Cyberpunk 2077 will improve on some of the options players were inundated with in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, including romance choices, according to lead quest designer at CD Projekt Red Paweł Sasko. Cyberpunk 2077 has been unable to avoid The Witcher 3 comparisons thanks to the latter's ubiquity at the top of Best RPG lists, and CD Projekt Red has leaned into the relationship between the two games at times, usually as a means of demonstrating the improvements the studio will be making to its newest game.
Cyberpunk 2077 already has a lot going for it - between the gigantic open-world questing, the dynamic player choices affecting environment and narrative, and the addition of Keanu Reeves as Johnny Silverhand, most of what players have seen has been positive. Unfortunately, the one thing that's missing is actual Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay, although that will apparently be fixed at PAX West 2019, where CD Projekt Red has promised to show off the demo that was shown behind closed doors at E3 2019. While that demo was impressive, it mostly covered traditional RPG stuff like combat, dialogue, and skill trees, while leaving questions that veterans of the genre would have unanswered.
That is, until now. A Reddit user by the name of magired1234 shared a conversation they had privately with Paweł Sasko about plotlines involving NPCs, and Sasko suggested that, romantically, they'll be "similar" in both depth and scope to the romance options found in The Witcher 3. However, Cyberpunk 2077 also gives players more ability to define their character, with a transgender character option apparently in the works, so romance options have been expanded even further. In a clarification statement to PC Gamer, CD Projekt Red indicated that romance would both be more present and more varied within the world of Cyberpunk 2077:
"Romancing is something heavily present in Cyberpunk, and players will be able to form meaningful connections with other characters as well as go for one night stands."
Historically, CD Projekt Red's romance options have been deep but narrow, thanks to Geralt of Rivia's interests needing to at least partially align with what fans of his literary adventures might expect. That severely limited options representing other sexualities, though, which wasn't necessarily a point of contention for the games but was certainly something that lacked the representation many fans want out of games in 2019. CD Projekt Red specifically pointed that out, noting that Cyberpunk 2077 gave the studio more freedom to explore sexuality and player options:
"Since we're not bound by a predefined character like in The Witcher anymore, the game will feature romance options going beyond heterosexual."
Of course, CD Projekt Red has gotten into some trouble with sexuality recently, getting lambasted by fans for Cyberpunk 2077's representations of transgender people. While the studio has acknowledged it will be looking to correct its mistakes, it does leave one wondering about how deftly it will be able to handle nuanced options beyond heterosexual romance. We'll have to wait and see how different characters' romances are pursued and enacted when the game releases next year, but for now, fans can at least be excited about the fact that Cyberpunk 2077 really does feel like a bigger - and hopefully better - Witcher 3.
Source: PC Gamer