Cyberpunk 2077's visuals have caused seziures
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CD Projekt RED’s Cyberpunk 2077 has triggered seziures for one games critic working at Game Informer.
Following the end of the first-person RPG’s embargo yesterday, games critic Liana Ruppert released an article revealing that Cyberpunk 2077 features multiple cases of strong visual effects that can cause harsh seziures for those who suffer with epilepsy.
In the article, Liana explained that they “suffered one major seizure and felt several moments where [they were] close to another one”.
“I kept going because I made that decision to, and I feel like that decision helped me sort of slap together a small little guide for players wanting to take part in this game for fear of missing out.”
Cyberpunk 2077 has a large number of visual glitch effects. When the the player gets damaged, the screen flickers with fast red glitches. Interacting with certain objects follows the same trend. Keanu Reeves’ character Johnny Silverhand appears with a bright blue glitch effect.
Even worse, very slight spoilers, Cyberpunk 2077 features a Braindance mechanic that allows you to dive into a character’s memories. This entire mechanic has been described as a dangerous trigger for epileptic players, going as far to appear similar to a device used in real life to purposefully trigger seziures.
“Pretty much everything about this is a trigger and this is something that caused me to have a grand mal seizure when playing to help with our review. This is also a trigger on many levels, starting with the device itself,” Ruppert explained.
“The headset fits over both eyes and features a rapid onslaught of white and red blinking LEDs, much like the actual device neurologists use in real life to trigger a seizure when they need to trigger one for diagnosis purposes.”
“If not modeled off of the IRL design, it’s a very spot-on coincidence, and because of that this is one aspect that I would personally advise you to avoid altogether.”
“When you notice the headset come into play, look away completely or close your eyes. This is a pattern of lights designed to trigger an epileptic episode and it very much did that in my own personal playthrough.”
At the time of writing, Cyberpunk 2077 doesn’t allow players to disable or reduce any of these effects. The game doesn’t feature any warnings of its epileptic triggers or any seziure warnings.
