Cyberpunk 2077 is a big game and Update 2.0 added a whole lot of quality of life changes. So much so, that both CD Projekt Red and I recommend starting a fresh playthrough for the best experience. I’ve been thoroughly enjoying my time as a young upstart in Night City and have a few recommendations on what to do first in your own playthrough.
First things to do in Cyberpunk 2077
Ignore the main quest
Cyberpunk 2077 does a lot of hand-holding in the beginning. It’s not until Jackie has set up a meeting with Dexter DeShawn that you’re free to explore Night City. Even then, you’re restricted to the Watson District. While you still have the ability to roam around a bit after meeting with him, it’s best to simply let him sit in his limo while you go forth and do literally everything else available to you.
Once your gig for him starts, it’s going to be a long time before you can do anything else. Additionally, it’s not an easy job by any stretch of the imagination, so do the Final Fantasy equivalent of wandering around outside and leveling up.
Take on all the available Gigs
The first step in ignoring the main quest is tackling all of the other stuff available. These include Gigs, Cyberpsycho Sightings, and NCPD Scanner jobs.
I recommend starting with the NCPD Scanner missions as you can start them immediately, they’re fairly easy, and they award a shocking amount of experience, Street Cred, and valuables. From there, keep taking on gigs from Regina until she’s no longer handing them out. The rewards are similar to the NCPD Scanners, but they’re a bit more involved.
Finally, you can try to do the Cyberpsycho Sightings, but since Regina prefers them alive, I advise waiting until Act 2 as you’ll have the ability to make weapons non-lethal. If you don’t care, go get your murder on.
Loot EVERYTHING
If you followed my advice above, you’ll be drowning in loot. Aside from the gig rewards, make sure to loot everything that isn’t nailed down. This includes food items and items marked as “junk.” The reason for this is simple, money. Night City is a super expensive place to live.
While you can break items down for crafting materials, that’s something you’ll want to wait for toward the end game. With 2.0, crafting and upgrading are better, but it’s still cheaper and easier to buy the better gear as you’ll be burning through weapons quickly. As such, looting and selling will fund your merc enterprise.
Visit the Ripperdoc and Gun Stores
This ties into looting everything. Your hard-earned capital needs to be invested into bettering yourself. This in turn will make encounters easier and allow you to take on tougher work down the line. Additionally, it turns Dexter DeShawn’s job from a nightmare into a cakewalk.
As you level up, make sure to visit these vendors frequently and start kitting yourself out with cyberware and weapons. I personally recommend a silenced pistol, a rifle, and a melee weapon. The melee weapon is purely for backup purposes in case you run out of ammo.
As for cyberware, Optical Camo and a Cyberdeck are incredible. You can turn invisible for a brief time and unleash hacks at your pleasure.
Start putting together a build
There are loads of options available to players to find the style that works best for them. By following this route of doing all the side content first, you’re leveling up much faster than you would otherwise and therefore have more space to play with in terms of builds.
While you’re free to tinker with whatever style you like, I recommend the following Solid Snake build as it trivializes much of the content. Note that this build is taken from the very beginning of Act 2, so it will be a bit higher than when you start the Dexter DeShawn mission.
This build is all about crouching, sneaking around, disabling cameras, and picking off enemies with silenced shots before they can alert others. You’ll deal bonus damage outside of combat and won’t be penalized for taking long-distance shots. Additionally, with Focus near-constantly refreshing itself, you have plenty of time to pick them off and line up your next shot.
- Body: 11
- Painkiller
- Comeback Kid
- Reflexes: 4
- Technical Ability: 6
- Intelligence: 7
- Optimization
- Encryption
- Proximate Propagation
- Cool: 15
- Killer Instinct
- Feline Footwork
- Ninjitsu
- Shinobi Sprint
- Creeping Death
- Vanishing Act
- Focus
- No Sweat
- Head to Head
- Deep Breath
- Deadeye
- California Reaper
- Longshot
