Disclaimer: I didn't really follow the game pre release so I don't know what was promised by the devs and what is lacking. I just rate how much fun I had with what I got. Played it after the 1.52 patch. So, first thing. Don't expect a RPG or open sandbox game. It is more like a story driven first person action game in the likes of the newer Deus Ex games. I finished the game after about 50h doing the main quest and I would say some of the main side quests. And I was greatly entertained and will continue with some more side quests and different ending options. The story and characters are great and well written. The city looks great and has many little details all over the place (ads, tv, radio, converstations of the npcs, etc). Tough that sad, the city still did not really lead me to just roam around and try to find things. This is mainly because I have no idea where is what in the city. If the story missions don't lead me some POIs I would not find them ever again. So the city sadly just feels like a (beatiful) large hubworld. Here I less would have been more, in the terms of smaller villages with a few interactable NPCs like in other RPGs. Also getting the missions via text messages from people I never met is just an awful idea, but I get why they did this, you would never find them otherwise. Also the loot system is pretty useless (like on most loot based games). It actually doesn't matter if you get new stuff, also I didn't need it. Played it on normal difficulty and it was basically just a walkthrough. The gameplay itself is fun though, played it in stealth/hack/close quarter combat style. So while it definitely has its flaws, I had fun through the whole playthrough.
This game is pretty Ok. The story and world is interesting, the puzzles are Ok, the controls could be better. In general the game could have needed a little bit more polishing. Important thing to be aware of, the end is very open and directs directly to the sequel (which I havent played yet). It basically stops right in the middle of the story, so this is more like episode 1 of the game. But overall, I still enjoyed the 2-3 hour trip. So if you can grab it in a sale and want to spend a few hours, why not. Just be aware that you probably also need the sequel then.
