10 Cruel Tricks Video Games Played On Open World Players

6. Killing Off Your Ride-Or-Die - Cyberpunk 2077

Cyberpunk 2077 - Jackie Welles
CD Projekt

One of the nastiest things an open world video game can do to you is help you bond with a charismatic, kind, or delightful companion only to unceremoniously kill them off. Final Fantasy and Cyberpunk 2077 and both culprits of this particular entry as they both use excellent writing to endear you to a character that you’d assume you’d never be saying goodbye to only to flip the switch on you in the cruellest of ways.

Spoilers for Cyberpunk in this next bit so if for some reason you don’t want those, come meet us over at the next entry.

This one was especially puzzling as the character in question, Jackie Welles, featured in all of the marketing material for the game and seemed like your ride or die bestie... only to be killed off relatively early in the game.

This has ongoing implications for V who spends a lot of the game processing Jackie’s death as he continues to come up in her journey.

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Jess has been a journalist and content creator in the games industry for over 15 years and has been WhatCulture's resident Australian import and sorry cop since 2020, upping the quotient of swearing and apologising in WhatCulture Gaming's annual blooper videos considerably. She previously worked at GameSpot for 10 years, most notably hosting GameSpot News in addition to E3 live shows, and PAX panels. She regularly livestreams a variety of games on her 'jessmcdonell' YouTube and Twitch channels and hosts the 'Do It On The Day' podcast. She has won awards for her news and feature work in gaming as well as an accolade for her comedic writing (likely an admin error). She can be found on X at @jessmcdonell and Instagram at @jessicamcdonell sharing her current videogame fixations, industry insights, and videos of her cat, Karma.