I’ve been playing Cyberpunk 2077 again lately, as it’s one of those games that I constantly fall back on to fill the gap between new releases. Despite its tumultuous year and half of existence (to say nothing for the several years of tumultuous development before launch), I have played a considerable amount of this game, logging at least 40 hours of gameplay across two platforms. Although I haven’t seen credits roll on the main campaign, I do expect that I will one day.
Recently, while thinking about what CD Projekt Red might do with future DLC, I realized I would love to see narratives from characters other than V. In fact, I will go one step further and say I hope CD Projekt Red avoids expanding on V’s story any further than the base vanilla campaign.
This probably comes as no surprise to anyone who knows my personal stance on open-world narrative DLC. I’ve long been a firm believer that most open worlds would lend themselves to alternative narratives rather than simply expanding on the one from the core campaign. I tend to prefer the Liberty City Stories approach to DLC, centered around the main narrative but still somewhat removed from it. And that’s what I would love to see incorporated into Cyberpunk 2077.
Look, V isn’t the best or most interesting character. This is especially true if you chose the male V, if for no other reason than his Jersey Shore voice and persona (I hear the female V fares better, though I have yet to start a new game to give her a whirl). I got love for the guy, don’t get me wrong, but if given the chance to experience the world of Night City from the perspective of a totally different character, I would drop V like a bad habit. And in many ways, I think Cyberpunk 2077‘s Night City would lend itself to smaller narratives from a multitude of various different characters. Hell, with Cyberpunk 2077 having its roots in tabletop RPGs, it feels like multiple characters and storylines are already in the Cyberpunk DNA.
You could see the more intimate side of different gang factions or lifestyles, spend time in a noir story about a sex worker who’s down on their luck, or take on the grind of a corpo exec on the downturn. I would love to spend some time as an NCPD beat cop or a detective investigating a string of grisly murders. Hell, even though flesh-and-bones cab drivers don’t really seem to be a thing in Night City, I would love to be a cabbie making the rounds; maybe someone new to town is starting a human cabbie renaissance.
I think all of this lends itself especially well to Cyberpunk 2077, considering the game is already has multiple class options when you first make your version of V. There are already perks built for Corpo, Nomad, and Street Kid; it’s not hard to imagine how slight variations on those would work for the side characters I mentioned in the previous paragraph.
In fact, being able to spend all of one’s time playing as a nomad without ever setting foot in Night City could be another cool concept for DLC. As it is, you rarely need to step out into the badlands (depending on your build and whether or not you opt to do the side missions out in that section of the map or not).
And don’t get me wrong, I would love to see new clothing and purchasable vehicle options, or even smaller content like new songs or radio stations. And that could all come with the additional story content; but it’s the story content that I would love to see the most. And depending on the size of this hypothetical content, I would personally be okay with paying for it as long as it was meaningful.
I’ve had my own struggles with Cyberpunk 2077 over the past year and a half, but I’ve managed to enjoy it at its worst, and I’ve grown to really love it at its best. So even if future content is just more V content, as long as it makes sense or a positive addition to what is already there, I’ll more than likely consume it. In fact, this is exactly what CD Projekt Red did with the Witcher 3 — they added more content to continue Geralt’s story.
As long as there’s more content in the future, I’ll be happy, but my greatest desire for Cyberpunk 2077 is to step into the role of some other characters with completely different lifestyles.
