As many of you have likely noticed, there are a lot of reviews out there for Cyberpunk 2077, and quite a few of them have been controversial, to say the least. Many of those reviews went live just a couple of days before the game was released to the public, which has raised plenty of questions. So, where is The Outerhaven’s review of Cyberpunk 2077?
A lot of what happened was already discussed by Keith Mitchell and me on a recent episode of The Spectator Mode Podcast, which you should be listening to or watching anyway. Still, I figured it was worth explaining exactly what is going on here. There is a reason our review is not live yet, and it comes down to review access, timing, and the current state of the game.
As mentioned on The Spectator Mode Podcast, I had been down for a copy of Cyberpunk 2077 ever since I sat down for an interview for the game back in 2019 at PAX Australia. I have also had a good working relationship with the Australian distributor of Cyberpunk 2077 for about eight years now. I have done everything they have asked me to do, including reviewing games I never asked for, because we value our publishing partners.
However, for whatever reason, The Outerhaven was left out of the initial early review period. Considering everything that happened with the Cyberpunk 2077 NDA, maybe that was not the worst thing in the world. The restrictions around using only official screenshots, provided B-roll footage, and other review conditions have helped create a lot of the controversy surrounding the game’s early coverage.
Well, we did eventually get review codes.
On release day.
Keith received a code, and I received one as well, both of which appear to be for the PC version of the game. But by the time that happened, I had already gone out and bought a copy with my own money, just like several other members of The Outerhaven staff and the general public. I had a PlayStation 4 copy of Cyberpunk 2077 reserved for more than a year, and I picked it up on launch day.
At the time of writing, I have spent some time with the PlayStation 4 version of Cyberpunk 2077, while the PC version is still waiting to be started. That puts us very far behind the eight ball when it comes to content creation. Keith is handling the guides and video content you will be seeing on our YouTube channel over the coming days, while I will be handling the review you will eventually see on the site.
Cyberpunk 2077 is a massive game, with three different life paths to explore and a large amount of content to work through. Each playthrough can easily take dozens of hours, and that is before factoring in side missions, technical issues, and platform differences. So, as you can imagine, it is going to be a while before we are ready to publish a full review.
We do not publish a review unless a few important conditions are met:
- The game has been given enough time for us to get a proper grasp of it.
- The game is in a playable state on the platform we are reviewing it on.
- We can tell you our honest thoughts and opinions about it.
At this point in time, Cyberpunk 2077 only meets the third condition. We can give you our honest thoughts because no one at The Outerhaven signed an NDA before or after receiving review code. That said, honesty alone is not enough for a full review, especially for a game this large and this technically messy.
We still need to spend enough time with Cyberpunk 2077 to get a true feel for what it offers. We also want to see the technical side of the game improve to a point where it is actually playable on the platforms we are covering. Since we have access to both PC and console versions, we want to be fair, thorough, and clear about what players are actually getting.
Right now, I can tell you that Cyberpunk 2077 on consoles is a complete mess and is not worth buying in its current state. By now, you have probably seen plenty of reports about the game’s technical problems, including clipping issues, crashes, bugs, and all sorts of other issues across console and PC. From what I have played so far, the console version is in especially rough shape.
What makes it worse is that the console version received a Day 1 patch of around 46GB, on top of the game’s already large 58GB install size. The PC version did not receive a patch that large, but it did get a smaller 286MB update this morning. Even with those updates, the console version still feels like it needs a lot more work.
At the moment, Cyberpunk 2077 is not worth buying on consoles. It is going to take several patches and updates before the game reaches even the most basic playable state on those platforms. Even playing the PlayStation 4 version on PlayStation 5 does not solve many of the technical issues, and the proper PlayStation 5 version is not due until 2021.
For the first time since the PlayStation 2 era, this game has me seriously thinking about taking it back to where I bought it and asking for a full refund. I can do that through my EB Games Level 4 membership and under Australian Consumer Law, which allows refunds if a product is unable to meet its intended function. Right now, Cyberpunk 2077 on PlayStation does not meet that standard.
So there you have it. That is why The Outerhaven does not have a Cyberpunk 2077 review live right now, and why you should not expect one immediately. We are going to take the time needed to play the game properly, evaluate the state of the PC and console versions, and give you a review that reflects the actual experience instead of rushing something out just to be first.
