It took roughly two years and “one of the most expensive art assets ever” to get Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty’s Chimera tank fight right

CD Projekt Red has shared some insight into Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty‘s fantastic Chimera tank boss fight, explaining it took two years to get the complicated sequence right.

In the latest episode of AnsweRED, the official CD Projekt Red podcast, game director Gabe Amatangelo and creative director Igor Sarzyński discussed the Chimera tank in a section focused on production challenges the team faced when making Cyberpunk 2077.

“Sometimes we’re making content that’s a nexus point of different disciplines – the Chimera is a great example of that,” Amatangelo explained. “It was gameplay, narrative, art, worldbuilding. I remember [art director] Paweł Mielniczuk and I were sending each other emails of various different military equipment of those guns, what are those called? they go ‘Brrrrrrrr’ [imitating a big machine gun] We wanted it to terrify you when it came up.”

“I think when we were iterating, it was two years to make this boss fight work,” said Mieniczuk. “We were iterating over and over.” Amatangelo added that there were “so many moving parts … Sometimes it was too gameplay, sometimes it was too narrative, sometimes too art demonstration. It was about striking a balance and I think the three of us got into it and went, ‘Okay beat by beat, let’s do this.'”

In the end, said Mielniczuk a little later in the conversation, “We were doing the tank I think four times, changing equipment,the weapons.” Sarzyński added: “One of the most expensive art assets I think ever.”

That cost would prove to be worth it. The Chimera tank fight stands out as an exceptionally exciting moment in a DLC expansion packed full of them. Former Eurogamer managing editor Tom Senior described Phantom Liberty as a “remarkable expansion and bittersweet end” for the game.