I feel totally out of touch with all the hype around the game, in particular the aesthetic choices is actually what disappointed me the most. The name of the game, as well as the design to me looks quite literally as if someone designed the most generic 'cyberpunk' game possible. It looks like the cyberpunk version of GTA, which is ironic because cyberpunk is supposed to be transgressive, yet nothing what I've seen a…
Spot on. It's so bright, glowy, and kitschified. there's none of the dark intrigue or aesthetic depth of something like blade runner
Cliche is exactly what gave blade runner depth. The juxtaposition of cliches that don't normally sit side by side was novel, the noir detective in a future L.A. was new, but it was deep because we already know the tragedy of the bitter drunken antihero gumshoe and the femme fatale, we already know about doomed rebellions, about evil corporations, about environmental destruction and desperate colonists fleeing a dying earth. If you can show us these things side by side, you don't need to explain, we recognize. though we've never seen a replicant bounty hunter getting korean noodles in the rain, we know all the pieces, we remember so much, that we only need a glimpse and we build the depth, the depth is in our shared memories, not on the screen.