I was thinking about the specialization of different playstyles and there's frankly a lot of things missing (similar to how World of Warcraft started as) where most gear is heavily stat based towards impacting damage with weapons.
So think these sockets should be something that the studio should take a heavy look.
Something more akin to: "Increase hacking damage by 10%" mod slots, making your character specialize doing damage by hacks, and not having stuff like "does 12 more damage" which then acts as a (confusing) boost to what I understand on every damage type, and same goes with critical damage.
Currently there's no reason to carry out more than 1 set of gear which is mostly maxed out armor because of how most end game damage is already enough to take out enemies.
Meanwhile hacking becomes almost worthless in end game due to the way contagion was heavily nerfed, and single target hacking takes a long time with not enough reward.
So to spice up the hacking there should be some set bonuses perhaps added to specific sets, like the suit you get from Judy, and Johnny's suit could be more focused on pistol damage.
Also, maybe this is fixed in expansion, but currently there's very little Ninja like gear or sockets, outside of movement speed, which to be honest I've not tested and maybe I'll have to check out later.
Some tweak on the stores I'd like to suggest is to remove the gap of just buying 1 item of specific slot and just allowing to buy all you need. Just fix the pricing instead, people are smart enough to wait 24 hours and purchase the new socket.
Talent trees need also more than just "does 5% more crit" and "headshots do more damage".
I think it would be interesting to have also "weapons" that further enhance your hacking, without being effective in combat. For example in Diablo 3 Wizard class has orb that they can carry in offhand, maybe V could hold onto some sort of signal booster on his hand while he's doing hacking.
This picture above could be something you can use as inspiration. V having his own bots he can launch in air and control, and drive them around, having this disk shape thing in his hand to boost hacking, maybe by replacing the cybernetic fist enhancement, while his weapon hand is holding a whip which is emitting radiowaves. It can be used as damage weapon but is 10-20% weaker than a regular whip.
Also similar concept art like this:
Where you could be stealth Ninja and control drones that do mild damage to enemies standing still, which would be good for disrupting netrunners from controlling the cameras. These drones could have 2 small needles and then bump into the player like a metroid alien leeches off the player and slowly drains their health. You could have other people damaging them, or the player has to get up and shake character to get these drones off.
I think this game has such vast untapped potential if there's ever an effort to remake these talents and item systems.
Frontline juggernaut who then steps into...
Also this could be good way to pave a way to more interesting multiplayer elements, with CSGO style objective maps where the "tanks" could step into a mech suit with a ton of armor on them, becoming basically Cyberpunk's equivalent of Reinhardt from Overwatch, with it's own unique skillset, and ability to unmount when the suit has lost most of its armor and is about to explode (giving players option to attempt to escape or fight to the very end).
I think biggest way to make multiplayer less frustrating would be by making armor more related to the clothing and class associated, thus making the enemy's skillset more easily recognizable, while still allowing fun builds like going full armor hacker, who just takes a mech suits, runs past enemy lines and then hides somewhere behind the corner and starts hacking the turrets. Or maybe a less movement speed and less invisibility oriented ninja who wears heavy armor and has hybrid set of defensive and offensive slots.
I think talent system in very early stages is good, but it lacks the "umph" in the later points.
Also... this is important... Breach Protocol needs to be way more powerful, taking out the Breach Protocol minigame is a must for multiplayer, and I think the hacking minigame should be reserved for the hacking of machines to get money out of, rather than having this minigame whenever you hack enemies.
Also it's just weird that engineer doesn't have any turrets or robots to use... I think the whole crafting tree should be removed entirely and made just universally easy to craft items, while engineering or "Technical Skill" tree is more focused with Robotics and Tech weapons.
And when these PvP rounds eventually come, maybe there could be a brief moment in start of game, where you can see your characters without wearing helmets. You could excuse this with lore, where you put players to fight each others, and you want to promote your "brand" when you go out there. Having animations added to putting these helmets back on, while the round is about to start, something that'd add a little extra touch to each round.
Also juuuust one extra point, but important one. The weight limit needs to be 1.5 - 2 times more. I am barely holding few armor pieces and I'm already full weight, despite carrying talent. The carrying talent shouldn't exist such early state and it should be reserved for far later in the talents, and making these massive heavy armors for frontliners (hopefully in first expansion).
So think these sockets should be something that the studio should take a heavy look.
Something more akin to: "Increase hacking damage by 10%" mod slots, making your character specialize doing damage by hacks, and not having stuff like "does 12 more damage" which then acts as a (confusing) boost to what I understand on every damage type, and same goes with critical damage.
Currently there's no reason to carry out more than 1 set of gear which is mostly maxed out armor because of how most end game damage is already enough to take out enemies.
Meanwhile hacking becomes almost worthless in end game due to the way contagion was heavily nerfed, and single target hacking takes a long time with not enough reward.
So to spice up the hacking there should be some set bonuses perhaps added to specific sets, like the suit you get from Judy, and Johnny's suit could be more focused on pistol damage.
Also, maybe this is fixed in expansion, but currently there's very little Ninja like gear or sockets, outside of movement speed, which to be honest I've not tested and maybe I'll have to check out later.
Some tweak on the stores I'd like to suggest is to remove the gap of just buying 1 item of specific slot and just allowing to buy all you need. Just fix the pricing instead, people are smart enough to wait 24 hours and purchase the new socket.
Talent trees need also more than just "does 5% more crit" and "headshots do more damage".
I think it would be interesting to have also "weapons" that further enhance your hacking, without being effective in combat. For example in Diablo 3 Wizard class has orb that they can carry in offhand, maybe V could hold onto some sort of signal booster on his hand while he's doing hacking.
This picture above could be something you can use as inspiration. V having his own bots he can launch in air and control, and drive them around, having this disk shape thing in his hand to boost hacking, maybe by replacing the cybernetic fist enhancement, while his weapon hand is holding a whip which is emitting radiowaves. It can be used as damage weapon but is 10-20% weaker than a regular whip.
Also similar concept art like this:
Where you could be stealth Ninja and control drones that do mild damage to enemies standing still, which would be good for disrupting netrunners from controlling the cameras. These drones could have 2 small needles and then bump into the player like a metroid alien leeches off the player and slowly drains their health. You could have other people damaging them, or the player has to get up and shake character to get these drones off.
I think this game has such vast untapped potential if there's ever an effort to remake these talents and item systems.
Frontline juggernaut who then steps into...
Also this could be good way to pave a way to more interesting multiplayer elements, with CSGO style objective maps where the "tanks" could step into a mech suit with a ton of armor on them, becoming basically Cyberpunk's equivalent of Reinhardt from Overwatch, with it's own unique skillset, and ability to unmount when the suit has lost most of its armor and is about to explode (giving players option to attempt to escape or fight to the very end).
I think biggest way to make multiplayer less frustrating would be by making armor more related to the clothing and class associated, thus making the enemy's skillset more easily recognizable, while still allowing fun builds like going full armor hacker, who just takes a mech suits, runs past enemy lines and then hides somewhere behind the corner and starts hacking the turrets. Or maybe a less movement speed and less invisibility oriented ninja who wears heavy armor and has hybrid set of defensive and offensive slots.
I think talent system in very early stages is good, but it lacks the "umph" in the later points.
Also... this is important... Breach Protocol needs to be way more powerful, taking out the Breach Protocol minigame is a must for multiplayer, and I think the hacking minigame should be reserved for the hacking of machines to get money out of, rather than having this minigame whenever you hack enemies.
Also it's just weird that engineer doesn't have any turrets or robots to use... I think the whole crafting tree should be removed entirely and made just universally easy to craft items, while engineering or "Technical Skill" tree is more focused with Robotics and Tech weapons.
And when these PvP rounds eventually come, maybe there could be a brief moment in start of game, where you can see your characters without wearing helmets. You could excuse this with lore, where you put players to fight each others, and you want to promote your "brand" when you go out there. Having animations added to putting these helmets back on, while the round is about to start, something that'd add a little extra touch to each round.
Also juuuust one extra point, but important one. The weight limit needs to be 1.5 - 2 times more. I am barely holding few armor pieces and I'm already full weight, despite carrying talent. The carrying talent shouldn't exist such early state and it should be reserved for far later in the talents, and making these massive heavy armors for frontliners (hopefully in first expansion).
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