If Cyberpunk 2077’s world and setting are as immersive and well-built as CD Projekt RED have been touting, and certainly as they seem in all that we’ve seen of the game so far, it’s going to be a game that players are going to want to spend dozens upon dozens of hours in. But every good game must know not to overstay its welcome, and from pacing to even something as simple as how many players choose to stick around until the end, having a perfectly sized campaign can be crucial.
That’s something that CDPR seem to be keeping in mind for Cyberpunk 2077. Speaking in the post-show segment of the recent episode of Night City Wire, the game’s senior quest designer Patrick K. Mills said that Cyberpunk 2077’s main story is going to be slightly shorter than the developer’s previous game, The Witcher 3. This, Mills said, was done in response to criticism of The Witcher 3’s long runtime, which resulted in a lot of players never getting to the story’s ending.
“We do know that the main story run in Cyberpunk 2077 is slightly shorter than The Witcher 3 because we got a lot of complaints about Witcher 3’s main story just being too long,” Mills said. “Looking at the metrics, you see tremendous numbers of people played through that game really far, but never made it to the end. We want you to see the full story, so we did shorten the main story, but we have lots to do. And in terms of a completionist campaign, I just don’t have that number.”
With a main story that easily lasts between 50-60 hours, The Witcher 3 was by no means a short game, while if you decided to engage with its bevy of optional content, that number could easily go up to over 100 – or even over 150 – hours. More content in a game is always nice to have, of course, but it’s good to know that Cyberpunk 2077 is looking to pace its main story better.
Cyberpunk 2077 is out on November 19 for the PS4, Xbox One, and PC, and will also be playable on Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and PS5 (with some enhancements) on day one. A dedicated next-gen version will be releasing next year, while a Stadia release is also planned for later this year.
You can check out the recently revealed (and surprisingly modest) PC requirements of the game through here.
