The tour of Cyberpunk 2077 districts stops at Heywood today, with a fresh set of concept art to give you an early look at life in the neighborhood.
Heywood is unique among the districts that developer CD Projekt Red has toured so far - Westbrook, City Center, and Santa Domingo - in that it has a dual identity. In the north there's "modern skyscrapers and parks", while in the south the city has fallen into disrepair and gangs control the streets. Mind you, that's not necessarily worse than the corporate-owned cops controlling the streets, just different.
Heywood is a neighborhood of contrast—from modern skyscrapers and parks in the north, to dangerous, inhospitable slums in the south. It's “the biggest bedroom in Night City”, where gangs like Valentinos and 6th Street get down to business—legal and illegal alike. #ConceptArt pic.twitter.com/wc5i1sxsJBJuly 20, 2020
The first piece of concept art gives us a bird's-eye view of Heywood: toward the docks and center of the district there are blocks of squat, low-level buildings, while further up are corporate high-rises. The second image zooms in to show us what looks like a sub-level of a shopping complex, with stores for guns, shoes, and cybernetic implants all handily accessible in one location.
The last image might be my favorite piece of Cyberpunk 2077 concept art so far, because it really shows off the people and the city as one organic entity: everybody's out and about, tending to their business, and it feels like each corner has a story. Even if I wouldn't want to play through them all, I'd like to lean in and listen for a little while. I'm especially curious about that bright red dog with the cybernetic leg and the cheetah spots. What is going on there, and how do I get one?
Cyberpunk 2077 recently made a tribute to Hideo Kojima, and Heywood would be a pretty good place to meet him for a street race. Just saying.
