This is a side plot happening during the main game's story, so you get all the characters with the same gameplay and some extra missions. If you liked the original game then you like this one too. But:-1 stars because it is finished in 8 hours.
If you want a good war or anti-war story, then play it. The gameplay is not great though, as different actions use the same button, so you will die a lot and get frustrated due to this. If you want to "win" then don't buying the game in the first place is the ultimate consequence. Remember this when you ask yourself about the "many choices" that will turn out as a big railroad and you start googling and discover the real rationale behind the scenes and feel fooled.
There are mixed reviews but I cannot share the negative points: The bugs I encountered on version 1.04 and 1.05 were few and they are no deal breakers. My PC fulfills the recommended specs and I had no crashes or other major issues within 60 hours or so of gameplay. If an issue appears like floating item stats on the screen (after 8 hours of gameplay) or glitching through the floor once after 60 hours of gameplay they can be solved by reloading a savegame. The main story does not require multiple choices for V's character because the way to play already provides enough variety to be constantly entertaining. Playing this game on hard with a balanced build allows a satisfying gameplay. Sometimes it can be really difficult but then I either come back later or I reload and come up with a better strategy for the situation. With a combination of force, stealth and hacking everything was possible so far (I reached the point of no return in act 3 this way but did not proceed further yet). The main story is very entertaining and well paced. The side quests are well written too. Some are like another but not really repetitive. The map encounters with ongoing crime scenes are nothing special though but the game offers so much variety in quests that sometimes a mission like that is just the right thing to do. The look and feel of the world matches my expectations of a Cyberpunk world. The street life is just an illusion but every game and movie has extras on set and games with a full day-night-cycle suck, which is not the case here. The acting (English) is well done and it is very uncommon for lines to be out of tone. What I dislike is the item system. Pen&Paper RPGs often have items with fixed stats but here it is random, which does not fit to the P&P background and it creates a looting nightmare (a common pistol I just looted is better than the legendary weapon I bought before) and forces V to wear chaotic style. Crafting is broken beyond repair to create infinite money.
Story and gameplay are alright. The game really shines in atmosphere (like huge cathedral style maps) and it is fun to play in multiplayer (especially on hardest mode after learning the maps). The singleplayer gameplay has some AI issues, like team mates not coming into the room you want to lock. The enhanced edition fixed some other gameplay issues (playability with gamepad, usability of weapons, ...) and introduces an additional character (the Chaplain) which basically obsoletes the tactical Terminator with better, similar skills. To keep motivation up, completing online missions allows unlocking player/weapon skins and weapon upgrades (like faster reload)
Graphics and music are nice. The gameplay varies and is topped by Fallout 3/NV. There is no real speech way, companions are just NPCs, quick travel is limited. The game is such a quest fest: Though diversified every quest requires you to do three things. Reapeating this obvious mechanic for 40 hours lets you finish the main storyline. Example: find bait, create a potion (3 ingredients), fight the monster. Find guards, find marketing, play in theater. Ask three women about someone. Get three cards (from three persons). Find three companions of some irritating dwarves I'd rather beat up. Help child1, then child2, talk to the parents. Not even story friends grant you favors. I failed mainline subquests on purpose due to all that just to reach the end sooner and it made me never care about people in this world besides Triss. According to the Steam achievement, only 1/4 of all players finished the story. The plot is alright but it did not motivate me. I had no connection to Ciri and only followed her because the game forced me to (by an asshole emperor and Yen keeping me in the dark all the time). Traveling this large world sucks: paths are small, too many objects are in the way, the horse does not always follow the dots leading to the objective and you can only quicktravel from special places. Boat traveling is even more frustrating: long distances during which you cannot do anything and of course get attacked by strategically placed flying enemies destroying the boat... so I left the boat in the middle of the ocean and dived all the way without being molested. Balancing sucks. Even on story mode difficulty the final battle was only doable by god mode and killall cheats. Nothing fun about being bashed by an overpowered, teleporting, unbeatable magic casting asshole of an enemy. Also I played a monster hunting quest and got utterly destroyed - revisiting two levels later with the same equipment it was easy as pie... The epilogue skipped the fates of all comrades.
Good story and depth in some characters but the world feels pretty alien to me, the language too (cypher, numenera, fettle, tides??). The world contains very different and unusual places. Good design but some where bland (the mind construct, a flying ground in empty space), some disgusting (I don't want to play in a giant stomach for 2 days). Places don't offer much interaction. Items were useless/weird. And there are too many of them. I never used cyphers or artifacts. If you don't fight, you don't need money or items anyways. I just used passive skills, no magical skills as 99% of them are only useful in combat. The philosophical interpretation of choices makes sense but the representation via color is not intuitive: good, neutral, evil would have sufficed. What means indigo and silver for example? While the game suggests that choices have impact I did not feel it often during the game. When you interact with the past this is awesome. But all actions in the present? nah. There is even a full choice how to end the game no matter previous choices. The main character is quite hollow. His purpose could have been fulfilled by anyone (or omitted without changing the story). I liked the main plot though but you only find out the missing pieces at the very end. Companions were strange. The first two are shady and in clinch, so I ditched them directly. Matkina was cool and has a background too including banter with several NPCs. Taking the crazy guy who had a crush on her might have been fun but my party was full though I had no clue what to do with the child and the blob. They never mattered. The RPG system is ok but if you leave out what makes it special you would not miss it. Combat was tedious, you have to wait a lot. So focus on dialogue, never fight. Story +1, Graphics +1, Music +1, Sound +0.5, Design +1 -0.5 rules, -0.5 alien world items and language I round up as I see parallels to Planescape Torment and backed the game. It is good but not a masterpiece.
I liked the setting of the game and how it looked in a Let's Play, so I decided to buy it. As I started playing it I noticed that I did not know how to interact with the game properly and how the mechanics worked. I did not see a manual and the game did not introduce me into the mechanics. You have to find out where the ingame tips are and which you want to read and then how to transfer that to the game. So this is basically a learning by doing approach. Then I had to get used to the resource management which is pretty complex and intertwined: You have to balance coal, wood, steel, raw food, food rations with a finite number of workers which you have to keep warm and healthy and you have to handle morale while building the settlement. The technology tree is pretty wide: you can unlock new buildings, improve efficiencies unlock new technology tiers and have to think about short- and longterm goals. You also have lots of political choices that heavily influence morale and game mechanics. The first time you will likely fail pretty soon. The second and third time you may have found a way to survive the campaign. And then you will ask yourself if that was just a thrilling game or a psychological experiment. Was it really necessary to go that far? Or did the game just trick you into these choices? (ok just a couple more days to survive, morale is (looks?) really, really bad, do I sign this horrid, grave law that might give me just one more day of survival... whose survival? The people in the game or my own as their leader? Do I want to win that badly? YES - oppression for everyone, I am your god-sent master, bow to me or die!) So this is how it goes :-) Or maybe you find another solution. This made the game worth it's money. Some people feel disconnected to the people but this is a strategy game, not an RPG. Unless you want to test out all possible choices and technologies, the campaign ends after an evening of game time. But the included DLC provides more campaigns.
