There's no doubt that Cyberpunk 2077 is one of the most highly anticipated video games in recent memory, especially after CD Projekt Red decided several months ago that it would finally share the forthcoming title's nearly hour-long gameplay demo with the general public. Now, details regarding the project continue to be eked out, with the developer having recently confirmed that the first-person action-RPG's open world will not contain any "procedural" design elements.
This much was declared during a recent interview, in which CD Projekt Red's lead cinematic animator, Maciej Pietras, was asked how large players should expect Cyberpunk 2077's open world of Night City to be, leading the developer to explain that measuring such metrics is "difficult" due to the vertical nature of the map. During Pietras' explanation, though, he revealed that nothing in the world has been generated procedurally, stating that everything has been "done by hand" through "manual creation" instead. Per a transcription of the interview done through Google Translate:
"To compare [ Cyberpunk 2077 ] to The Witcher 3 , let's say that the world of the latter was very vast in its length. It was an open world made of very large natural landscapes. Going from point A to point B took a lot of time, because you were riding, but also because it was a game that stretched horizontally. The world of Cyberpunk 2077 is above all a vertical world, with buildings everywhere, and in this, it is difficult for us to establish a metric comparison. [. . .] The game will allow you to enter many buildings, knowing that everything was done by hand, because we believe that quality comes first through manual creation, nothing is procedural in our world. It is in this that the city of Night City will be vast to go, thanks to this verticality."
Based on what has been shown of Cyberpunk 2077 thus far, the fact that CD Projekt Red has decided to eschew the use of any kind of procedural generation elements akin to those found in the worlds and creatures of No Man's Sky or the weapons of Borderlands may strike some as being rather impressive. After all, the developer confirmed that each floor of the game's buildings can house myriad activities, and depending on what those may be, the fact that they were all created manually is quite the meticulous feat to say the least.
All things considered, CD Projekt Red is now widely recognized as a developer known for its attention to detail, especially after players encountered the studio's incredible amount of polish in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. So, while it might not come as much of a surprise that the company has opted to manually create practically all of the assets in Cyberpunk 2077, it's something that many fans will surely applaud. And with the game's visuals aiming to be “as refined as Red Dead Redemption 2”, it's safe to say that Cyberpunk 2077 is easily one of the most ambitious titles to date.
Cyberpunk 2077 currently lacks an official release date, but is expected to launch for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
Source: JeuxActu
