Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, who should you side with - Reed or Songbird?
All things considered, Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty is about a binary choice between two characters, and who you love the most along your path across the expansion: Reed or Songbird.
Of course, things are rarely as simple as they look, and, as we told you in our Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty review, you will often be led to reconsider your choices based on the new information that both Reed and Songbird offer you.
Trust your guts, but never assume who's the hero and who's the villain in this spy story, or who's going to prove helpful in V's broader plot.
Along the entire Phantom Liberty story, you will repeatedly be offered the option of siding with Reed or Songbird, but the final decision is still represented by what you do in the Firestarter mission.
We're breaking down the differences between one path and the other, and who you should choose between Songbird and Reed in Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty.
Should you help Reed capture Songbird? - Phantom Liberty
Your final decision to side with either Reed or Songbird is based on what you do during the Firestarter mission.
CD Projekt Red
If you are on Reed's side, install the Icebreaker on Songbird when asked. However, you will soon notice that something's going wrong, and that will lead to:
- failing to kill the leader of Dogtown, Kurt Hansen.
- Songbird's escape, with her now completely out of control.
By choosing Reed here, you will have to make your way out of the stadium and, eventually, you'll be greeted with a boss fight against Hansen.
How to defeat Kurt Hansen - Phantom Liberty
Siding with Reed leads to a boss fight against Hansen.
CD Projekt Red
It's a two-stage fight, even though Kurt's health bar remains just one all the time, and the first part will go down easily.
It is worth noting that the first part of the boss fight may have minor enemies around Kurt, if you have not eliminated all or most of them during your escape. So, as much as it is technically possible not to defeat any of them and escape up until the boss fight, we recommend that you clean up the area a bit before the final confrontation.
In the second part, stay at a safe distance, and turn around whenever you see him go slow-mo to charge an attack and when he executes it, opening up a rather long vulnerability window. Doing so, it'll be just a matter of patience and time before you kill him.
Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos and Somewhat Damage missions - Phantom Liberty
Once you beat the boss fight, you will be picked up by Reed and escape with him. As you move through Night City, Reed will intercept a call from Max Tac - they've been deployed to solve a cyberpsychosis case. V will immediately know it's Songbird.
Let the scene continue, and you will see from a distance the Max Tac neutralize and pick up Songbird. From here, you'll get a new two-mission questline. These are two new quests that are unique to this path:
- Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos - you must eliminate the Max Tac enemies guarding So Mi
- Somewhat Damage - a final stealth mission in an underground facility where you need to escape a deadly robot
The ultimate goal here is to safely pick up Songbird and get her out of Night City with all her dangerous information uncompromised. Whatever your preference, you will likely want to see this new questline at some point as well, so save your game before you choose whether or not to install the Icebreaker on So Mi - you'll be able to replay the bulk of the mission from there, and see the alternate version of your story.
Should you help Songbird escape? - Phantom Liberty
Siding with Songbird makes things a lot easier.
CD Projekt Red
If you choose to side with Songbird in the Firestarter mission, things will be much easier, but you might not necessarily regret it - as we told you in our guide to Cyberpunk 2077's secret ending from Phantom Liberty.
When asked if you want to install the Icebreaker, decline. This will lead to two events. The first is the death of Kurt Hansen, whom you will see killed by Alex through the large glass window above you. The second is the death of Alex herself, who will in turn be killed by Hansen's guards immediately after eliminating the Dogtown leader.
You will find yourself going through the same section with all of Hansen's guards running and shooting at you - and again, you can ignore them and go your own way. However, you will no longer have a boss fight to complete eventually, since Kurt will have already been eliminated.
If you help her, Songbird will lend you a hand, too.
CD Projekt Red
A special feature of this route is that, if you decide to help her, So Mi will lend you a hand with some hacks of your choice during the escape - the ability to take control of a tank, for example, and more. However, these actions will take their toll, as she'll be almost out of energy by the end of this section.
You'll manage to escape from the stadium together, and Songbird will have already ordered two cars to wait on the outside - one for her with a chaperone, one for you. This way, you can separate and not be too suspicious for some time. Wait a couple of days, and you will receive a call from her to plan your next moves, which involve escorting her to the spaceport for the final act of her story in The Killing Moon mission.
