CD Projekt’s Cyberpunk 2077 (opens in new tab) now sits in a more comfortable, and certainly more stable, state than it did in the early part of its life. The developer has continued to work assiduously at smoothing out troublesome elements of the game and adding numerous quality-of-life features, which was probably the right thing to focus on, but it has left a big gap in content for a game that, lest we forget, was at one point supposed to have multiplayer by now.
The modding scene has taken to the game with some verve, and it’s there that you find the stuff which has begun fleshing out Night City in more interesting ways. One example is the recent Drone Companions mod (opens in new tab), created by Scissors, which adds a new type of operating system to the game called a Techdeck. Equipping this lets the player craft drones, androids and mechs, and you can have up to four at once.
Drones exist in Cyberpunk 2077 but you only got to control them in one story mission, so this is a substantial change and comes with some level of depth. The TechDeck has up to three slots for modular upgrades, and there are eight different models of varying quality (unlocked according to your technical ability stat), and in terms of the crafting itself you buy drone recipes at weapon vendors.
TechDecks let you create drones, then you can cast ‘TechHacks’ (which work like quickhacks) which apply temporary buffs and effects on them. Drones are also more likely to attack targets you’ve tagged.
Among your small army you’re only allowed one mech (booo!), they can’t be healed and will slowly decay in health over time (though you can turn this feature off). This is presumably because they are ridiculously overpowered and go through Night City’s goons like they’re nothing.
There are in total five types of drone, six types of android, and three types of mech. The distinctions are mainly among weapon loadouts, although there’s an android type named ‘netrunner’ that just tootles around with a gun quickhacking everything.
You can grab the mod here (opens in new tab). As for more official stuff along these lines, Cyberpunk’s first expansion (opens in new tab) is still expected later this year, although it doesn’t have a release date.
