A lot of people will still parrot the launch criticisms at you and refuse to acknowledge that they pretty well fixed it. The devs overpromised and underdelivered, even now its not quite what they promised. But if they had dropped what the game is now on release it would be pretty universally regarded as one of the best games of all time.

If the world exploration and character interactions in RDR2 are scratching your itch, then 2077 will definitely have you covered there; Night City is huge and has a lot of hidden spots and characters to find. I'd say that the combat is generally a bit more hectic in 2077, but not overwhelming. You can also freely adjust the difficulty whenever you want, so if you're not interested in mastering the buildcrafting aspects (since it leans more heavily into RPG aspects than RDR2) and just wanna get the story, that's also an option.

While it's definitely not required to have an amazing experience, I'd strongly recommend also picking up the Phantom Liberty expansion if you decide to give 2077 a shot. It adds a lot of additional content, including some new endings. And Idris Elba is fucking fantastic in it. He brings a very similar energy to Keanu, where you can tell that he really loves his character and the story he gets to tell. It honestly sets a ridiculously high bar for video game acting in general.

YES. It’s brilliant.