As its name suggests, CD Projekt Red’s new RPG, Cyberpunk 2077, is set in a cyberpunk world. The game is based on an old pen-and-paper RPG, with the goal being to draw upon those pen-and-paper designs for a modern, open world role-playing game.
To help find inspiration for their game, CD Projekt Red checked out a bunch of other games that share a similar setting or game concept, and have listed some of these on the Cyberpunk 2077 development blog. Here’s the list, by senior designer Marcin Janiszewski:
Dystopia and Syndicate are, of course, not the only games that we are looking at, though they are obvious inspirations. There are quite few more. I will only highly major features of these games that have guided what we want Cyberpunk 2077 to become, and maybe in the future we will go into more details about how these concepts work together.
System Shock (1994) – Great atmosphere combined with non-linear gameplay
Fallout 2 (1998) – A character’s development could determine the available dialog options he/she would encounter
Baldur’s Gate Saga (1998-2000) – Faithful adaptation of a Pen& Paper RPG system without getting bogged down in numbers.
Deus Ex (2000) – Considered by many to one of the best (if not the best) Cyberpunk game. It had an involving story multiple ways to accomplish a goal. One of first games of its time and still one of the very few games where it was possible to finish it without killing anyone.
The Witcher series (2007, 2011) – Rich and mature story. Stunning graphics.
Skyrim (2011) – One of the best implementations of an open, sandbox world.
You may notice that The Witcher, CD Projekt Red’s other series of games, is listed as one of the influences that Cyberpunk 2077 is drawing upon. CD Projekt Red have stated in the past that their experience from developing the Witcher games will be put to use in Cyberpunk 2077, and that ideas which didn’t make it into those games will be used here instead.
