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It starts at $3 a month and you can pay more if you like. Go check it out at patreon.com slash Cyberpunk Lorecast. Hey there, Cyberpunks. This is your host, Tom, a robot right at the beginning of the show, knowing something that I say later in this episode because I need to make an apology.
Later in this episode, you'll hear me refer to Mike Pondsmith as a well-spoken black man, and I did not realize it at the time, but that kind of terminology, that kind of phrase, can be used in racist and harmful ways towards the black community. I apologize, I'm putting this right at the beginning of the episode so that everybody understands, and I'm leaving this in the episode so that everyone understands that. Sometimes it's easy, even when you're trying to say nice things or try to do the right thing, sometimes it's easy to be insensitive towards people who need our support and need our love and need our help. And so I wanted to make that 100% clear that I did not intend that in a derogatory or racist way at all, and that I have 100% respect for Mike Pondsmith, for the things he does, for his choice of words and his opinions on situations like Black Lives Matter.
So I just wanted to put that out there in the beginning, and I promise I'll keep doing a better job of choosing my words in ways that are kind and considerate towards everybody. So I hope you guys enjoy the rest of the show. Robots are radio present. Welcome to the Cyberpunk Lorecast, where style is just as important as substance.
Welcome to the podcast where we explore the lore, news, and gameplay of the Cyberpunk games, and other dystopian worlds. I'm your host, Robots. Alright Cyberpunk, so welcome back to the Cyberpunk Lorecast. I'm your host, Tom, or Robots, and this week we have some updates to make in the world of news for Cyberpunk 2077, and there's a lot going on.
It's been a few weeks since we've done a news update, and we've got some new info about finalists for the Cyberup Your PC PC build, and there was a interview with the devs from a German podcast, and I've got a breakdown of some of the things that were revealed on the podcast GameStar. We also are going to discuss some of the hidden details and things going on with the Xbox One X and the controller, because that is now out in people's hands. We're also going to touch on the Stadia release of the game, the Cyberpunk 2077 World of Cyberpunk Book, that will be coming out, there's some news on that, and also Mike Pondsmith chimes in with kind of the state of the world and how it relates to Cyberpunk, so we'll be getting to that as well. And this episode will be going up as both an audio podcast, so many of you are probably listening on a podcatcher of some sort, but also as a video version so that you can actually take a look at some of the things I'm talking about on this episode.
So if you want to check out the visuals, head over to the Robots Radio YouTube channel, there will be a link in the show notes. And if you're already watching on YouTube, then if this video is informative or helpful at all, and you want to come back for more cool information about Cyberpunk news and also the lore behind the game, then hit that subscribe button and give a like and come back and visit again sometime soon. Alright, so let's get into the news about CyberUp your PC. So this is a bit of a debated topic over the last week or so.
The top five finalists have been released, and they've narrowed this down to five finalists, and let's just start with the positive. The positive is that these finalists look freaking amazing. These PC builds are out of this world. Is that a good phrase for this?
Are out of this timeline? I guess you could say they are phenomenal. Now, some of the debate about these is that they didn't exactly follow all of the guidelines, so there are some people who are a little bit miffed because they did hold themselves back in their creativity in order to build PC mods and cases that were a little bit more constrained by the guidelines. So here's an example.
Check this out. We have Bondi's Throne. And this one is a chair. I mean, it's basically a PC gamer chair.
I mean, it looks like a command throne that you would love to sit in if you were piloting a ship or something. And it looks like the processor and the actual components all sit within the base of the chair, although it's very hard to tell. There's some really cool design work on the chair. There's some cool lighting.
There's panels that are up at the placement for where the hands would go. And there's even an area to kind of put your feet and pedals for the feet as if you were piloting some sort of ship or something like that. My guess is that this is the size of a case. So it's kind of a miniature chair.
It's not actually a physical size, like human-sized seat that you can sit in, but it does look really, really cool. Now, clearly, this goes beyond the scope of the initial intentions, or at least the guidelines of the designs. But it does look really, really cool. The second one here is called Finder's Keepers.
It is a Militech Recon Droid that was repurposed by the lower class. There's some notes here on this image. 3D printed elements on top of the cables and aluminum braces. It has 3D printed leg mounts that are detachable from the base.
A 3D printed visor box with LED light, which looks really cool. It's kind of stuck on the side with like a red, almost looks like a laser scope kind of light armor plates made out of acrylic tiles are on the sides of the case. And then there are even recycled materials and old router attached to fake circuit boards, those kinds of things kind of tacked on. So it definitely looks like a piece of hardware that's been repurposed and taken from its original intended use and turned into something else.
Speaking of Militech, the third one here is called the Militech Curvehead Bot, Maelstrom mod. So similar kind of idea as if it was a Militech bot that was now taken over by Maelstrom. And as we know, Maelstrom is a group that is not against completely working in mods on everything. What's cool about this one is not only does it have these four spider-like legs coming out of the side, but it also has the Maelstrom facelights that you would remember from the trailers.
That are modded into the heads of the Maelstrom gang members, I guess you can say. And that design is right on the front and along with that is the Militech logo all in red lighting. Along the sides you have what looks like artwork and tubing and even along the top you have spikes that are added in. So it's got this very punky or reworked dangerous vibe to it.
The fourth one is also a Militech design, but it looks like it hasn't been repurposed. And what's cool about this one are the details around the case. This one looks much more traditionally like the shape of a case. They're on any weird legs or any really, really over the top mods here.
But the texture along the outside of this case looks like it's some sort of textured aluminum or steel. And there are pieces that are bolted in around it, including what appear to be heat sinks along the outside. And then there are very clearly noted areas that are these hexagonal holes, not necessarily holes, but vents that are cut into the case to add in airflow. This one looks a lot more professional, I guess you could say, a lot more originally designed for its purpose.
And it's all very, very dark with what looks like a very dark kind of shaded metal across all of it. The final one here is the Yiba Kusanagi Aurora. And the Aurora, of course, is the type of alien where PC it is. And this one breaks from the others in some very key ways.
This design has a lot more of the bright, you know, standard cyber punky colors going on with it. It has the this bright red across the top. It has kind of a what looks like a sliding piece along the absolute top of the case that can, I don't know if it tilts or opens up. It's kind of like a transparent shield of some sort.
This also has some stickers and things stuck on the sides. And then on the second diagonal bottom half, it's very hard to explain these for somebody who's listening audio. It appears to be more of a gray metallic design. Again, with two of these vents placements kind of cut into the side of the case.
All of these cases are cool in their own rights and very cool in their own ways. The last two are to me, the ones that seem to follow more of the guidelines of the original competition. The other three are a little bit more modded in the pieces and components that have been tacked on and breaking away from the original shape of the case, that sort of thing. But I recommend if you are listening to the audio version of this podcast, then go check out the video.
You're going to see examples of each of these in the video. All right, so in other news, the limited edition Xbox one X is now in the hands of human beings out in the world who are going to be playing cyberpunk 2077. And I have some details directly from a friend of mine, Captain Logan, who hosts the keel hall of C of thieves podcast, got his hands on one. He actually ordered one and showed up and he was telling me about some of the details on this and how well this is designed in me.
The pieces around the case look like they're all components from different types of things that have been bolted on and added onto this case. And that is actually a very phenomenal looking product. So if they're still available out there and you're interested in picking one up, you may want to do that. Now, there are some other details that have come out about this.
One of those details is that there is some hidden information along the back of the case. If you look on the back corner of the case, I believe it's the bottom left of the back and correct me if I'm wrong, there is what you can read is a little tag and some black ink on the back that says, uniform vector, mic, echo. And if you take the first letters of that that says, UV me. And if you take a UV light and you shine it across the back panel, you get words that come up, words and designs.
And it says many languages, one message, which is cool. CD Projekt Red, Xbox. And if you continue reading across, it has in a number of different languages. Thank you.
In English, in Dutch, in Spanish, and I'm sure a bunch of other languages that I can't read. But it's a very, very cool detail that they included this in an ink that can only be read in UV light. So it's kind of a little Easter egg. And that's not all on the back of the controllers, the special design controllers that come with this that I believe you can purchase separately as well.
There is a QR code and there's a cure. If you look on the back, there's a QR code and then there's asterisk 2077. So clearly that's for cyberpunk 2077. Now, if you scan the QR code, it takes you to a song in a YouTube video called the Ballad of Buck Ravers.
Now, this is a song that in the game world is written and performed by Samurai, the band famously fronted by Johnny Silverhand. And this song in the real world is performed by a band called Refused. And I wish I could play it for you here, but I'm not sure about the legal ramifications of playing somebody else's song on my show. So what I'm going to do is I'll add a link to it in the show notes or you can just search the Ballad of Buck Ravers refused.
I'll put that in the title because there are some remixes and things that are out there and you can go listen to it. Very cool 80s kind of punky, angry rock, basically. Along with some cool guitar effects and those kinds of things. So go check that out if you're interested.
So in other news, we have some delays to note here and not delays for the game, fortunately. Well, I guess I should clarify delays for the game on the regular consoles and PC. That's not a thing. So the game is still coming out on time PC and regular consoles.
What we do know though is that it will be coming to the Stadia, but not at the same time as all of the other consoles. So here's the press release about it. Cyberpunk 2077 will be released on the 17th of September, 24 PC Xbox One, and PlayStation 4. By the end of the year, the game will also make its debut on Google Stadia.
Further information can be found on the game's official website and on a Facebook and Twitter profiles. So it looks like it could be delayed quite a few months. They're promising here the end of the year, so we're just going to have to see about that. Now, I don't know too many people who are going to be upset about the lack of this game on Google Stadia, but who knows?
Maybe there are a few people out there that were hoping to play it on Stadia and they're just not going to get the chance until the end of the year. Unfortunately, that's not the only delay. Night City Wire, which is CD Projekt's Red Response 2 E3 not happening this year, has been delayed. It's going to be a live stream where we'll be getting more information about the game, probably a lot more visuals and things for us to drool over.
But this isn't happening now until the 25th of June. So we've got a few weeks still to wait for that. And this is for good reason. They messaged about this on Twitter and they said we decided to move Night City Wire to June 25.
We still look forward to sharing new information about Cyberpunk 2077, but more important discussions are happening right now. And we want them to be heard. We wholeheartedly stand against racism, intolerance, and violence. Black Lives Matter.
This is a message of peace from developers who are working on a game that shows a very dystopian version of the world where violence and intolerance and probably racism and some other things have taken hold in a way that they're even worse than they are in the world right now. So the spirit of this is very good. And if you just to address this a little bit, if you happen to have any issues with that, please consider that the Cyberpunk tabletop RPG was created by a black American, Mike Pondsmith, is a black man. And he's a brilliant black man who came up with a system and a world that all of us love and enjoy.
So just consider that when thinking about this and understand that this was absolutely the right move. And we can wait a few extra weeks in order to hear more information about this game. It's not going anywhere. So the 25th of June, that's when you're going to hear it.
Now, similar news, similar news to kind of follow up on this. Mike Pondsmith himself weighed in on some of the situation going on in the world and is quoted as saying, Cyberpunk was a warning, not an aspiration. And this is clearly addressing the issues with the world right now. Now, our Telesorian games put out a statement, an official statement that says Mike Pondsmith, as many of you know, is black.
RTG is to our knowledge, the first major role-playing company founded by a black man. It remains, in our opinion, one of the most prominent black owned and operated tabletop game companies. It also notes that he is the only black person in Origins Hall of Fame. And quote, he is aware of how public the upcoming Cyberpunk 2077 video game has made his profile.
It also goes on and notes that Pondsmith has been thinking for the last few days and reflecting on the current events and his life as a black man in the US. And he's currently taking time to prepare a statement about, quote, race, abuse of authority and power. He's also been thinking about what it means to look out your window and see too much of the dystopian future you've made a career of writing become the dystopian present. So I don't know about you guys, but I would love to hear his perspective on this, because he's coming from two perspectives here that are very important and accurate to the situation that we are going through right now, both speaking as a game designer and a world designer for a dystopian future, but also as a black American, somebody who knows first hand about the abuses of power and the problems with that perpetuated on, it sounds like him personally, but also on the culture that he's a part of.
And I'm interested to see what more comes from this. I think he's a well-spoken, intelligent person who has a lot to say on this. So we'll be reporting on that more as more information is revealed. All right, so one more one more delay to note here in the world of Cyberpunk.
The world of Cyberpunk 2077 book is rumored to be delayed. So as of this recording, if you look on Amazon.com or wherever this is being sold, you're going to see that it is originally scheduled for July 14, which is pretty soon and before the release of the game itself, which is cool. The rumor is that it's delayed about a week. So not a big deal.
July 21 and still well before the release of the game. Now, if you're interested in this book, you can go check it out. It's here's the summary from the Amazon page about this. And aside note, I'll add a link underneath the video or in the show notes for this.
So if you want to go check it out and if you're interested in purchasing it, you can actually use my affiliate link, which will not cost you anymore and you can also help support the show. So that's kind of cool. So check this out. It says an insightful, captivatingly designed, full-color hardcover that transports readers to the futuristic megalopolis, megalopolis, what a good word of Night City, the epicenter of the vibrant new action RPG from CD Pro.
Step into the year 2077, a world dotted with dystopian, metropoles where violence, oppression, and cyberware implants aren't just common. They're necessary tools to get ahead, delve into incisive lore to discover how the economic decline of the United States created a crippling dependence on devious corporations and birth the free states of California. Explore the various districts gangs in history of Night City. Learn all there is to know about the technology of tomorrow and research the cybernetics, weapons, and vehicles of Cyberpunk 2077.
So it looks like this book is going to put me out of work. But to kidding aside, this seems like a really awesome book. I'm going to have to pick it up for myself and use some of this material on future episodes of this show. So go check it out.
It's got a bunch of cool artwork in it. Some of the images on the cover are images that you've probably seen passed around in social media that were used in the development of the game and the kinds of things that we're going to see in the game. So go check that out. Very, very cool stuff.
And it's not only available as a hardcover. It's $35, $36, $35.99. But it's also available on your Kindle for half the original price. The original price is $39.99.
So it's actually on sale for $4 cheaper. So half the original price, $19.99 on your Kindle. If you want to just give it a read through and enjoy the artwork without actually having to have the physical product yourself. And what would be more cyberpunk than just getting the digital version of it rather than having to actually have a real book.
Alright, so let's take a quick housekeeping break and I will be back at the end of the episode with more information about Cyberpunk 2077 and the things that were revealed to the German podcast about Cyberpunk 2077 from the developers. So stay tuned for that. My name is Brian Burton. It's been 26 years since the bombs fell since I left the ball up and trying to rebuild.
This isn't the apple that I remember. There's so much more to everything going on. And I promise to find the answer. So if you're out there listening, just hone in on these coordinates.
There's a place for you at the end. Omega. The Omega broadcast fallout story is available on iTunes, Spotify and many great podcasting sources. Alright, so I'm going to be tuning in as always and thank you for your support and your reviews on Apple podcasts for being part of the community and number of you guys have been noticing have been joining our robots radio discord.
So check out the links for that underneath the video or in the show notes and other big news. We are now sponsored by Loot Crate, which is super exciting because I love Loot Crate. I just signed up for a new crate myself. I'm getting the elder scrolls one because I've never gotten that before and I do the elder scrolls lorecast.
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You can get 15% off your purchase of any of the regular crates. Any of the regular great bundles subscriptions just by using the link underneath the video or in the show notes and make sure you use that link because it lets them know that you came from my show and the code robots radio. And if you haven't heard of Loot Crate, they are a crate service. They give you a box of a whole bunch of cool stuff, t-shirts and figures and artwork to put on your walls and all sorts of fun.
All trinkets and all sorts of fun stuff. Really, really great stuff. If you look in my videos where you can see the office behind me, you'll see a whole bunch of characters and things all over the room. A lot of that stuff I've gotten from Loot Crate.
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Some of them come every month. Some of them come quarterly. Some of them come every two months. So read the details on that.
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Click the link in the show notes. Use the code ROBOTSADIO at checkout for 15% off. And by doing this, you help support the show. So I really, really do appreciate it.
Alright, let's get back to the rest of the episode. Alright, welcome back, Cyberpunk. This is the end of the episode where I have teased a bunch of details that we are getting from the German podcast GameStar when they spoke with the devs. And thank you to Morais, M-O-R-A-E-Z on Reddit, who consolidated a bunch of these points because I don't speak German, so I wouldn't have been able to understand what they were talking about.
So let's just go down the list of the most important points that they consolidated from this interview. They start out with, the developers said that the improvements in the level design are as big as they were from Witcher 2 to the Witcher 3. And I've played through the Witcher 2 and I've played through the Witcher 3, and that game went from being a semi-open world, kind of larger zones that you could go through and then you would move to another zone and you couldn't go back to the previous zone, to being something that was completely open world. So I'm not sure exactly what they mean by level design.
It may be some of the places that you interact with events in the quests and those kinds of things are even more detailed and interesting and dynamic than some of the places that you end up in with the Witcher 3, but again, that's a much more open world game. So I'm not sure exactly what that means, but sounds good. So we're just going to go with that one. The next point is there will be no such thing as the barrels from Witcher 3 in Cyberpunk with an overwhelming amount of map icons because some players want to complete every single map icon available.
So I think this might be a translation thing, but what I'm taking from this is that the map won't be dotted with as many icons for you to get lost in. Like if you're one of those players that has OCD and has to click on everything and go to every place, then that was very distracting in the Witcher 3. You took forever to get through his own because there were so many things to stop and do rather than just discovering them naturally as you ran through the world. The next point says, due to the coronavirus, the devs had to work from home and CDPR sent over 700 workstations out to the devs around the world with Cyberpunk installed.
Therefore, we know at least 701 people are working on the game. And that's kind of a funny statement, but that is huge. 700 different people. Now, who knows?
Maybe they had to send a replacement station or two, but around 700 people working on this game, that is absolutely huge. Another point they edited in here says, you will have about three times that much ways, there are that many ways to solve a mission, then in the Witcher 3. They thought, what is the dumbest thing a player could do now? And how is it possible that the mission continues?
The only thing stopping it is the player's death. They call an example where you talk to someone, get shot. And instead of fighting back, you run away and buy a hamburger, but the mission has to continue. So the side point here is, does that mean that eating is confirmed?
Can you actually eat in the game? I don't know. They go on and say, they tried to improve this in the Witcher 3's DLCs and want to improve it even more in Cyberpunk. Colin, some players said the missions when using the Witcher site were too similar and not that interesting.
Remember when you could change your view and say, follow a trail or do that kind of thing? Well, they say we're not going to see that again, but there may be uses of Cyberware that are for missions and help you determine where to go and that kind of thing. While there are some areas in the Witcher 3 where villagers don't have a daily routine, they are planning to improve this with giving more than a thousand NPCs a handmade routine. Holy crap.
They also note here, according to a dev working on quest design, they have no rules about how a quest has to be. Do not let you move more than a thousand meters. You talk to 2.5 people. The only rule they have is if it's good, then we are expanding it and implementing it.
So it looks like they've had a really open palette for what can happen with quest design and have a feeling we're going to see a lot of diversity, a lot of creativity around that. Also, when they, the developers fully finished a quest, like designing it, they don't put it aside and work on the next. They continue playing it over and over again until the game releases because they might find something to fix or improve. That's what they did with the Witcher 3 and what they're doing with Cyberpunk.
So this sounds like they're using the full team to polish this game to high heaven. I guess you could say, is that a phrase? Is that a thing people say? Because it sounded like they needed extra time to finish the game.
And usually that's from a technology standpoint. They have to work out some of the bugs. They want the game to be polished in that standpoint when it comes out for everyone so that everything works right. But that doesn't mean that their quest designers and level designers were sitting idle.
They've been going over the details in the quests and polishing and polishing. This will add a huge amount of replayability to this game. Also, they point out that they were really proud of themselves that no one leaked the appearance of Keanu Reeves. In more than a year, they knew they got him before E3.
So in the year before they knew that Keanu Reeves was going to be part of the game, nobody leaked it before E3. That's pretty cool. The melee fight system shown in the E3 trailer was not nearly where they wanted it. So expect some big improvements there.
So they've been tweaking that and fixing that as well. Now, the final point here is that inside the cyberspace, you will be able to summon fantasy RPG like creatures and warriors who can, for example, burn out another hacker. What? So there is, and this is news to me, and maybe I just haven't been paying attention to everything that's been released out there, but there is a part of the game where you actually go into cyberspace.
So net hacking and net running and that kind of thing moves you into a different reality where you can summon creatures and warriors and combat things in a completely different way than you can in the physical meat space. That is absolutely huge. Amazing stuff. So thank you.
Thank you so much for putting this out there for the world to read because those of us who don't speak German wouldn't have been able to do that. So thank you very much for that. And thank you for tuning into this episode. Cyberpunk, I will be back next week, most likely with a regular lore episode of the podcast.
And if you aren't already subbed on YouTube or subbed, who knows, on your podcast reader, then go ahead and do that. Come back for more information in the future. And I will see you guys around. Until next time, stay safe in Night City.
It's the dangerous world out there. Talk to you guys later. See ya. Thanks for tuning in to the Cyberpunk Lorecast.
This show is a part of the robots radio network, Smart Podcasts for interesting people. If you'd like to help support the show, please tell a friend and leave a five star review on iTunes. If you'd like to get in contact, please send an email to cyberpunklorscast.gmail.com or follow us on Twitter at cyberpunk lore. Also join the community on the robots radio discord, the link is in the show notes.
The music on the show was written and performed by the Midnight and was used with their permission. Go check them out at themidnightofficial.com. Until next time, stay safe in Night City. We'll talk to you later.
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