ByteRockers' Games has officially taken over publishing duties for the ambitious cyberpunk project "Neo Berlin 2087" from Elysium Games. The new duo's most important point right off the bat: this won't be a huge open-world RPG, but rather a focused, linear detective thriller in a compact indie format.
Reality check at the planetarium
Instead of spending money on an expensive, official Guinness World Record attempt, the team simply played their in-house space game Exovia illegally and brilliantly on the giant planetarium dome in Berlin – and then used the saved budget for proper catering for the assembled community and the developers' families. ByteRockers CEO Maik even showed up in a real spacesuit. A nice gesture.
The real star of the evening, however, was the new look at "Neo Berlin 2087." And this presentation was above all one thing: a much-needed course correction. Earlier, extremely cinematic trailers had raised expectations in the community that the next gigantic triple-A cyberpunk epic was brewing.
That was a colossal misunderstanding. Now the developers are pulling the plug and lowering expectations to a realistic level.
Investigation instead of an endless sandbox
No endless open world, no grind. Instead, "Neo Berlin 2087" focuses on handcrafted, linear levels and a tight, suspenseful thriller story. You take on the role of a detective and decide whether to silently sneak through the shadows or let your guns do the talking. The transition between first- and third-person perspectives is seamless.
That sounds incredibly sensible. We much prefer a polished, emotionally resonant indie experience to a soulless, unfinished, sprawling sandbox that a small studio would inevitably overreach with. This unflinching honesty is a huge benefit to the project. Avoiding the "open world" label takes a massive amount of pressure off the studio and gives us hope that we'll get an atmospheric, well-rounded detective adventure set in the streets of a futuristic Berlin. Anyone wanting to grill the developers and get hands-on experience can do so at the upcoming Gamescom.
Honestly: Are you happy about the focus on a linear story, or would you have preferred a freely explorable Berlin cyberpunk world despite the indie budget?
The way the game looks, it's too good to be true.