"Jotaro Shobo. Twisted motherfucker like no other. He's a Tyger Claw and a sadistic scumbag who's got a thing for scrolling XBDs. Who's to say whether he just gets carried away or (and my money's on this) he gets off on the tortured screams of his victims. Best guess is seventeen murders to his name, but the (in)justice for the street's dead and missing joytoys is notorious."
— Regina Jones on Jotaro Shobo, Cyberpunk 2077
Night City might be the city of dreams, but it is chock full of corrupt CEOs leading Mega Corps; assassins; and feuding gangs. Here are the worst that it has to offer.
All spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!
Franchise-Wide
- Adam Smasher was a thuggish murderer and rapist who willingly chose to throw away his humanity for a chance at power. A mighty cyborg, Adam is a dark legend who is known and feared for the massive amount of people he has murdered. Serving corporations for the carnage it affords him, Adam Smasher savors the deaths of as many innocent bystanders as possible. Having been the one to kill Johnny Silverhand, Adam Smasher worked for the Arasaka Corporation in the Fourth Corporate War to kill as many people as possible and, before becoming Arasaka's head of security, returns to resolve the Cyberskeleton crisis through brutally killing Rebecca and finishing off David Martinez when the latter refuses to join Arasaka.
Original tabletop game
2020- "Back From the Penalty Box" scenario: Joshua Brightman is a former electronic store manager who moonlights as "The Night City Stalker". With a fondness for "spooking" his victims before murdering them, Brightman racked up 32 kills before his arrest for kidnapping and attempted murder. Released from prison 17 years later, Brightman resumes his murder spree, racking up more kills as he attempts to eliminate the fixer Carole Medina before she can reveal to the public his true identity as the Stalker.
- The Osiris Chip: Charles Westhaven is a Humanatech scientist tasked with perfecting the Osiris Chip and its ability to turn those suffering from cyberpsychosis into slaves. Heading up the Calahoun Project, Westhaven disguised himself as a crime boss named "Ju-Ju" and begins deliberately driving people into cyberpsychosis just so he can kidnap them and use them as guinea pigs for the Osiris Chip. Westhaven uses the enslaved cyberpsychos to butcher various people and even an entire gang as a test run of their capabilities, then plans to mass produce the Osiris Chip so that countless people can be taken control of by Humanatech.
- Land of the Free: A Cross Country MEGA-Adventure for Cyberpunk: Seiji Okano is an Arasaka executive who schemes to take over the entire corporation. Working with Biotechnica to perfect cloning technology, Okano hopes to create an entire Servant Race meant to be nothing but slaves and soldiers for him to take over Arasaka with. When the very first working, sentient clone named Adriana escapes his clutches, Okano hunts her across America and leaves a trail of dozens of bodies in his wake, at one point helping to crash an entire airship of hundreds of people just to get to Adriana. Should Okano recapture Adriana, he cruelly destroys her surrogate mother, then lobotomizes Adriana and turns her into a blank, mindless template for his clone army. Okano also betrays and tries to murder the Player Characters no matter how compliant they are, willing to do anything to see his nefarious plans to embroil the world into a new, bloody Corporate War brought to fruition.
RED
- Danger Girl Dossier: Ripper started off as a particularly sadistic enforcer of the Maelstrom gang with a noted history of torture and murder, before Warlock promoted him and gave him control over the Maelstrom's scavvers. Ripper began subjecting scavvers to excruciating "tests" so he could weed out the strongest and promote them to proper members of the Maelstrom; only one in twenty on average survive these "tests", and invariably come out both physically and psychologically maimed because of Ripper's sadism. In one exceptional moment of cruelty, Ripper forced a scavver named Ghoul to fish a knife out of molten aluminum with just his bare hands in order to prove his mettle. Completely untrustworthy and nursing ambitions that may one day lead him to stab Warlock in the back, Ripper is the cruelest member of a gang already reputed as Night City's worst.
- Tales of the RED: Street Stories' "Reaping the Reaper": "The Reaper" is an A.I. downloaded from the Old Net that quickly begins killing and manipulating Netrunners for nothing but its own amusement. The Reaper begins by insidiously manipulating Netrunners to insanity and eventually suicide, leaving no less than seventeen bodies in its wake before it finds a new way to control its victims: hollowing them out from the inside-out and reducing them to empty meat puppets called "Biodrones". Turning dozens upon dozens of people into Biodrones and using them to kill even more people, the Reaper hopes to hijack an old radio tower and broadcast itself into the minds of anyone and everyone for miles, allowing it to wreak chaos and destruction to its heart's content.
Cyberpunk 2077
- Maman Brigitte is the matriarch of the Voodoo Boys and hired Evelyn Parker to steal the biochip housing the consciousness of Johnny Silverhand. Sending Evelyn into a coma by hacking the latter's cyberware, she lures in V with promises of removing Johnny and saving their life, but uses them to make contact with Johnny's old girlfriend turned A.I., Alt Cunningham. Brigitte intends to use her to cast down the Blackwall surrounding ruined cyberspace to allow hordes of malevolent A.I. to destroy humanity but spare her own life in exchange.
- "Guinea Pigs": Dr. Joanne Koch is a Biotechnica scientist, who is known for her unethical, abusive experiments. Koch oversaw the creation and implementation of Project Nightingale, in which the Red Ocher clan was used as test subjects for a painful, brutal treatment that lead to over 70 men, women, and children dying horrible deaths. To clean the slate and ensure she faces no repercussions for her actions, Koch frames and assassinates multiple people who could connect her to Nightingale, and when V comes after her seeking vengeance for Red Ocher, Koch brushes off the vile experiments as nothing but necessary research.
- "Monster Hunt" : Jotaro Shobo, aka the "Devil of Kabuki", is a Tyger Claw member known for his extreme sadism. Running a Black Market ring for illegal braindances, Shobo films himself torturing and murdering men, women, and children in the most horrific ways he can think of, even attempting to ally with another snuff ring to expand and pondering ways to make the kills even more gruesome and emotionally devastating to his victims.
