I am terrible at roleplaying in video games, and, despite its promise of offering a truly next-gen open-world experience, Cyberpunk 2077 has not fixed that. I'm not sure where my struggles with roleplaying come from, whether it's the limitations of the game stifling my imagination - getting stuck in terrain or NPCs running out in front of my car definitely don't help - or whether I'm simply ill-equipped to totally embody a role, especially one that's already laid-out, such as V.

Nevertheless, like others, I find Cyberpunk 2077 to be one of the most immersive open-world games ever made, and, so, I have little trouble believing in its world and characters, even if I'm viewing it from an outside perspective, rather than truly embracing V's. Yet, as much as I may be terrible at roleplaying in video games, Cyberpunk 2077 often feels like it doesn't want me to, or, at least in the way I want to. Despite lots of marketing heavily implying the contrary, Cyberpunk 2077 and its neon-soaked gritty Night City refuse to let me be a bad guy.

Cyberpunk 2077 Can't Make Me A Bad Guy

Night City Doesn't Accommodate Being Evil

Cyberpunk 2077's marketing pushed the idea that players could be whoever they wanted in Night City, that they could mold V into whomever they desired, whether that was a criminal or a goody too-shoes. However, while that sounded appealing, especially to me, someone who was keen on improving my video game roleplaying abilities, in reality, that is only partially true. Thanks to Cyberpunk 2077's excellently crafted narrative, V ends up becoming a compelling yet utterly linear character that I have little direction over. Simply put, Cyberpunk 2077 doesn't want me to make V a bad person.

There's a lot that points to this, such as the fact that V can help the police put criminals down in some of Cyberpunk 2077's most immersion-breaking gameplay mechanics, or that V can't really annoy or antagonize anyone to the point that they lock themselves out of their missions. I can't even get V to commit any crimes, as, outside randomly killing people for no reason and forcing MaxTac to take me down, there's nothing villainous I can do. Stealing cars is utterly pointless as you can't keep them, and buying them becomes trivial by the endgame.

Even Gigs, which require V to do something criminal, are often against bad people, making V the hero every time. Sure, sometimes I have the option to not help someone, but typically you get a bigger payout for doing the right thing. I can't even any of Cyberpunk 2077's gangs, as it forces me to fight them all, with no option to side with one over the other. Really, the only objectively evil thing I can do in Cyberpunk 2077 is to kill innocent people for no gain, which, while potentially fun for a few seconds, gets tiring quickly.

One of Cyberpunk 2077's most convenient features even makes speeding through Night City impossible. That's why Cyberpunk 2077 needed to make V evil, or at least somewhat flawed, from the start. However, he's an endlessly loyal, often kind, and typically considerate person, no matter how much I try and make him the opposite. I completely understand wanting players to feel like the hero, especially in a sprawling RPG like Cyberpunk 2077, but it really takes it to the extreme, especially considering how Night City is supposed to amplify the worst in people.

Games Need To Do More To Incentivize Being Evil

It Can Be Hard To Willingly Break Your Moral Code

Honestly, this isn't even a problem exclusive to Cyberpunk 2077, although I do feel it's perhaps more noticeable here. In fact, games have been failing to make being villainous a compelling option forever. There have been some instances where morally ambiguous or even downright evil options have felt like a genuine option, such as the Mass Effect and Dragon Age series - although The Veilguard lacks the bite the series once had. However, for the most part, games have failed, at least for me, to make it feel worth breaking my moral code.

Because, ultimately, being mean, cruel, or purposefully malicious towards someone, even if it's a digital character, can be difficult. It would take a lot to turn someone into a villain, and, as someone who, as aforementioned, struggles with roleplaying even good characters, it takes even more. It's up to the game to throw a little gameplay incentive to encourage choosing the dark side over being a morally good hero, but, all too often, games forget this. It's as if the writers themselves don't really feel like writing terrible characters, as it ruins the hero fantasy so many games offer.

Cyberpunk 2077 needed to give players a reason why they should turn their V into a criminal, even if they're a good-natured one.

Not every game needs it. However, when they do, such as with Cyberpunk 2077, it is important to give players a good reason to do it. Cyberpunk 2077 needed to give players a reason why they should turn their V into a criminal, even if they're a good-natured one, such as by implementing Star Wars Outlaws' Syndicate mechanic, which gives players bonuses based on which one they . At the very least, I wish Cyberpunk 2077 had made V a bad person from the start, and let players decide whether to make him good or not by the end.

Cyberpunk 2 Should Feature An Evil Protagonist

They Could Turn Good If Players Wanted

I don't hold it against Cyberpunk 2077 for failing to give players meaningful reasons to be evil or really let them do bad things in general. V is such a well-written character, and the narrative that unfolds around them is so compelling that the necessary steps needed to fit players' moral choices around it would have been too hard. CD Projekt Red has proven it is exceptionally talented when it comes to creating pre-defined characters, but Cyberpunk 2077 has also shown that it can be a little flexible with that.

That's why I'm hoping Cyberpunk 2 either lets players choose which direction they want to go in and are rewarded either way or that the protagonist is evil from the start. There are too few games that make people play as generally bad ones from the get-go, and Cyberpunk 2 should break that trend. That's not to say that players shouldn't have the choice to be good, but rather that Cyberpunk 2 should make its protagonist a bad person, and slowly let people shape them into either a worse one or a better one over the course of the game.

It feels like CD Projekt Red tried to do that with V, especially depending on which Cyberpunk 2077 Life Path players pick, but, in my opinion, it didn't work out. I just want Night City, or wherever Cyberpunk 2 is set, to feel a little more dangerous and more cyberpunky. While Cyberpunk 2077 did a great job of creating a visually impressive world, I don't think it went far enough to make it as convincingly awful as it perhaps intended to, but it could change all of that by allowing the protagonist to be evil if only a tad.

Source: PlayStation/YouTube