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Cyberpunk 2077's opening hours go to great lengths to show V and players the thrills of a crime-filled life. Fast cars, expensive guns, a new crib, drunken bar fights with bestie Jackie, and high-speed chases flash by in the game's introductory montage – but lead quest designer Pawel Sasko explains that developer CD Projekt Red intentionally pulled the rug from under players with its intro.
Then-designer and now Cyberpunk 2 director Pawel Sasko speaks to TheGamer about how the neon-sponged RPG begins by making players think they're in for a Grand Theft Auto-style adventure about the highs and lows of being a criminal. "Cyberpunk starts, and it pretends to be GTA," he says. "You are going to become a legend. And it's about getting money and cars and becoming a person in Night City."
That's until CDPR pulls a switcharoo, at least, with V swallowing a bullet by the time the prologue ends and the entire game instead turning into a fight for survival. "We are trying to trick you," Sasko adds. "We are trying to tell you this is your dream. And the thing is, that is all true until you get shot in the head. In that moment, we reset everything."
Despite being set in a capitalist nightmare where everyone's out for themself (and their wallet), Cyberpunk 2077 does eventually let you find joy in that fantasy. Buying fancier cars and bigger condos is part of the game's progression, after all, but Sasko is right in the sense that Cyberpunk 2077's main quest is in no way interested in being a rags-to-riches story by the time Johnny Silverhand's whispering revolutionary soundbites in your ear. In the end, all that money can't buy you a cure.
