The ghost town Busan is currently the talk of the town as a potential DLC setting for Cyberpunk 2077. But where does the speculation come from and how meaningful is it?
If current rumours are to be believed, one of the expansions for Cyberpunk 2077 will take us to the ghost town of Busan. We tell you where the speculations come from and why you shouldn’t get excited too early.
If you are also interested in the upcoming patch 1.5 for Cyberpunk 2077, we can also help you. In the following article, we have summarised all known information about the (hopefully) upcoming update.
Cyberpunk 2077 Patch 1.5: Hints of an imminent release are growing
Table of Contents
Which speculations are meant?
This is what happened: Last week, numerous reports made the rounds according to which CD Projekt Red is teasing the South Korean city of Busan as a DLC setting. Also in (diverse forums) numerous fans speculated about the possibility that we could see the ghost city of the Cyberpunk universe in the course of a content expansion.
Where is the speculation coming from? The reports can largely be traced back to a report by US site ScreenRant. In this article, (ScreenRant) describes that there are info snippets in Cyberpunk 2077 that describe the state or fate of Busan – you can read more about this in the (official Cyberpunk Wiki).
ScreenRant concludes that this would be a teaser for a potential DLC setting. However, there is no indication of this at all – except for the mere existence of a datashard containing lore information about Busan. So this is a theory based purely on personal interpretation.
Why you shouldn’t rejoice too soon
What CD Projekt Red says: We have already asked CD Projekt Red if there is any truth to the speculations about a Busan DLC and received the answer:
We generally do not comment on such rumours.
Regardless of this, we don’t think it’s exactly realistic that Busan will be the setting of an upcoming DLC for Cyberpunk 2077 – at least at the moment. And that for a number of reasons:
- The theory is on very thin ice: As already described, there is almost no evidence that Busan will become the DLC setting for Cyberpunk 2077. The news made big waves, but that doesn’t automatically make it more credible.
- No trace in the leaks: Dataminers have found something in the code of Cyberpunk 2077 and could find various hints that point to upcoming content. However, there is no trace of Busan as a setting or a potential reference to it.
- CD Projekt Red has other priorities right now: Cyberpunk 2077 has received numerous patches over the past year, but the work is still not done. The studio is probably still working on optimising Cyberpunk 2077, but we think it’s unrealistic to launch a completely new setting under these circumstances
- Night City still offers untapped potential: Despite its weaknesses in open world design, Night City is an exciting setting for which numerous players would like to see much more activity and variety. The absolutely logical consequence would therefore be to first satisfy this need instead of turning one’s back on Night City.
Would Busan have DLC potential?
What happened to Busan in the world of Cyberpunk 2077: The fate of Busan in the lore of Cyberpunk 2077 makes exciting reading. At one point, the South Korean city was home to over four million people and was heavily influenced by automation. But at some point, a deadly virus was accidentally released by the mega-corporation Militech and Busan was quarantined.
The inhabitants were not helped further, however, and instead were left to their fate, where they had to fight for survival. These events took place 50 years before the events of Cyberpunk 2077 and Busan has been considered a ghost town ever since. In the meantime, however, satellites have detected activity in the city, which is why there might still be survivors.
This premise sounds exciting for a DLC or a spin-off set in the cyberpunk universe: We could invade the ghost city in the role of a mercenary to investigate the traces of possible survivors or AIs left behind – or to recover valuable treasures. A similar story was already told in the sequel to the zombie film Train to Busan: Peninsula.
Does the idea even complement Cyberpunk 2077? However, it is rather questionable whether the setting would complement the actual gameplay of Cyberpunk 2077. This is because a post-apocalyptic end-time setting would replace the cyberpunk aesthetic of the main game – and thus become much more interchangeable.
Moreover, it would have to be argued to what extent half a century old technology is compatible with V’s augmentations – or do without them altogether, thus curtailing hacker builds, for example. So the ghost town of Busan would be exciting as a setting for a cyberpunk DLC, but probably impractical.
What we know so far about the DLCs
For Cyberpunk 2077, CD Projekt Red has planned several small free DLCs, but also paid expansions. There are no concrete details on this, and the developer studio also recently denied an alleged leak on the subject.
We have of course already summarised all the information on the current roadmap, the free DLCs and major add-ons for you:
What do you think of the Busan theory: Do you think the speculation is credible or is it too much out of the air for you? Would you be happy to see the South Korean city as a DLC setting? Let us know in the comments!
