Games What’s Changed In ‘Cyberpunk 2077’ Since Launch? A Comprehensive List Paul Tassi Senior Contributor Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. News and opinion about video games, television, movies and the internet. Following New! Follow this author to stay notified about their latest stories.
Got it! Sep 22, 2022, 07:59am EDT | New! Click on the conversation bubble to join the conversation Got it! Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Cyberpunk 2077 CDPR This article was republished on 9/22. Cyberpunk 2077 is experiencing something of a renaissance on the back of the release of Cyberpunk Edgerunners on Netflix, along with an accompanying patch and sale. Many people are getting back into the game, or trying it for the very first time since launch.
And they all may have a common question. What exactly has been changed in Cyberpunk 2077 since release? We just hit patch 1. 6 with the release of the Edgerunners update, but there have been many, many updates before that.
I thought it would be wise to go through what’s changed over the last almost two years now, though I am not digging into every bug and performance fix. Suffice to say, there have been thousands upon thousands of bugs that have been squashed, and the game performs better on all platforms than it used to. The game also now has dedicated current-gen console versions, which it did not have when it was released.
So, what’s changed? Let’s go through the patches: Cyberpunk 2077 CDPR Patch 1. 1 This patch was almost entirely emergency “put the fires out” fixes for quest progression bugs and performance issues. This also fixed an issue with save files that were becoming too large and eventually corrupted.
It also introduced an infamous new bug where you’d get stuck on a Takamura quest, which was eventually fixed. Patch 1. 2 This was a massive patch, 8,000 words of patch notes, which again, was 99% fixes, and the word “fix” appeared 274 times in the patch notes.
But there were some in-game changes. Police would now spawn further away when summoned rather than directly on top of you. Gorilla Arms damage was buffed 20% The item to reset perk points had its cost reduced.
You could now craft multiple items at once, and some costs were reduced. NPC would no longer stay as frozen when afraid in the midst of combat. Delmain will now no longer constantly call you if you’re in the region where one of his quests take place.
Car controls were improved and you can now unstick your car with a control option. Cyberpunk 2077 CDPR Patch 1. 3 This arrived in August of 2021, and started to add more fan-requested changes to the game.
GPS was now more zoomed out so you would not miss turns as often and could better see where you’re going. You can now more easily redistribute your Perk points and for less money. Higher difficulty levels buffed enemy detection of players, searching for them more aggressively.
A new Optical Camo mod was added that allowed you to become invisible. Adam Smasher drops actual loot when killed. NPCs no longer stay hiding in cover when you flank them.
Vehicles will honk and drive around V instead of just hitting you. NPCs now have a dying animation attached to the Short Circuit quickhack. NPCs will not react by crouching to every gunshot.
NPCs will no longer randomize appearance when you look away from them and back. Legendary clothing schematics are now permanently available in shops. You can now double jump during phone calls.
You can now fast climb or slide down ladders. Shards are now in correct categories. Judy will now leave a gift in your apartment after she texts you post-romance side quest.
This patch also brought with it the game’s first “free DLCS”: Two jackets from Vic you find in your stash. The Quartz Bandit car from Rogue if you side with her during the Panam quest. A different (worse) look for Johnny you can turn on or off in the starting menu.
Patch 1. 31 This was a relatively minor patch that brought with it a few fixes from the much larger 1. 3, but this was the patch where I really started to notice a visual transformation in the game, as specific improvements were made to wet/reflective surfaces.
Cyberpunk 2077 CDPR Patch 1. 5 This was an absolutely massive patch in February 2022 for the launch of the game on next-gen consoles that was so big, they actually just skipped 1. 4 entirely.
They completely reworked many aspects of the perk tree, removing pointless perks and buffing or changing others. They refunded everyone’s points so they could respec. They significantly changed the entire concept of Throwing Knives, no longer making it so you had to literally go and pick up your knife again, but making the knife auto-return to your hand, with better knives returning more quickly.
They overhauled many aspects of combat AI to make enemies smarter in combat, taking cover more often. Further driving improvements were made with better braking, handling, cornering and the ability to do burnouts. Crowd AI was updated where pedestrians will now not all act the same way, some will flee, others will fight, some will panic and crash their cars into things.
Fixers now have a mission counter so you can tell when all their gigs are done. They each give you a special reward when you finish their mission chain, usually a weapon or car, which you can find at your home. The entire economy was rebalanced giving out more cash rewards, and making cars and guns cheaper.
New weapons were added in this patch you could purchase or find in the wild. You could change your appearance in the mirror for the first time since launch. You can now buy various apartments throughout the city, four in total.
Love interests were more fully fleshed out with more text conversations and the ability to wake up next to them when sleeping at your place or their place. Cyberpunk 2077 CDPR Patch 1. 6 And this is it, the last patch that was launched just ahead of Edgerunners.
This is also the last patch that will launch for last-gen consoles, as future ones will only be next-gen/PC. A new quest tied to the show which ends with you receiving David’s jacket from the series. New weapons hidden around the map from the show, and other weapons, both guns and melee, that are now available to find or buy in the game.
Three full new Gigs from different fixers in two regions of the map, the game’s first true new missions since release. Full appearance customization available at last, allowing you to change almost everything about yourself at Ripperdocs. Transmog, where you can wear your powerful items and reskin them with saved looks that you create out of your wardrobe in one of your apartments.
Cross-progression has been added through cloud saves between console and PC. REDmod launched for help with installing and managing mods on PC. I tried to be as comprehensive as I could here, though I know I missed some stuff.
Again, this does not include the thousands of fixes and performance improvements that made up most of these patches, but rather the long list of additions and changes you’ll feel in the game. Or if it’s your first time, an indicator of what’s there that wasn’t before. Enjoy.
Update (9/22): Some developments since this was published, as the players heading to the game to see all these changes has dramatically increase its overall playercount. CDPR released a post saying that a million players a day were playing Cyberpunk 2077 for a week, a massive total for a game that again, is single player and has been out for nearly two years now. You just do not see that.
Past that, it does not seem like interest has even started to fade yet. Yesterday, Wednesday, we saw Cyberpunk 2077 surpass its concurrent playercount resurgance record that had been previously set the past Sunday, during the height of the anime hype. The fact that the playercount total is still going up means more and more people are getting back into the game or grabbing it on sale, and this surge is not over yet.
It’s possible this upcoming weekend could be even bigger. I would have frankly already expected a slowdown, but that’s not what the data is showing. Some people have asked me if I thought that this new surge would change CDPR’s plans for Cyberpunk 2077 going forward, like would they greenlight the second DLC that they were originally planning, but have since scrapped in favor of releasing just one next year.
It’s possible, but I would say it’s still unlikely, as those decisions have to be made really, really far ahead of time, and I don’t know if CDPR is willing to reshuffle its entire workforce to accommodate that (the majority is currently working on the first DLC, and it would take the majority of the studio to make a second, instead of moving on to Witcher 4). I do think, however, that this will accelerate plans for more non-games Cyberpunk content, including a possible Edgerunners season 2, and also a true Cyberpunk sequel for years from now. As for the current state of the game, as I’ve said, I think a clean slate, fresh playthrough is going to be the right call.
There are too many changes that have been made over the past two years that you might miss if you just load up an old save. I also forgot to talk about the future changes that they said will be coming to the game in a future patch, though whether that’s a patch before the DLC or the DLC patch itself, I’m not clear on. Those coming changes will be: A total overhaul to the police system in the game.
While the game has done things like spawned the police further away, this sounds like it would be a complete rework of the system, and I would be surprised if it wasn’t more GTA-like. Actual vehicle combat. We may have gotten a taste of that in the new gig in this patch which has an on-rails car chase sequence, but I hope that future versions of this are going to be more free-flowing.
Changes to melee combat and new perks. Melee combat is a bit mundane and frankly, somewhat overpowered, so I will be curious to see what changes are made here. New, more extreme Cyberware.
We have only gotten some very, very tiny upgrades in the Cyberware department after all this time like Optical camo. I would like more upgrades that you can actually see on your body, like the arm upgrades. Nothing else really does that though.
These changes will not be coming for everyone, however, as 1. 6 is the last patch for Xbox One and PS4 players, who will also not be getting the DLC next year. Whatever CDPR has planned from here, they are done trying to accommodate last-gen consoles, which caused so many problems at launch, and are likely what’s holding back some of the stuff they want to do in the future.
Still, not great that those systems had the toughest time at the start, and now they won’t even get the DLC that fans have been waiting for for two years now. I guess sacrifices must be made. I am also continuing to wait for one big addition that never seems like it’s going to arrive, New Game Plus, which has been cited as a technical challenge to implement given how the game is built, even though it’s a pretty standard thing that most other single player games have at launch or get patched in over time.
They say they’d have to rebalance the difficulty of the entire game based around it, but we’ll see if they ever get to it. Past that, I think we have finally gotten through most of the major fan requested additions. I think the game needs more clothing that isn’t fan-made mods, and the ability to see the damn minimap icons when you’re at a fast travel station.
Other than that though, it’s really added a lot of stuff I wanted to see, most recently transmog, which is a great system in practice. Follow me on Twitter , YouTube , Facebook and Instagram . Subscribe to my free weekly content round-up newsletter, God Rolls .
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From: forbes
URL: https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2022/09/22/whats-changed-in-cyberpunk-2077-since-launch-a-comprehensive-list/