that to say this is a world that demands a 1st person perspective and I say that as someone who hasn't played an FPS since the first Black Ops game, I don't particularly like FPS games. In any case while I hope they don't, they can probably change to 3rd person in the next CP game since they've already introduced ppl to this world but I would vote for it to remain as is.
Of course this is purely an assumption on my part but having followed the development and consumed every piece of detail and interview prior to launch, this is my takeaway. I think at a certain point the devs found they had to choose between Utility and immersion and they chose immersion. That's not to say one was completely ignored, it was more a matter of what the priority should be.
1st person allows you to appreciate the "cyberpunk" experience/world and this is evident by the sheer amount of detail that went into this game. Just take a moment to look around your environment. Anyone who was exposed to the "Cyberpunk" genre way before this game would likely prefer that perspective because it's something they've been waiting for...to BE in that world. Of course that leaves the rest who were drawn to the game for combat/gameplay and the visuals and the world is purely secondary, they would most certainly prefer 3rd person. This is however first and foremost a story driven game, that results in a clash in ideologies among the gamers because CDPR is trying to cast a wide net to appeal to both. When you consider it's origins, it's easy to understand why immersion was so important as well.
If the devs went with 3rd person then it would have been at the sacrifice of immersion. And I'm sure ppl will say you can do both and the game can be immersive in 3rd person. To which I'll say no you cannot, at least not right now. Maybe 1 or 2 generations further down the console line. PC players can probably do it now but we know we aren't the majority. A cyberpunk world is heavily reliant on visual storytelling and of course this is also a very dialogue heavy game...you will lose that immersion in 3rd person. It was easy to do this in Witcher 3 because outside of towns it's really just trees and dirt roads, nothing to be taken in by. Furthermore it's not condensed and while you would see more in 3rd person you simultaneously see less detail and everything eventually starts to look the same.
All that to say this is a world that demands a 1st person perspective and I say that as someone who hasn't played an FPS since the first Black Ops game, I don't particularly like FPS games. In any case while I hope they don't, they can probably change to 3rd person in the next CP game since they've already introduced ppl to this world but I would vote for it to remain as is.