Glitchpunk is Grand Theft Auto 2 meets Cyberpunk
Wanted.
Glitchpunk is Grand Theft Auto 2 meets Cyberpunk - and its developers are pretty open about that.
This top-down open-world action adventure is the debut game from Polish indie studio Dark Lord, which wears its GTA 2 influence on its sleeve. At a recent preview event held by publisher Daedalic, Dark Lord admitting to riffing on DMA Design's 1999 crime kill 'em-up, while adding modern design mechanics.
You take contracts, either succeed or fail, steal vehicles, drive around, run from the police, collect money and shoot guns. "You might find more similarities, and we are very open about not trying to pretend this core experience is much different. In this particular aspect, we want to build on the GTA 2 formula and enhance it with modern UX solutions, like an easier save system, fast contract replays, more wanted levels, easier item management, and more destructible objects."
Then there are RPG game elements, too - street vendors who sell cars and weapons, drugs that boost your abilities, and garages to park your vehicles in.
The Cyberpunk comparison comes from the aesthetic, as well as the augmentation, mods and hacking mechanics. You play an android who has a glitch, which means they can operate outside their programming. You can hack people out on the street to, for example, make them attack each other or walk under trains. You can trigger a quarrel between gang members or police officers. You can trigger handbrakes in cars, which is useful for when you're trying to escape police chases, or even blow them up.
Character progression takes place in the form of modules. You can end up with a powerful dash, teleport back to the place you were in a few seconds ago, become partially invisible, and steal someone's visual identity.
There are dialogue choices to make when talking to characters in the story, too, that usually come in when you need to decide which gang to help out. The developers said that when driving you will hear commercials about genital enlargement operations, and listen to music inspired by cheesy rock bands. Edgy!
Glitchpunk is expected to his Steam in early access form during the second quarter of 2021.