After taking a few months off, I finally returned to the game and have now beaten it. I unironically agree with most of what Dunkey said in his review. Even setting all the bugs and glitches aside - and the bugs and glitches are easily the game's biggest problem - this is still an enormously flawed game, far more so than I would have expected from the developers of TW3. The combat is mindless busy work, as putting just a few levels into your primary skill makes it easy to curb-stomp almost anything the game can throw at you, unless you have the bad luck to step on a mine or stand next to a gas tank someone shoots at. The driving is awful. The motorcycles aren't too bad, but literally every car in the game handles like dogshit and feels very bad to drive. Traversing Night City is a chore sometimes, too. It's full of these super tall fences that you can't jump over and fenced-off roads that you can't drive onto and just annoying little obstructions in general that force you to take long roundabout routes to get to wherever you're going. Something that happened quite a bit was that I'd warp to a spot that on the map looked to be right next to my objective, but when I spawned there, it turned out that the warp point was on top of a tall building that I couldn't jump off of, or the objective was surrounded by a huge wall with the only entrance being a good distance away from me. The badlands don't have as many obstructions as the city proper, but they compensate for that by making the already-shitty vehicles handle even more poorly when off-roading, so you'll constantly be bouncing and rolling and spinning out as you try to drive to your objective. I'm not saying I should just be able to teleport to wherever I want to be at all times and have the game served up on a silver platter to me, but it's just a pain in the ass to constantly have to be spending several minutes running to your objective because the game forces you to go so far out of your way.
And here's something that really baffles me. When you've completed most of the main story and reached the point of no return, then, and only then, do you unlock the questlines for Rogue and Kerry. Rogue only has a couple of quests, but Kerry has seven. And all of these are punctuated by waiting periods of several in-game hours, and in some cases whole days. (Granted, there's an option to skip time, but there's no way that repeatedly skipping 24 hours of in-game time was the intended playstyle.) Bear in mind, at this point in the main quest, V has realized that their time is very limited, and the story is about to reach the climax. I have to ask, why? That's not rhetorical. I seriously want to know why this game holds off on introducing you to a very lengthy optional questline until you've literally reached the point of no return in the main story. It's such weird, confusing placement.
There is a bright side to the game, and it comes in the form of its story and setting. For all my complaints about the world's lack of responsiveness and difficulty in smoothly traversing it, Night City is beautiful, atmospheric, and reflects a level of detail far above and beyond what most devs are willing to put into their games. It's things like the intricate designs of the vehicles, the weapons, the bars, the diners, and the different parts of the city, like the sleek and luxurious high-rises, the working-class neighborhoods full of dingy little shacks, and the seedy red-light district. Interaction is minimal and the AI obviously leaves a lot to be desired, but at least in terms of atmosphere and visual design, Night City is easily the most impressive city I've seen in an open-world video game. The story is also great, as I think pretty much everyone has already agreed. V is not the foul-mouthed edgelord the trailers portrayed them as, and I was very pleasantly surprised to discover that there's a ton of potential for character development for players who are so inclined. Character development that's actually acknowledged by the game's narrative and dialogue, I mean, not stuff that only exists in your head like "after a profound religious experience, my hunter dedicated his life to the service of Talos and began training as a knight." The supporting cast are similarly strong. They're not one-dimensional quest dispensers, but characters who feel like real people with their own personalities, needs, and goals. And the romantic relationships you can begin with certain characters are genuinely very nice. Panam is best girl.
In closing, Cybermeme reminds me a lot of Bethesda games. It's flawed to such a degree that I'd hesitate to call it an unambiguously good game, but I loved playing through it, and I'm sure I'll do so again in the future, although subsequent playthroughs will definitely be a lot less completionist than this one was. I really wish the game had cut down on the number of assaults/reported crimes and given us more interesting sidequests instead.