More Cyberpunk 2077 Thoughts

 Having sunk a lot more time into Cyberpunk 2077, I have further thoughts, but a lot of them get into spoiler territory.

Not so spoilery:

- Crafting can be a very big thing in the game if you want/let it, but there it isn't a well-explained system by the game itself, particularly things like how crafting mods can randomly(?) be higher rarity, but weapons not so much.

- Upgrading... is poorly explained and not very practical from my understanding. Gear seems to have a hidden item level based on when you pick it up, and upgrading lets you boost that (apparently a level at a time up to your current level), but after a few times, the component cost gets prohibitively high, meaning there's a functional limit. So don't really expect to keep using the same few iconic weapons the whole game unless you accept the damage won't keep up. Later-game, slots on armor seem more valuable than base stats, so that item level matters less there.

- The special part of tech weapons is being able to charge them and shoot through most cover. And yet, I find myself shooting through cover with many power weapons. Not sure if that's a bug or design.

- There are a couple side job chains that use braindances/virtus that I missed on the first playthrough. That's good, though it's still a barely-tapped aspect of the game - they could justify dropping the player in other characters or settings entirely. You could make a whole expansion of that.

- There are several vehicles you can get for free and a lot more you can purchase. Of all that, I love my Javelina. Nomad aesthetic, high speed, good control both on and off road - my fav of what I've driven in the game.

- It's worth remembering that difficulty is adjustable (though does require loading from last checkpoint). The game can start out pretty tough, but gets easier in almost every way as it goes on, so I found myself turning up the difficulty to keep things more interesting.

- The projectile launcher arm with the tranquilizer ammunition for it is probably overpowered. It isn't silent and can be a little hard to aim, but one hit will non-lethally drop basically anyone who isn't a story boss, cyberpsychos included.

- I expect stealth gameplay to involve a silenced pistol and sniper rifle. Alas, there's really only one silenced sniper that you get through a mission chain and not all pistols accept silencers either. It's still viable to some degree, but quickhacks are a much more reliable stealth attack, especially the higher rarity ones in a good deck/OS.

Much more spoilery:

- Being able to access the "secret" ending seems to require some very specific dialog choices on one or more Johnny-centric missions. Oof. Working toward that end I had to reload a save from hours and hours ago.

- In fact, all the endings require a commitment as the save before the branch point still requires playing through probably an hour or two of content before the credits roll. Rough for completionists, but each one is more satisfying than choosing a button and watching the epilogue.

- Having played through three of the main ending branches, I have the solid feeling that none of them are flawlessly "good." The secret ending is supposed to avoid some of the collateral damage, but otherwise fighting Arasaka will involve some friendly NPC deaths. Helping Arasaka leads to an appropriately (for the genre) mediocre fate that disappoints many NPC friends. But even in the best case, V seems to close out the main campaign living on borrowed time with months left. Story-wise, that leaves room for V to go on to other things trying to find a cure, potentially.

- The Sun ending is a little odd. Somehow having survived an assault on Arasaka, V is now a legendary merc and... super rich? Not really clear where that money came from. I read the situation as implying Rogue "gave" the Afterlife to V, which could explain it, but V picks up a job there acting more like an active merc than fixer, so it's a bit unclear.

- I'm a little surprised the answer to my lingering questions about Saburo only come out in the Devil ending. Why would he let himself be killed in the first place? Well, it turns out he definitely did have an engram of himself saved, so that makes more sense.

- I like Takemura, even if he is an Arasaka loyalist. I was initially surprised to see videos about how to save him, because on my first playthrough I totally did that anyway.

- Most of the endings do have the option of V giving up his/her body to Johnny, but I haven't followed through on those. That just doesn't feel right to me.