We all fantasize about living in Night City until reality sets in: without main character plot armor, it’s just a neon-drenched hellscape reeking of urine and burning chrome.
When most players boot up Cyberpunk 2077, they become unstoppable cyber-gods. Double-jumping across rooftops, hacking brains remotely, cruising in vehicles worth more than entire economies. But YouTuber Any Austin, who’s quickly establishing himself as the David Attenborough of video game suffering, decided to take a radically different approach.
His question was deceptively simple: Can you live a normal, mundane life in Night City?
The answer is yes. But your sanity pays the price.
Austin didn’t settle for casual roleplay. He constructed an elaborate torture protocol disguised as a “challenge run,” committing to a full 7-day in-game week, roughly 21 real-time hours, played in a single marathon session. No quests. No combat. Just employment, commuting, and the soul-crushing weight of late-stage capitalism.
The Wage Slave Protocol
To authentically experience the pain of Night City’s working class, Austin established ground rules that border on masochism. He refused to skip the eating animations. He actually synchronized his real-life biological needs with his character’s schedule.
Since in-game time moves 8x faster than real time, the math got weird.
THE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT
The self-imposed restrictions that turned a fun RPG into a survival horror.
| THE RULE | THE REALITY |
|---|---|
| The Diet | He only eats when his character eats. Because of the time dilation, he consumes 1/8th of a real food portion. Yes, he ate 1/8th of a burrito. |
| The Job | A server at “The Ginger Panda.” 12-hour shifts (noon to midnight). This means standing in one spot for 90 real-time minutes doing absolutely nothing. |
| The Commute | No fast travel. Fast travel is for rich mercs. Normal people take the NCART train or walk and hope they don’t get shot. |
Staring Into The Void (And Naming It Chloe)
The physical challenge is brutal enough. But watching the human brain desperately manufacture meaning from absolute nothingness proves far more fascinating.
Austin spends hours stationed inside The Ginger Panda, a cramped noodle shop. There are no mini-games to pass the time. No “serve customer” interaction prompts. He simply exists there. To preserve his deteriorating sanity, he begins studying NPCs with disturbing intensity.
He christens the line cook “Lucille.” When her character model gets swapped the following day for a blue-haired woman, he names the replacement “Chloe.” Chloe becomes his work bestie. He fabricates entire conversations, emotional storylines, and relationship dynamics based purely on glitches and idle animations.
At one point, he suffers a genuine mental breakdown over a customer whose elbows clip through her body. He spirals into a rant about “telepathic flesh.” This particular flavor of madness only manifests after 15 consecutive hours of staring at low-poly dumpling textures.
The Tragedy of Day 7
The experiment concludes with a twist that feels impossibly scripted. It isn’t. It emerges organically from Cyberpunk’s chaotic systems.
On his final day, Austin arrives at work heartbroken because Chloe isn’t there. He genuinely mourns this collection of polygons. During his walk home, he stops at a street food stall and spots her. The game had simply recycled her character model for a different vendor.
In his sleep-deprived delirium, he constructs a narrative: She didn’t vanish. She just found better employment! He rushes over to “greet” her.
But this is Cyberpunk 2077. There’s no “talk” button for random vendors. There’s only “Heavy Attack.”
In his excitement, he accidentally punches a nearby customer in the back of the skull. Chloe cowers in terror. Police materialize instantly. His seven-day record as a law-abiding citizen disintegrates in milliseconds because he tried to say hello to a friend who never existed.
It’s the perfect conclusion. Definitive proof that you can attempt a normal existence in Night City, but the city itself and the game engine simply won’t allow it.
If you can spare 40 minutes, watch the full video. It’s a masterclass in emergent storytelling that might just change how you perceive those background NPCs next time you barrel past them at 100mph.
FAQ About Living a “Normal Life” in Cyberpunk 2077
Q: Can you actually get a regular job in Cyberpunk 2077?
A: No, V cannot hold a conventional, stable job like a clerk or factory worker that provides a consistent income without involving violence or crime. Most “gigs” lead to combat scenarios.
Q: Is there a way to avoid all combat in Cyberpunk 2077?
A: While stealth and non-lethal options exist, completely avoiding combat throughout the game’s story and side quests is extremely difficult, if not impossible, due to core narrative progression.
Q: What happens if I try to live a normal life and avoid main quests?
A: Your progression will be severely limited, and earning eddies for basic needs will become a frustrating grind, as the game’s economy is not designed to support a non-combat lifestyle.
Q: Does the game reward exploration for non-combat activities?
A: While exploration itself is rewarding for its atmosphere and lore, most concrete rewards like gear and significant eddies are tied to completing objectives, which often involve combat or morally ambiguous choices.
Q: Are there any mods to help facilitate a normal life in Night City?
A: While the modding community for Cyberpunk 2077 is active and innovative, a comprehensive mod to fully support a non-combat, mundane lifestyle with appropriate economic and social systems is not widely available, or at least not integrated into the base game.