So i was someone who got hyped for Cyberpunk when it came out. Played it for maybe 4 hours and decided it was terrible, didnt touch it again till about 2 weeks ago.

I was also someone who was hyped for Starfield. It came out on gamepass so i installed it and gave it a go on PC.

I played around 40 hours of Starfield, and to be honest, it wasnt because i was really enjoying it. I was mostly just bored and it was free with gamepass, and i kept expecting to get interested or invested and just couldnt.

Im currently over 100 hours into the 2.0 version of Cyberpunk (also grabbed the expansion) and i cant even believe how great that game has become. Id not rank it up there as one of my top RPGs, alongside the witcher 3.

I will try and keep this review mostly spoiler free and keep things mostly vague.

Here are some of the things id compare between the two.

Main Storyline.

Honestly, i liked the main storyline of Starfield. I thought it was a cool idea, dealing with unknown tech, a cool rich explorer group dedicated to exploring the unknown. Was one of the reasons i played for as long as i did.

The Cyberpunk main storyline is also very good. The early stuff was a little slow, but still fun, and once Johnny gets involved the thing takes it up to 11. Story is awesome.

Call it pretty even here.

Main cast of characters.

Starfield does fine with this, although it did advertise that it was going to have much better companions than usual, more interesteing, better in combat, deeper stories. Id basically consider the companion characters the main characters in that game, and i did actually like their stories. Thought they were pretty interesting. But was very disappointed at their combat ability, them not having skill trees or levelling, the equiping them was pretty clunky, just all around poor. They all felt basically identical having them along. Also thought their stories progressed at an odd pace. Like you could do a bunch of missions with them in a row and in the space of an in game week they are bearing their souls to you. Would have preferred that to happen a bit more organically.

Cyberpunks main cast are basically the characters the V interacts with the most. Think Judy, Panam, River Ward, Jackie. Maybe some fringe ones like Viktor, Meredith, Misty, Takemura. And of course, Johnny Silverhand.

I think they absolutely nailed the main characters. Loved them all so much and completed every quest i could for them, loved every converstion I had with them. Judy and Panam were the standouts to me, but i loved Jackie to death as well.

And Johnny, what is there to say about Johnny. I love his character, his attitude, my relationship with him, how we both seem to be coming to terms with things, his sarcastic commentry. He is SUCH a good character. And he can be such a bitch sometimes about my decisions lol.

Id give this one slightly to Cyberpunk not because the Starfield ones are bad per se, but because some of the Cyberpunk ones are so good. I think the companion system in Starfield was actually bad enough that it detracts from the game instead of adds to it. Would have just preferred they didnt give us the option instead of showing us that half arsed attempt.

Side missions/stories

Ok, this is where Starfield fell over the hardest for me. I had a number of frustrations with the game, but the worst part was how many god damn filler and fetch quests there were. Quest after quest of, hey man go to planet x and get that thing for me and bring it back. Or another copy paste dungeon in the exact same layout where the objective is just, get to the end of the dungeon. There was actually a couple of cool and interesting side quests in the game, and i thought the companion one for Sarah showed us a glimpse of what planets should have been like, plus the storyline for it was great. There was a cool terramorph one i found randomly on a planet too. But id say 9/10 side quests i found were total filler crap, put in the game to make the game longer for the sake of it being longer. I was so upset with this.

On the other side of things, Cyberpunk has some of the best side missions ive ever seen. Im not quite finished the game yet, but i already know im going to 100% it. The fixer jobs are usually the most basic, often (sneak into this base, steal something, kill someone, etc etc) but they honestly managed to make i reckon 70% of them interesting and unique enough that i actually intend to do them all. I remember one of them made me so angry at all the people involved that despite having snuck into the building and knocked all the people unconscious non-lethally, i legit went back and shot every one of those fuckers in the head cause i was just sick at what i found in the messages on the computers and the results at the end. No real in game reason to do it either, i was just that emotionally reactive to it.

And that just increases with the “Side Jobs”. These are well designed side missions that you can totally ignore, but that let you get involved in the world more. Some even seem to have ongoing effects or multiple parts. From some criminal who found god wanted to be crucified in front of the world, to a seemingly sentient candy machine. From someone asking me to investigate the mysterious death of the Mayor, to enterting a shooting contest with some MAGA looking gang dudes having a party. And Ive had so many visceral reactions to some of the shit ive seen on these random side missions. I still feel kinda sick at the outcome of the criminal crucifixion one but i still dont know what the right thing to do was.

Just like the witcher 3, Cyberpunk absolutely blows starfield out of the water in this category. Could and will do these side jobs all day.

Skill trees/Combat/equipment

Something else i thought really let us down in Starfield. Basically, they went down the path of, if you unlock some things, you can interact with stuff in the world in a different way (lockpick, etc etc). Otherwise, nearly everything you unlock seems to just be a % increase in stuff. I didnt feel like my playstyle was changing at all by unlocking stuff. I still just mostly got into cover and shot things regardless of how i levelled up. I was even excited looking initially at the skill tree but as i got into it it just felt so… bland? The combat AI is terrible, the enemies all do the same thing, but some wear different colour clothes. Just all around disappointing.

And when i unlocked the “magic powers” system, firstly, how the hell did they test the float around a room chasing shining lights for 5 minutes to unlock a power method and go, yep, nailed it. The temples were terrible. You just walk over a shitty planet, and find a temple, enter the door and you float into a room, catch some lights and get a power. The powers i unlocked all sucked too. I think i had 5 unlocked before i called it quits.

The equipment was also really lackluster. I was never excited to find new gear as it felt like it changed nothing. The weapon types felt mostly similar, the armour and clothes were boring, just felt pretty let down here. I was hoping for exoctic alien technology, cool implants and futuristic shit.

Cyberpunk when i played it the first time didnt really inspire me with the skill tree either. But my recent playing has made me absolutely love it. You really do get to specialise in a way to play. I went super hard into stealth. When i started, it was very hard to do, i kept getting spotted almost immediately. Now, i can dash past some guy looking in my direction but if i do it fast and get behind the next wall, im good. And it makes a difference, you feel powerful, sneaking, and you can go around breaking necks, and using silenced pistols or thrown daggers to take out your enemies silently. The skills really support the playstyle you want.

Want to use this games version of magic (using your implants to quickhack enemies)? Then go down the intelligence tree, increase your max Ram (mana) unlock options to drop multiple hacks on enemies at a time, make them harder to find, make them critical hit, unlock the ability to trade health for RAM during “overdrive” time.

Want to use a samurai sword? Go down the reflexes path, you can unlock the ability to dash attack enemies, to dodge around them, to leap attack them to deflect bullets back at them with your sword, to decapitate and dismember them.

And the skill tree lets you add perks and remove them to get the points back so you can respec whenever you like to change up your play style. Realistic? Maybe not. But ive had a great time going from a sneaky ninja with a pistol and throwing daggers, to a Samurai sword weilding lunatic, to a elite quickhacker killing the enemies through hacked cameras before they can even see me to now finally settling on the high tech smart weapons that aim for you lol.

Equipment has been 50/50 for me. The weapon variety has been awesome, but most of the special “unique” ones have been pretty meh. The cyberware is where its at, theres some awesome looking cyberware and some of it really changes up how you play the game.

Combat was fun too. The AI is actually pretty solid. Trying to flank you, tossing grenades, if the enemies have a netrunner he will try and quickhack you. There is only a few types of enemies, and many of the gangs feel fairly similar. But there are some that have their own style. The Voodoo boys tend to have a lot of netrunners trying to hack you. The Animals are all roided up dudes that want to punch your face in. Malestrom all seem to have a bunch of cyberware they use to like dodge bullets and shit. The combat felt fun enough that ill often take part in random gang fights just to enjoy the feeling of a good headshot, or katanaing off someones head.

Cyberpunk wins this and its not close.

Exploration/Travel

I think we know where this one is going. Tons of boring bland worlds you cant even drive a vehicle on so you walk slowy around the empty landscape wondering what the point of it was. And dont even get me started on the weird half arsed outpost building. The awesome planet that was part of Sarahs quest gave us a tantelising view of how awesome a designed world could be. Weird biomes, animals that camoflagued and fit in with the world, beautiful scenes and landscapes. I legit enjoyed exploring that world. Every other world you could explore was featureless garbage. I REALLY hope companies will eventually realise that while “100s of fully explorable proceedural planets allowing for hundreds of hours of gameplay” might sound good to a boardroom, it basically just leaves people hating that part of the game.

And then there were the hub areas. Citys/towns etc etc. Giant buildings where only the foyers is accessible, and the foyer is practically empty. Just one dude at a desk. Just souless, lifeless cities that didnt feel lived in. And me running around said city delivering some dude a coffee for some reason hoping it turns into something interesting (it didnt).

Ships were super annoying too. I actually loved the ship builder aspect, but really wished that the different “frameworks” of ships has unique characteristics. Otherwise why would i ever do anything but just cram more shit onto my starting ship? And the boarding/capturing ships was beyond hopeless. You had to board the enemy ship, kill the enemies (so far so good), sit in the captains chair, for some reason make that ship your home ship, catch the ship you want to keep using before it flys off, board it, walk to the captains chair, sit in it and make THAT ship your home ship, realise you forgot to register the ship you captured and try and work out if its worth repeating all of that again, realise that the registration fee costs like half of what it will cost to sell it, and the amount will be low enough that just looting random shit would be faster anyway and decide fuck it and just blow the ship up. Again, no idea how this got tested and someone said, yep, this is heaps of fun. They even mentioned you could “take up the life of a pirate”. Ummmm how? Ships sell for fuck all apparently.

Cyberpunk nailed this again. The city looks amazing and full of life. Apparently the cars used to drive poorly? Either way, they feel awesome to drive now. I often skip fast travelling just so i can cruise the streets in my new car that just flys, or on a motorbike so i can weave in and out of footpaths. The exploration is awesome too. You can parkour around the buildings and can get a cyberware mod to be able to double jump and suddenly the city is so open to you.

You find a bunch of cool side quests this way (hello seeminly sentient AI in a vending machine). And you also see just how shitty the city is. They have this thing where gangs just randomly rob a shop, or attack each other or whatever, and Night City is so fucked that the cops pay people for vigilante justice. So you can walk around a corner and see some gang beating up a shop keeper. Not on my watch, go daggers to the face. And there just a bunch of interactions going on. Like i walked past some girl talking to a netrunner about some guy that was looking for her and she wanted him to stop. Nothing for me to do, just overhearing a conversation. Or i walked past a cop just beating the shit out of a homeless dude. You better believe he met my katana up close and personal. Absolutely no impact on the world (except i had to do a fun car chase to avoid the cops for a bit) but i was invested enough that i was like, aw hell nah.

So yeah, cyberpunk blows starfield out of the water yet again.

Conclusion

Welp, i wrote a novel, sorry. I didnt realise how annoyed i was with starfield, and how impressed i was at how far cyberpunk has come until i vomited out all these words lol. Now to be fair, if you compare both games on release, Starfield was better. But as of right now, CD Project Red listened to the fans and made the game they should have made in the first place over the last few years. I encourage anyone looking for a cool futuristic game to give cyberpunk a go, it honestly stands along with some of the greats in my opinion now. Alongside Witcher 3 which is some of the highest praise i can give it.

As for Starfield, i dunno. There are so many systems that seem half baked, unfinished, poorly thought out. I dont know how they get around the fact that there are just a ton of shit uninteresting worlds, and a bunch of MMO style filler fetch quests that are super boring. Maybe they can pull a CD Project Red and overhaul a bunch of the games core systems and make it a good game? For now, i genuinly wouldnt reccomend anyone sinking their time in it, even for free. I hope they do improve it, beause there are some genuinely good ideas in there, and the core story works well. But i found myself dreading booting up the game until i finally just said, why am i still trying?