Lea Leonowicz, CD Projekt Red’s Senior Concept Artist and Coordinator, recently shared a couple of concept art for Cyberpunk 2077, including ones showcasing what Johnny Silverhand’s appearance was before Keanu Reeves was involved in the game.
It was first revealed that Reeves would play a vital role in Cyberpunk 2077 as Silverhand during E3 2019. Still, no one expected just how important Silverhand would be in the overarching story of Cyberpunk 2077.
Before the events that take place in the game, Johnny Silverhand was a rockstar who essentially just wanted to see the Corps brought down to ruin. Reeves gave him the personality of a know-it-all—an extremist who had little to no filter and manners.
The way Reeves played the character was impressive and really worked well, so much so that some would even argue that Silverhand was the highlight of Cyberpunk 2077. However, it’s quite clear to see that Silverhand didn’t always used to look like Reeves, and Leonowicz’ concept art proves that.
The Senior Concept Artist and Coordinator recently shared a few art pieces dedicated to Cyberpunk 2077 on her ArtStation account. What makes these pieces even more interesting is the fact that a few of them showcase the initial appearance of Johnny Silverhand—way before Reeves was a part of the picture.
Instead of having the actor’s likeness, the conceptual version of the rockstar-slash-activist looks younger and doesn’t have a beard. Aside from that, though, his general look and aesthetic remained the same. He still has his sunglasses, his signature robotic arm, boots and matching leather pants.
Leonowicz’ astounding art gives us fans an interesting glimpse into how much or how little the character changed over the course of Cyberpunk 2077’s development. That being said, we have yet to see just how much Silverhand’s personalty and backstory have changed as well. Of course, we can’t glean anything regarding that from these images alone, but it’s definitely interesting to think about.
Even though characters like Silverhand, among others, have done a great job in making Cyberpunk 2077 even more immersive, such interesting highlights are, sadly, buried underneath all the controversies and ongoing issues.
Fortunately, CD Projekt RED is working hard to release stabilizing updates and hotfixes for the sci-fi title, especially for the last-generation consoles which bore the brunt of the issues. As a matter of fact, the studio released a major update last week that supposedly contained stability improvements and other similar fixes.
Unfortunately, this most recent update—while it did for a fact fix some issues—also introduced a game-breaking bug that halts a player’s progress during the Takemura mission. As expected, this caused even more backlash directed toward developer CD Projekt RED.
While fans appreciate the studio’s efforts in prioritizing patches and fixes, it’s unfortunate that yet another bug was added to the game.
