So having played this game for about 19 hours and optimizing to the point of looking good and running stable, this game is a hard sell for me. On one hand I really like it but my reasons for liking it are way more abstract than the average gamer probably (sometimes I like to RP walk through the city and pretend I'm actually apart of the world). Story has so far been pretty good with a lot of genuinely emotional moments with facial animations that are not cutting edge, but still convey a good amount to know what a character is subtly thinking about. Gun play is average as per usual and as I had suspected; it's still a lot of fun to pick up a different variety of weapons through stats or mechanics and Very Hard difficulty is as it describes with a lot of times where I was in a genuinely precarious situation. The only downside though is the tension is wasted because health and ammo seems to drop like candy in a candy store. I can't think of one time where I didn't have enough ammo or health kits because holy shit this game is generous with them. Another thing that bugs me is enemies are scaled to take more damage which is something that I've came to hate about modern RPGs because giving enemies an unfair advantage in a fight by artificially increasing their health to almost inhuman levels means that gunfights become a battle of who's aim is more broken rather than actual strategy and planning. Stealth is... it's stealth and there are some fun things you can do with it. Stealth bonuses are flat broken in this game because I can't think of one time when I'm shot someone with a sniper and a stealth attack bonus never came up.
Driving in this game is average and there's not much more I can talk about with it. Brakes and turning feels super awkward on the other hand. Civilian AI is dumb as pig shit however. So fucking inept that it's actually fucked over a lot of moments when I'm either trying to complete an assault or a reported crime. When a gun fight breaks out they'll just stand around like nothing's happening and many times they'll get in the way of your shots and one dead civilian means all of NCPD's asses will be all over you in a second. Sometimes the cops will get called for no reason because a civilian in the distance got shot with one of my bullets and I couldn't see them. Parking your car also means you could create a massive traffic jam because civilian vehicles will just sit in one spot behind your car never moving which may cause some unintentional comedy, but it gets kind of aggravating and immersion breaking. I've seen some cars smash into streetlights during important cutscenes completely ruining them because I burst out laughing. Someone could be telling me a sad story about someone's dead wife, but a stray car will completely wreck havoc around me and it gets very distracting. Enemy AI is not much better and I have pretty low standards when it comes to that. But when an AI enemy just stands around doing nothing when I get close leaving them open to getting blasted by my overpowered AR? That's a big problem in this game. But sometimes this will also work against you because some enemies seem to have sixth sense or something because I'll be in stealth and grabbing someone and all of the sudden out of nowhere I get spotted. It's serviceable at times, but in certain situations the enemy AI has no clue what to do and will just accept its fate.
Graphically the game looks amazing on PC hardware though I can't say the same about Xbox One and PS4 though texture work seems to get kind of spotty with some textures seemingly popping in out of nowhere and cars having pop in geometry making them look like blobs. It doesn't happen often enough for me to give a shit, but it's there so I may as well mention it. The only thing I can't stand is the lack of an anti-aliasing option. My computer isn't strong enough to run in 1440p so I usually play 1080, but good lord the jaggys really fuck with my eyes which is why I usually have to sacrifice performance in some games to play 1440.
Bugs. Lots of them. One of them gamebreaking where I was in a hotel and an enemy was stuck in an elevator and constantly spawning inside and out making it impossible to loot his keycard. Pop in is ridiculously bad and objects just seem to mysteriously disappear when you get too far or look at them at a certain angle. Most of them have been pretty minor to the point where I'm willing to ignore them, however.
Now lets talk about my most hated aspect of this game that would make absolutely no sense in any video game; the armor system. I have no clue what the hell CD Projekt Red was smoking when they thought of this idea but it has to be the most bafflingly retarded concept I've ever witnessed. Clothing in this game gives you armor. A short skirt and baseball jacket is more durable and protective then a body suit with armor plated vests and padded kneecaps. Why? Why on earth does a trilby have disproportionately more armor than a police helmet or a motorcycle helmet for that matter? Why the fuck do I have to stroll around town doing missions looking like a clown if I don't want to get outgunned by my enemies? Even worse is these clothes sometimes carry percentage bonuses to stats, but generally they're so underwhelming that you'd be better off maxing out your armor rather than counting stats because as long as you can aim and shoot a maxed out weapon with perks it doesn't matter. Another part of this is the RPG stats themselves. They're fine, but they feel so underwhelming to the point where it just feels like I'm pumping more into damage rather than performance because you get used to the shitty recoil once you play long enough. They also feel way too easy to earn and obtain to the point where I have to ask was there another way planned or did they intent to have you earn them as you leveled up?
All in all however, this is probably going to be this year's Tom Clancy's The Division; a game that everyone else seems to dislike, but I actually end up really liking. It's not perfect by any means and there are several aspects I would definitely change, but I'm so far enjoying my time in this game. Can I recommend playing it now? I really don't know. It depends on how much you're willing to tolerate and put up. If you're willing to tolerate my issues that I stated above, you're going to probably enjoy it like I am. If you can't, then maybe it'd be best to wait on it or just avoid all together. If I had to score this game, it'd probably be a 7.5/10 for me.
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