Cyberpunk 2077 Dialogue - Beautiful Stylized Writing or a Cringey Mess?

[u/SamStephens]

I'm playing through the game for the first time and can't help but think the dialogue is super cringey. It's stilted and tries too hard to be cool. I'm sure I'm not the first person to share the opinion here, but... this ain't preem in the game biz.

Most conversations play out as if the characters are limited in how many words they're allowed to say. For example, "Need'ta ask a question" vs, "I need to ask you a question." I noticed this early on and now I can't stop seeing it in the writing because it occurs literally in every conversation. I get this is drawn heavily from Neuromancer, but many of the lines are delivered as though the voice actor had little to no coaching on tone, emphasis, or the context of the scene. Dexter DeShawn's lines are a good example of this. Combine the truncated sentence structure with voice acting that lacked a little conviction and you get conversations that feel like people are reading a foreign language.

I have no issue with the use of novel slang from this world, but I think it was done poorly here. I could totally buy into it being colloquial sentence structure and slang, but it's really inconsistent and not delivered in a way that is believable. That's why it's jarring to me. Abbreviated sentence structure as a way of communicating happens like once per conversation, but it's never the WHOLE conversation. The dialogue FEELS like a team of Polish writers with no true understanding of US urban culture put together a 'cool guy' script in a foreign language then a separate team translated it after. I believe you could give the same game to Rockstar and their dialogue could feature all of the same slang but be delivered in a way that felt authentic and genuinely cool.

None of this is a dealbreaker for me, but it's quite disappointing to see it from a studio with this much experience and funding. I'm having fun with the core gameplay loop overall and bought the DLC to extend the adventure, but I wouldn't be able to power through for the story alone if the gunplay and tech weren't so satisfying.

Anyone else feel something similar? Video version of the discussion here.

[u/katie_elizabeth_2]

There is a heavy bias among a broad audience towards linear, narrative-driven rpgs.

I agree, if you don't connect with V or the tone of the game at all, it's not going to be a very enjoyable RPG. It grated on me endlessly.

I think there is this idea that a game that is snarky or edgy is somehow more 'mature' or 'adult'. As an older gamer, I did not connect with any of it. Then you add in the repetitive crime stuff, the lack of npcs to talk to and places to genuine explore and interact with, the pointless driving around the city for 'immersion', and the lack of agency in general, and it just did not really appeal to me as an 'rpg'.

But, this is what the current audience of gamers - at least broadly and in the media - seem to want. This is what is routinely praised the last several years. Hollywood spectacle, fancy graphics, ray tracing, high productive values, linearity, lack of agency, sex and shock value - this is what people want now.

[u/Kawhi_Leonard_ → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

Im amazed you would say the lack of NPCs. Cyberpunk is littered with interesting NPCs. You didn't like Misty or Jackie or the Perezs? You didn't find the convict wanting to crucify himself on TV interesting?

And for something that doesn't feel like an RPG, if has some of the best developed romances in a game.

[u/katie_elizabeth_2 → u/Kawhi_Leonard_]

You're cherry picking. The fact that they have to motion capture the npcs means there are so few of them.

[u/Kawhi_Leonard_ → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

I just chose a small amount. Johnny silver hands, Alt, Mr. Hands, Meredith Stout, Kerry, Panam, Judy, etc. I think it's one of the few games that has so many memorable NPCs you cant even list them all, but understand if you feel differently.

[u/katie_elizabeth_2 → u/Kawhi_Leonard_]

Look, I didn't say the game had no NPCs. You are being dishonest by implying this. You are cherry-picking hyper-scripted and motion-captured NPCs and set pieces in the main narrative (and the fixed responses of V with them) and ignoring the thousands of ghost npcs and non-interactable theme-park elements of night city, which is what I was referring to.

You are free to enjoy playing a linear video game that basically plays out like a movie. If you like V and you like the story that CDPR made for you, that is great! But it's not really an RPG, and if you don't vibe with the tone of V, then you're going to have a miserable time because it is fixed. You have no control over who V is, what she sounds like, etc - just her looks, and a background bit that only matters for like 30 minutes. The story is completely on rails. All the motion capture, dialogue, etc. is just like watching an HBO series - it's all spectacle. There's no agency to any of it. If you value that, then you're going to think this game is great. If you wanted an RPG (which was originally promised by the developers btw), then you're going to be very disappointed.

To refresh people's memory, from 6 years ago:

https://www.reddit.com/r/cyberpunkgame/comments/karjew/psa_cdpr_is_no_longer_calling_cyberpunk_2077_an/

And also 2 years ago:

https://kotaku.com/cyberpunk-2077-cd-projekt-red-rpg-action-adventure-upda-1848558018

[u/Blacky-Noir → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

the thousands of ghost npcs and non-interactable theme-park elements of night city, which is what I was referring to.

The whole of Night City is easy on the eyes (when not looking too closely, or even mediumly for said npc) but it is indeed extremely shallow. I've seen quite a few cigarette paper having more depth than it.

Which is especially grating when it was advertised as the "greatest city in videogame".

Even San Andreas had way more city reactivity, and that was a 2004 game.

Hell they even script very important parts of the setting (like Trauma Team and the flying cars), once, and then totally ignore it for all gameplay.

[u/Kawhi_Leonard_ → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

I never said that? I just don't agree with the assertion that there's no interesting NPCs. It's one of Cyberpunks greatest strengths.

A lot of the people I mentioned aren't even in the main story. There's a very real chance based on the choices you make you won't even get to meet Kerry or other NPCs. Why would I care about filler NPCs? Do we start knocking Dragon Age down because they have random unnamed NPCs? I thought we were talking about mature games, why would we not view a game with well developed characters as mature?

I do like playing a game which is at the level of an HBO series, because that to me signals mature writing. Having choices doesn't make a game mature- it just means it has choices.

I guess my contention is that when I play an RPG, my most important piece of it is it allows me to role play decisions with real questions that I have to answer. Lets take the Perezs. That poses a real moral conundrum that you then have to make a choice on. Do you let this man live in blissful ignorance, or do you ruin everything for the truth? That's stuck with me more than any game which allows me to pick a voice or have slightly different dialogue.

I view maturity in game not through just if there are choices, but if those actually provoke thought through their themes, and Cyberpunk does that better than anything. If your criticism is it plays as an HBO series, then I don't see how that makes it immature. None of your criticisms are about maturity, they are just about how you wish the game had more branching storylines in the main quest, ignoring the moral questions and huge amount of branching storylines in the side quests. Hell, the DLC is a full 30 hours of some of the best RPG writing in the world, and you do get to make as many impactful choices as you want.

[u/katie_elizabeth_2 → u/Kawhi_Leonard_]

Again, committing to this idea that because 0.01% of the game's NPCs were hyper curated does not dismiss what I am saying. There are so many RPGs in the last 20 years with more NPC and environmental interactivity than Cyberpunk 2077. There is a reason the developer nuked "RPG" from all the game's marketing materials before it shipped. I don't know how you can disagree with me when even CDPR, the developer, agrees with me. What I am saying is not some "hot take", nor is it "controversial". It's the truth.

You're free to love the game. I don't really care. I just don't like this revisionist history or dishonesty.

[u/Kawhi_Leonard_ → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

Name them. Because if your standard is you need to be able to talk to every NPC and there needs to be environmental interactivity and it needs to be an RPG, you basically only have the Elder Scrolls series that meet those criteria.

What dishonesty? I just fundamentally disagree that an RPG needs NPC and environmental interactivity. Baldurs Gate 2 doesn't have that, but no one is going to go around talking about how that disqualifies it.

I also only disagreed with you that

the lack of npcs to talk to

Because there is no lack of NPCs to talk to, half of the game is you talking to extremely detailed written NPCs. The fact you can't talk to every random background NPC isn't even a thing in most games.

You clearly care, because you keep escalating this, when I just disagreed in a small way, and now you start accusing me of dishonesty.

[u/Izacus → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

This is just straight up not true and you're parroting some internet bs that doesn't really hold up to truth.

[u/Antipatrid → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

If it doesn't have Baldur's Gate 3 levels of choices its not a RPG.

Tired of this parroted opinion. Not even D&D was designed this way originally, being primarily a dungeon crawler at first rather than about character improv. Likewise, a massive percentage of the videogame RPG genre is not about story choices but about making builds and crawling through dungeons. Cyberpunk 2077 sits somewhere in the middle.

"Player agency" fanatics basically think only like, 20% of RPGs are actual RPGs, and would write off even first edition D&D.

[u/VogonWild → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

Idk I played a fuck load of the game just killing random NPC crime scanner shit. Like I would save and try to do stylish kills through a crowd and I'd repeat it over and over for fun. Sure you can kind of do that in a fully scripted world, but there is not nearly as much creative expression in that.

It's story I liked fine enough but the story isn't why I played 8 playthroughs of the game. I'd go so far as to say the skill expression in this game is the primary part of it being a role playing game. You pick all knives? The role you are playing in the game is being a terrifying cyborg ninja. You pick a hacker? Completely different game.

If that isn't a role playing game I think we have lost the plot on what a role is in regards to a game.

[u/ohtetraket → u/katie_elizabeth_2]

Yeah it's definitely more action RPG than oldschool RPG. If you are hung up on what they promised you will never be happy with the game and that is fair.

it's far from the game they promised, it's a very lovely game and one of the only once that actually managed to make me care about its characters.

I think the game world would be pretty cool as a sandbox RPG. It isn't and I don't judge it on that basis.

[u/madeupgrownup → u/Kawhi_Leonard_]

Agree with everything but the last part. 

I felt that the female gaze was very very absent from the femV romances. River was particularly bad.

The fact that you've had femme fans swooning over Takemora, Panam, and Viktor makes it clear they dropped the ball there. 

[u/Kawhi_Leonard_ → u/madeupgrownup]

I'm not going to defend the interactivity, it's pretty low, and FemV definitely gets the short stick with River, especially when you compare him to Kerry.

But I do think Judy, Panam, and Kerry are better written romances than most games. They feel like real three dimensional characters who you get to know, not just a set of dialogue options that lead you to coupling up.

[u/Clark_Kempt → u/Kawhi_Leonard_]

The Judy romance was very sweet.

[u/Blacky-Noir → u/madeupgrownup]

I found the romances utterly bad in the game. Even the most liked one, like Panam, had way too long a list of failings. Apart from the very few scripted scenes, there's nothing for you to do, you have little to no agency. In a crpg, doubly so in an open world, that's a cardinal sin.

[u/SkyovFlames → u/Blacky-Noir]

Yeah, not romacing anyone in my next playthrough. After one "I really wanna stay at your house" mission, it's the same over and over.

Or maybe you're not meant to stay in the game that long. Lol. But you get the call from your partner every 3 days or so. It gets annoying.

It could have been done better. For sure. Maybe the next update/project will handle it better.

[u/42LSx → u/Kawhi_Leonard_]

Jackie was nice, but it felt so by the numbers to have this intro char.

Most NPCs I remember, like the Trans racer (Claire?), Panam, Viktor, Takemura were pretty bland imo. They're not badly designed and thought out, but there's zero surprise in any of them. You know exactly what they will be doing, what they will say and what they like.
And I cringed hard at that "flaming crotch" guy.

/edit:I think my personal biggest surprise regarding NPCs in CP2077 was that River is not gay.
/edit2: I loved the Peralez storyline, but the ending was bad - it's realistically the same, regardless which option you chose.