When Cyberpunk 2077’s first-person perspective was revealed back in 2018, quite a few fans were worried. For CD Projekt Red enthusiasts who were used to staring at the back of Geralt’s gorgeous little ponytail all day in The Witcher 3 and for others who just wanted to be able to see their painstaking customizations of protagonist V, the decision sparked its fair share of skepticism. However, it ended up working out pretty well, and now one of the game’s leads has taken to social media to explain why.
On Sunday, Igor Sarzyński, who worked as Cyberpunk 2077’s Cinematic Director before being bumped up to Creative Director for Cyberpunk 2, elaborated on the team’s decision to use a first-person perspective in 2077 via a thread on Bluesky.
“Purely from narrative design pov I think subjective FPP [first-person perspective] works well with ‘77 story, genre and world. You’re a mind trapped in a decaying body with only means of leaving it being through technological consciousness processing,” he wrote (thanks, Games Radar).
Sarzyński went on to elaborate on the role the perspective plays in our experience of a game’s story. Third-person perspective, he feels, “is better for more defined characters – Geralt, Kratos, Ellie – where you play-replay someone else’s story. FPP lends itself to more avatar-like player characters. V exists somewhere in the middle of this spectrum but for reasons stated above ^ i feel FPP was better for ‘77.”
He also added that the camera lets the game’s visions of “digital ghost” Johnny Silverhand, which he described as a “thing existing only in your subjective perception – rather than both of you being seen equally by an external, objective TPP cam,” feel more immersive.
Sarzyński clarified that his comments aren’t meant as a hint at the perspective that will be used in Cyberpunk 2, or anything else about the game for that matter. “It might be a play-doh stop-motion RTS for all we know,” he joked. It’ll likely be a long time until we hear more news about Cyberpunk 2, but I’m just happy to hear from one of its leads. It’s always neat to hear about the thinking behind a design decision, especially at a massive studio that could, if it wanted to, be a lot more cagey about its development process.
Cyberpunk 2077’s sequel is still a ways away, but we do know that it’ll be set in Night City once again, alongside a second city that’s “like Chicago gone wrong.” CD Projekt Red also apparently began toying with some form of online multiplayer for the game shortly after it moved into pre-production last year, but it’s unclear if that’ll even be implemented.
