Why Cyberpunk 2077’s Ending Doesn’t Feel Satisfying
Cyberpunk 2077 has a massive narrative filled with branching storylines and great characters, but the ending’s lack of closure is unsatisfying.
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One of the biggest potential problems for branching narratives can be an inability to tie everything together at the end, and Cyberpunk 2077’s unsatisfying conclusion is no different. In spite of a lot of good elements to the game’s story, the structure of the ending fails to resolve storylines and offer total closure to players in a single playthrough.
Cyberpunk 2077 has many possible endings. Upon reaching the point of no return, V discusses the potential options with Johnny for their final mission. V can either hand control over to Johnny, call in the Aldecaldos, join Arasaka, go on a solo mission in a secret ending, or commit suicide, and the potential outcomes of those storylines factor in the various decisions V has made throughout the game. There’s a lot going on in these endings, some of them involving a ton of different characters, and it results in an ending that feels incomplete.
Cyberpunk 2077’s ending just isn’t satisfying. Depending on which route the player chooses to take when reaching the final mission, they’re going to be missing a key aspect to the story. After spending most of the game’s second act working with Takemura, there is absolutely no resolution to the ongoing problems within the Arasaka organization unless V sells out to the corporation. And if the players decide to either let Johnny take over or call in the Aldecaldos, they’re not really going to get any sort of closure in the relationships with certain characters based directly on that choice. In the ending where Johnny takes over and returns V’s body, V’s romantic relationship is discarded in a way that completely removes the element of player choice for an ending that feels forced. There’s just no way to end a single playthrough of this game that offers closure for every storyline.
Investing in Cyberpunk’s Lifepaths Would Have Improved Its Ending
Cyberpunk 2077’s endings feel like they were specifically designed with the lifepaths in mind. In the game’s final mission, V can either go the corpo route by seeking the aid of Arasaka, the nomad route with the Aldecaldos, or the street kid route in allowing Johnny to take over and team up with Rogue. While there are also ending routes that involve either suicide or a solo mission, these three endings are the primary choices V is faced with at the point of no return and they make Cyberpunk 2077’s lack of emphasis on the lifepath system all the more glaring.
If the player’s lifepath truly mattered, one of these options would feel like the absolute only option for V depending on the details of that particular playthrough of the game. Cyberpunk 2077 exists in this strange middle ground where players choose a lifepath at the beginning, it’s not even remotely relevant for 95% of the game, and then all of a sudden the potential endings all feel like they should be directly linked to that choice. This absolutely could have worked and been an excellent way to make different playthroughs feel unique, but the irrelevance of Cyberpunk 2077’s lifepath decision undermines it.
Overall, Cyberpunk 2077’s plot is pretty good. The game features a fantastic world with interesting side stories and great characters, but its inability to resolve each of those elements in a single playthrough is its biggest narrative misstep. There’s nothing inherently wrong with varying amounts of resolution depending on a particular outcome, but Cyberpunk 2077 makes some of the biggest facets of its story feel complete irrelevant in an unsatisfying conclusion.
Link Source : https://screenrant.com/cyberpunk-2077-ending-weak-lack-closure-v-death/