Cyberpunk 2077 drops the bombast for one last launch trailer
Whispering in your cyber-ears.
Cyberpunk 2077 is very nearly almost here. But while the marketing train is coming to an end, CD Projekt have one last trailer to show us before we dive into Night City proper with Keanu and the gang. Our (probably) final pre-release short gives us a glimpse at leading lad V's no-good day in cybertown, waking up in the garbage with a rockstar in his head and a city wot needs burning. Can't say I've had many worse hangovers than that.
In a somewhat jarring tone-shift to previous trailers, this week's launch vid is remarkably subdued, and somewhat unsettling? Listen, I wasn't prepared for a cyberlass to be whispering in my ears about getting bullets in my head.
Where previous vids were all synth-rock bombast, hacky gunfights and cyber shenanigans, this launch trailer gives us a more sombre view of Night City. V rides passenger with their trauma as they recover from a gig gone wrong, and it's only near the end that we see the katanas come out for some slashy murder. Instead, lots of presumably important characters tell us about what a big deal we're gonna be, with a couple even leading us off to the other room for some cyber-naughties.
We weren't among those to get early Cyberpunk codes, so our review will be a while coming yet. But early reviews speak to a game plagued by technical troubles (many of which may hopefully be amended in a day one patch), so perhaps it's best to wait a minute to see how it pans out anyway. Our pals over at Eurogamer have been plugging in the hours, with Chris Tapsell's Cyberpunk 2077 impressions describing a game that sits far from where its (often crass) marketing would suggest.
"Cyberpunk's story so far is one of fear, the surface of it plated in chrome and angst and body horror gore, but still built on a core of humanity. It's more than I expected, and more than we've been taught to expect, frankly, by the brashness of the marketing, the pitching of Night City as this great, submissive, ultra-hedonist playground. Night City is a vile swamp, in actual fact, and Cyberpunk's characters are drowning in it. It is, so far, more than just a synthwave skin on another puerile open world."
Cyberpunk 2077 is out this Thursday on Steam, GOG and the Epic Games Store. You can pre-load it now - although it's worth noting you probably shouldn't if you suffer from epilepsy, with some early reviews reporting that certain visual effects were triggering seizures. Not great!