Cyberpunk 2077's Night City hailed as one of gaming's best open worlds, how times change

Oh my, oh my. I think it’s fair to say that plenty of us have well and truly fallen in love with Night City. Cyberpunk 2077 is certainly getting the love it now deserves. It’s been in an impressive shape for a while, but with the release of Update 2.0 and Phantom Liberty, CD Projekt RED devs have finally succeeded in making Cyberpunk 2077 reach its true potential.

The numbers speak for themselves. Following the release of Phantom Liberty, Cyberpunk 2077 is set to overtake Starfield’s player count - which is a huge achievement when you think about where Cyberpunk started when it was released back in 2020. Players may still be itching for a third person mode, but there’s so much else to love. Some fans have stumbled across a confusing new mystery which appears to be linked to The Witcher, while others found a touching tribute to a fan who died prior to Phantom Liberty’s launch. Phantom Liberty may introduce exciting new quests and characters (Hello Idris Elba), but there’s no denying that Night City itself, remains the main star.

Take a look at Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty in action below.

Reddit user karna771 kicked off the conversation, suggesting Nighty City could be “one of the best settings ever created in a video game”. They wrote, “I don't know if it's just me who for some reason really likes this universe, but I feel like it has something so good and unique about it. I already loved The Witcher games for this reason, but I feel like it's even stronger with Cyberpunk. The city has such fantastic art direction, scope and size, and level of detail in its architecture. You don't see a single building that looks the same.”

They continued, “You combine this with the quality of the stories told, [and] how the characters feel so real - like they have emotions and their own personality. All of this created a video game that made me live an experience I [have] never felt before in my life. [...] I really believe that I'll still remember this game and how much I fell in love with its world and atmosphere for many decades.”

The user wasn’t alone. Anastasia_of_Crete wrote, “They did an amazing job, never experienced anything like it in a video game, that level of visual detail, and scale for a city,” while Rouge_92 said, “World building is amazing. I really feel like I’m in Night City.” Is it too early to say bring on Project Orion?