Cloudpunk

Atmosphere nigh unparalleled. Writing is a bit uneven, on the whole the writing disappointed me. I think it's a must-play if you're interested in video game cities.

You are delivering packages and talking to people like in Death Stranding, you are in a flying car that meanders among neon-covered sky scrapers forever whipped by a permanent rain like in Bladerunner and it all looks blocky a bit, like Minecraft... Good story, phenomenal atmosphere. Once done, this game is worth loading just to fly around for some time in cockpit view, rain rapping on the chassis, Vangelis-like soft electronic ambient in the background, while the windshield wipers tirelessly work...

I just finished Cloudpunk. I really enjoyed it. I think the game's story hits harder now than it would have, had I played it when I purchased the game back in 2020. If anyone enjoys a narrative adventure with driving and dystopia, check it out. I'd like to go back and get all the achievements, but I think I'll need some time to process the story. The decisions felt very impactful and a bit heavy. More than I expected them to. Great writing, great sound design.

i tried to love this so bad but i simply cannot get past the voice acting im sure they tried their best, but quality is so inconsistent between characters, with some even sounding like they were recorded from their room 8/10 for gaming concept, but i can't recommend for folks who are sensitive to voice acting

I like the city, the design style and the blade runner hover car mechanic. But I've tried to play through this game twice now and both times I bail out. The writing is terrible, The characters (especially the main) are terrible and the gameplay is just tedious. Fetch quests interspersed with terrible dialogue. It becomes irksome fast.

Games of this scale are so rare. Something that's unique and personal, and yet possesses enough technological polish to carry it to a wider public. It's not my favorite cyberpunk of all times, but it's an important corner stones in the genre

Cloudpunk Review: A Stylish Cyberpunk Shell With Thin Gameplay Beneath (6.5/10) First of all, the thumb up simply means it's not a bad game (so don't deserve a thumb down), but it's not very good either. After finishing Cloudpunk, I’m left with mixed feelings. The game is like a synthetic drink that tastes refreshing at first, full of neon flavor, but gradually becomes watery the more you sip. As a small, atmosphere-driven title, its strengths are very clear, but so are its weaknesses. In the end, I would give it 6.5 out of 10. The strongest part of Cloudpunk is undeniably its atmosphere. The city of Nivalis captures the essence of cyberpunk surprisingly well: neon reflections on wet streets, oppressive mega-structures looming above, and the classic “high tech, low life” contrast permeating every district. Flying through the city on a hover-vehicle: repairing it, refueling it, weaving through air-traffic, is genuinely fresh. And when I switch to first-person perspective inside the cockpit, the immersion increases dramatically; for brief moments, it truly feels like a scene from Blade Runner. The city’s different layers are also well realized. The mid-level districts glow warmly with soft neon, the lower levels feel suffocating and dim, while the upper city carries a cold, sterile brightness. One unexpectedly immersive detail is your own apartment balcony. Standing there, watching the endless flow of vehicles on the sky-high highways from the perspective of an ordinary resident, creates a sense of “living in this world” that surpasses many of the actual story beats. Flying around while listening to the game’s linear narrative also gives the whole experience a relaxed pace: something suitable for a quiet evening when you want to unwind. Unfortunately, the charm doesn’t last. Cloudpunk’s shortcomings reveal themselves quickly, and they heavily shape the overall experience. First, I simply don’t like the voxel/“Minecraft-style” aesthetic. Cyberpunk worlds rely on heavy detail: texture, density, grit, and voxel visuals inherently lack the level of expression needed to sell that. From afar the city looks stylish, but up close it becomes coarse and simplistic, far below the level of visual fidelity I’m used to from more realistic games. In a genre where detail is half the experience, the limited expressiveness really hurts immersion. The city’s layout itself is also disappointingly rigid. Most of the elevated “highways” are just endless repetitions of straight lines connected by 90° turns. There are no curves, no intertwined layers, no complex intersections: nothing that could make flying genuinely fun or dynamic. Since flying is supposed to be the core of the game, the lack of variety or flow in the roads ends up being a major design failure. After a few hours, the act of flying becomes monotonous rather than thrilling. Walking sections are even worse. The fixed camera feels clumsy, first-person helps only slightly, and movement is slow with no sprint, no meaningful interaction, and nothing visually interesting about voxel NPCs. Large portions of gameplay boil down to walking through repetitive hallways, waiting for elevators, riding elevators, then waiting again. With collectables that feel pointless and environments that look nearly identical, these sections quickly become a chore. Gameplay is essentially “pick up package at A, deliver to B.” Death Stranding uses that formula too, but with deep mechanics, top-tier visuals, and a fully fleshed-out delivery system. In Cloudpunk, deliveries are purely symbolic—arrive and it’s done: with no strategy or challenge. Since delivery mechanics lack depth and driving lacks complexity, the game’s core loop becomes extremely repetitive and struggles to sustain a 10-hour runtime. The narrative doesn’t manage to compensate for the weak gameplay. The storyline plays like a compilation of familiar cyberpunk tropes: AI ethics debates, class divide, corporate power, identity questions, and most developments are predictable within minutes. The main character Rania suffers from flat voice acting, as if reading lines off a script, and the writing often feels juvenile. There are many moments where players instantly understand the situation, yet the characters remain oblivious until the game spells it out repeatedly, breaking immersion. Early pacing is especially rough: long, overly talky tasks with little payoff, though the main plot does improve somewhat in the later chapters. Audio is a mixed bag. The soundtrack is excellent, matching the detached, melancholic tone of the setting. But the sound effects, especially for the hover-car, are crude. Engine noises can be shrill, and the landing sound is a short two- or three-second clip that loops obviously, creating an unpolished, low-budget impression that cuts into the atmosphere. In the end, Cloudpunk is very much an atmosphere-driven game. If all you want is to float through a neon-soaked city late at night in first-person, soaking in the vibes and relaxing, it will absolutely deliver a few hours of pleasant escapism. But if you expect engaging gameplay, meaningful narrative depth, refined city design, or strong audiovisual polish, the game’s repetitive loop, stiff environments, voxel limitations, and drawn-out script will likely disappoint you. Cloudpunk builds a beautiful, lonely neon shell, but never fills it with a soul strong enough to carry the experience. It has wonderful moments, yet cannot sustain a truly compelling cyberpunk world. For me, it’s a charming but flawed little game: enjoyable for its atmosphere, inadequate in most other respects. Final Score: 6.5/10.

[h1]Recommendation: 90%[/h1] Carries hard by atmosphere. The Blade Runner references were a pleasant surprise. Has some minor issues, but overall a great experience. Easy to recommend