Year After Cyberpunk Debut, CD Projekt No Nearer Redemption (bloomberg.com) 95
A year since the botched premiere of CD Projekt SA's Cyberpunk 2077, things haven't got a whole lot better for the struggling Polish video-game studio. From a report: The shares are down 54% in that time and analyst price targets indicate a further 15% downside over the coming 12 months. It's a far cry from the hype that surrounded the launch of the futuristic role-playing game that had been touted as the next in a line of blockbusters that culminated with the third installment of the Witcher series in 2015. Where analysts had originally expected Cyberpunk sales of 30 million units in the year after the game's release, they now expect 17.3 million copies to have been sold in that time, according to the average of nine estimates compiled by Bloomberg. That includes 13.7 million sold in pre-orders and at around the time of last year's launch. "2021 has illustrated how long and bumpy the road to rehabilitation will be," said Matti Littunen, an analyst at Bernstein. "Fixing Cyberpunk, which is the key for audience relationship, will take a while." Even as Cyberpunk is finally getting better reviews thanks to multiple patches, redemption remains distant. In 2022, when the studio plans to release a new, technically advanced version of the game for next-generation consoles, analysts see sales rising to only 5.3 million units from 3.6 million for 2021. They are also uncertain about average prices, as Cyberpunk is continues to be sold at a discount to its launch price of $59.99.
Redemption? No. (Score:2)
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I've got a coworker who is also a gamer, who loves Witcher 3, and who flat out stated don't waste your time on 1 or 2. He claims the consensus is that they aren't worth playing. So yeah, it's clear that they had an unearned reputation. And given that the world of cyberpunk is still far inferior to many other titles that fact has really been rammed home.
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First or second being half-ass is nothing new in the gaming world. Just look at the dumping No Mans Sky took.
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One Man's Lie was also MUCH smaller in scope. It is much easier to fix a smaller game.
Can Cyberpunk 2077 be "salvaged"? Yes, with a lot of work. The question is: How much MORE money and time will have to be spent fixing the game and ultimately the reputation? Ultimately, what is the final ROI?
If CD Projekt SA continues to focus on releasing an "enhanced" version for the PC and next-gen consoles that fixes most of the issues then it might pay off in a year or two. We'll have to wait and see.
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No Man's Sky was supposed to be HUGE. It actually in the current state. It seems like a boring sort of game though. Cyberpunk is a small game, set in a small area, it's fundamentally a smaller game in scope. Maybe Cyberpunk is bigger in disk space and code and features, in in "scope" it's not that big.
But I think there's a reason why open world games get such angry push back from some "fans" because they will be inherently buggier. Never mind that on-the-rails crap like Assassin's Creed, the opposite o
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In a game like the Cyberpunk, most of the millions of man hours spent on development are going into developing art assets and modeling since it is such a detailed and high resolution game world.
However, most of the complaints aren't with those things: they are with core game engine bugs, such as the game losing track of character locations, animation glitches, the traffic simulation halting, etc. While challenging, those issues are probably on roughly the same order of magnitude as the No Man's Sky issues.
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With all of CDPR's hubris before Cyberpunk 2077's release, they fully deserve the shit they've gotten.
They're not newcommers in the business and should understand that expectations must be managed if disaster is to be averted. But nope, they gladly seemed to fuel any hype.
Hopefully they can learn from this 'more popular than Jesus' experience and do better in the future.
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Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay was pretty similar to Witcher 3. It's not a bad game, but the big problem was CD projekt hyped it up for years so a lot of the fans were expecting the best game ever. For people that weren't paying attention to all the hype, it's just fine, but I guess it's all a matter of your expectations
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Only a newcomer to gaming would ever believe hype about a game though, or else someone highly gullible and unable to learn from the past.
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someone highly gullible and unable to learn from the past.
That about sums up the internet gaming community!
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I played witcher 1, and it was weird. The "hero" is an utter asshole. For a "role playing game" it utterly fails because it's impossible to like the character. I suspect this is now the nature of the character in the books, and it wasn't that way in the TV series. I do have the second game but never got around to playing it.
I may get cyberpunk someday. It's playable, it's not unredeemable in any way. I just don't like to pay full price for games, and my computer probably can't handle the graphics at t
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I've got a coworker who is also a gamer, who loves Witcher 3, and who flat out stated don't waste your time on 1 or 2
Well, that's just like his opinion, man!
Witcher 1 and 2 are also great games. As is Thronebreaker. They are unique RPG's with great storytelling.
The growth that CDPR made between W1, W2 and W3, in terms of quality of their product and evidenced from their rise as a small, unknown indie developer to a giant of the video game industry is a clear testament to their quality.
The problem is they greatly underestimated the complexity that goes into a game like Cyber-GTA. Rockstar excels at that sort of immersive o
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I'm not going to argue with your coworker by proxy, but it sounds like he has bad opinions. I will assume that he is ugly, and wears stained t-shirts.
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We all wear stained tee shirts. We work for a living, sadly.
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Witcher 1 and 2 are both great games with great stories. There increasing success laid the foundation for what CDPR went on to do with Witcher 3. Most studios don't just form one day out of the blue and put out masterpieces, it takes knowledge and experience to get there. Witcher 3 is one of the best games ever made, and CDPR deserves every bit of credit for it.
That said, since Witcher 3, many of the key people have left CDPR. Sadly, I don't think the key talent they had that gave them such an edge works th
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Having played both Witcher 1 and 2 I don't know if I'd say they aren't worth playing. They definitely don't have the polish of AAA developer games, but they did a lot of things that mainstream RPGs didn't do. Witcher 1 was one of the first RPGs where I felt player actions really had a profound effect on the world. It also had this grey melancholy atmosphere that not many other games have made me feel. All that said, it definitely had flaws graphically and gameplay-wise, but was clearly a labor of love and s
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It is fully playable with the patches. The vast majority of big name games are buggy pieces of trash that still have legions of fans, so why is everyone focusing on this company instead of others with vastly worse records and reputations, like Ubisoft?
Of course, it is the second hobby of all gamers to go on rabid vents against game makers, everyone I think automatically filters out most of it. Maybe too many got duped by hype, but it's been standard practice by many to wait a few months after release befo
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I myself was told a number of times prior to the release of the game that it's something that I must absolutely play.
CDPR allegedly was the underdog company from East Europe, that with only a couple of developers could make such a great game like Witcher 3, while Mass Effect Andromeda from a large American developer team was absolute garbage.
I already wasn't too fond of Witcher 3. It had good writing and decent animations and graphics. But f
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Cyberpunk 2077 isn't broken. (Score:3)
It's boring. So much side quest content which all amounts to the exact same thing over and over again, a lifeless mobile phone driven objective system, and next to no real RPG elements. The story is okay but there's no sense of urgency. We all talk about how we're about to die, and then fuck around in Nightcity with no real downside to meandering along getting that 100% completion factor.
This game would be orders of magnitude more exciting if you had a time limit until death and weren't actually able to do all the side quests.
Buggy as it was, the bug fixes should have been abandoned in March and serious work on core gameplay done instead.
Shame.
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Most of the issues you mention are fundamental parts of the game. Changing them would require tearing out a lot of core foundations of the game and rebuilding them from scratch.
It's difficult to see how this would be even remotely possible considering the size and scope of the game as it is today without just remaking the game.
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Not really. The core of the game is fine, all of the elements to build an RPG (as it was advertised) are actually there in the game including a class based system, and upgrade system, and that shouldn't be a surprise since it uses the same underlying engine as more competent RPGs.
The problem is the RPG content isn't actually meaningful, the interactions are hollow, it's too much Grand Theft Auto, and not enough Witcher. Too much follow the icon on the map and save someone you don't know from getting beaten
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"Core of the game is fine". Followed by "Fundamental design elements with this game are bad".
22
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Aaaand slashdot decided to nuke the "does not equal" sign.
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"Core of the game is fine". Followed by "Fundamental design elements with this game are bad".
22
You seem to be struggling between what is a core game mechanic, and what is content. Either that or you have problems with some basic english and simply can't follow the words I'm putting on your screen. How can I help you? I would love to communicate with you but I struggle with you a lot. Is there another language we can try instead? Germany maybe? Dutch? I'm flexible. Let's talk.
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You seem to be struggling to justify why your personal opinion on why the game is bad should be everyone's. Turns out it's not by a long shot https://www.metacritic.com/gam... [metacritic.com] .
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Notice how I wasn't the one who said the game was bad. Projection is real.
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Notice how I didn't criticise you for your opinion on the game, just the idiotic concept that you think it would need a ground up re-write to address the few things I said. Your lack of english comprehension is very real.
Now please what language can I speak that would help you understand what I'm saying? Clearly English isn't working for you.
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I do wonder how far down the periodic table we need to go to hit this level of dense. Do we even have dense enough materials to describe this hilarity?
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Oh please, you're one to talk on reading comprehension. Yesterday you literally just started talking about what ever you had on your mind about the game in response to my very specific comment.
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You seem to be struggling to justify why your personal opinion on why the game is bad should be everyone's.
Not at all. But your reading comprehension is easy to correct so let me spell it out for you in simple words:
I postulated content related issues and a few minor game mechanics.
Luckyo said it's unfixable because what I gave is fundamental to the game and would need a rewrite.
I postulated that no, the fundamental part of the game is fine, as is the core engine which is successfully used in both other games so a rewrite is not needed. I gave examples.
Luckyo ignored everything I wrote and repeated his trash.
I i
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It absolutely slays me that your go to insult is "reading comprehension" when you and I had an entire conversation based around your poor reading ability.
You're entitled to your opinion, as is the reviewer, but please make a new thread instead of shitting on someone else's conversation with your completely off topic post.
Believe it or not on Slashdot I'm entitled to post anywhere I want. I have no problem using that privilege to troll a troll.
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And yet scores of games even more shallow are given rave reviews and have a loyal following of fans willing to buy andy and all sequels in the franchise.
Is the problem here that the expectations were higher than any reasonable amount of reality would have implied? Did they believe the hype and pre-purchase for higher than the first day selling price? If so, the fault lies with the buyer.
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Is the problem here that the expectations were higher than any reasonable amount of reality would have implied?
No because the expectation was based on past performance. People didn't expect great things because some dude had verbal marketing diarrhea at E3, they expected great things because a company that has delivered truly great complex and engaging games in the past promised to do it again (but this time with a cyberpunk theme) and that company has been historically reliable. Had this been an EA game no one would have expected anything from them.
Using past performance as a judge of future expectations isn't a fa
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Is the problem here that the expectations were higher than any reasonable amount of reality would have implied?
Not in my case. I find the game unreasonably unentertaining. There is something wrong at the core of the game, once you strip away all the pretty graphics.
Why would you expect that? (Score:5, Interesting)
The story is okay but there's no sense of urgency. We all talk about how we're about to die, and then fuck around in Nightcity with no real downside to meandering along getting that 100% completion factor.
What you describe is basically every single player open world RPG I've ever played in my 30 years of playing computer RPGs. Not sure why you expected different in this case.
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Not sure why you expected different in this case.
The fact you don't like any of them doesn't mean there aren't large quality differences between them. The contrast between this and the Witcher 3 couldn't be any stronger. One has you chasing dots on the map to shoot people you don't know in an effort to save other people you don't know without so much as a conversation, the other at least gives you some level of interaction.
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Don't like any of "them"? What the hell are you talking about? I didn't talk about liking or not liking anything in my post. Maybe you're claiming I don't like computer RPGs? Why then would I have been playing them for 30 years if I didnt like them? I would honestly think you replied to the wrong post if you hadnt quoted part of mine in yours.
Get back to me when you have a response that makes sense.
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I can only assume you don't like any of them if you think that I described all the games you played in the past 30 years, and you believe there's no variance between them. Either that or you only played one, that's also a possibility. I pointed out specifically things that make boring games, now that you mention it maybe you have actually have some weird thing for boring games and you like being bored. Whatever man, you do you.
My complaints about CP2077 were specifically pointing out that it is significantl
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I can only assume you don't like any of them if you think that I described all the games you played in the past 30 years, and you believe there's no variance between them. and you believe there's no variance between them...
Jesus Christ, do you have a problem reading? Literally the only thing I've commented on is false urgency in RPGs and it being so common why would you expect anything else. I quoted the specific point of your post I was addressing and only talked about that one point in my original point. Why do you keep making nonsense up and trying to tie other meaning to what I've said that was in no way present?
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Jesus Christ, do you have a problem reading?
No, but you seem to have a problem following my point as well as making your own. Keep trying kid you'll get this communication thing one day.
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Oh, well then please show me where I attempted to engage you on any of the points you clearly so desperately want to talk about. Make sure to explain how me quoting a specific point you brought up and only that point lead you to believe I was attempting to address everything in your post but that one point. Maybe also show me where I said I don't like computer RPGs too while you're at it.
Keep trying kid you'll get this communication thing one day.
Hahaha, you wont just admit to it and be done but on the other hand you have no way to justify your stupid so now you're
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Not the greatest game in terms of quality, but it makes the passage of time a resource that you need to manage.
Now from personal experience, talking and polling in gaming communities, I'm aware that a lot of people hate if the game puts pressure on them, whether it's through some kind of visible or invisible timer running, preventing them from doing everything in the same go.
It's likely because we've been conditioned to play games without that kind of ti
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Hey, maybe there's a market for such a thing, I wouldnt know. What I do know though is that false urgency is an incredibly common feature in RPGs so I don't know why anyone would expect anything else.
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It's likely because we've been conditioned to play games without that kind of time based simulation in mind, with a couple of exceptions of course.
I don't think this is the reason people hate time pressure in games.
At least, for me it's simply about stress. Time pressure gives me lots of stress. And when i play games i don't want to experience that kind of stress.
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Though not everyone experiences stress that way.
In fact gameplay mechanics like managing meters with timers that indicate how close your character is to virtual death are a staple in the contemporary survival genre, which by now has become so popular that it's become a nuisance where everyone tries to invent their own wheel (to me at least).
Take one of the largest survival games that became hugely popular -- Minecraft.
There's a lot of timers that you need to man
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I don't agree that minecraft has time-related gameplay that generates a lot of stress.
If you're out in the middle of nowhere and it becomes night you can dig yourself in for the night.
If you go hungry you don't die, you simply don't restore life anymore.
There are no huge consequences.
In fact, dealing with the consequences of time limits in minecraft can actually become pretty creative and part of the fun of the game.
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But so be it, I won't argue that the way I know it is the only valid one. There's probably vast amount of game modes via mods, where the experience can be customized.
Consequences are certainly another interesting topic that do go hand in hand with timer mechanics.
Consequences of failure states are probably another thing that a lot of people are conditioned to expect to only work certain
Re: Why would you expect that? (Score:2)
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Thanks for the info. I did the pre-order and then refunded after the first reviews. I was just about to be ready to buy it at a sale and give it a 2nd chance. Now I will not.
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That depends. Do you want an RPG? Don't buy it. Do you want a FPS? Then I do recommend it, it's quite a solid shooter with a decent enough linear story, think Deus Ex Mankind Divided, and not Witcher 3 with cars.
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That depends. Do you want an RPG? Don't buy it. Do you want a FPS? Then I do recommend it, it's quite a solid shooter with a decent enough linear story, think Deus Ex Mankind Divided, and not Witcher 3 with cars.
Well, I did enjoy Mankind Divided, but I played it as a sneaker mostly. But good to know they got at least something right.
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Do you want a FPS? Then I do recommend it, it's quite a solid shooter
I'm sorry, it's a shit shooter. Have you actually played a good FPS? It doesn't get more half-assed than cyberpunk 2077.
think Deus Ex Mankind Divided
If you think DE:MD is an FPS then you probably haven't played most of what a Deus Ex game has to offer.
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If you think DE:MD is an open world RPG you've not played an open world RPG.
Have you actually played a good FPS?
Yes I have. I didn't say it's a "good" FPS. I said it's a "solid shooter". Decent enough linear story, enough movement mechanics to keep you going, and once they nerfed some of the stupid scaling issues between enemies it actually is quite okay.
If you're comparing it to the likes of Half-Life or Doom then then that's your fault, not mine.
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If you think DE:MD is an open world RPG you've not played an open world RPG.
I don't think that at all. But it's far more than an FPS or even just 'a shooter'. You can go through most of the game without firing a single bullet, for one. Gadgets, multiple paths, exploration, story, sneaking, all that stuff. It's nothing like an FPS. And that's what i like about the deus ex games. The shooting in not the core of the game.
Actually, i played a little DX:MD today. Raided the Dvali Theater. Took out one sniper fro
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It's boring. So much side quest content which all amounts to the exact same thing over and over again, a lifeless mobile phone driven objective system, and next to no real RPG elements.
Yes. If you want an RPG, you need a decent human game master. Computers do not and can not do RPGs.
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And this is the nature of an open world game. You *always* put the main quest on hold. It's the only way to get 500 game hours out of 3 hours of main quest. Ie, Fallout 4, ignore the fact that your baby was kidnapped, Morrowind where the main quest literally tells you to slow down and go make a name for yourself elsewhere before continuing, and so forth.
There is a split out there with a lot of gamers; or at least RPG and/or action gamers. Those who like games that are simple, straight-forward, and on th
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Ie, Fallout 4, ignore the fact that your baby was kidnapped, Morrowind where the main quest literally tells you to slow down and go make a name for yourself elsewhere before continuing, and so forth.
But that makes sense. What doesn't make sense is doing either of those things when you're constantly told you have only a week to live. The core story line is inconsistent with the urgency of the matter at hand. Even the Witcher 3 where you're looking for Ciri in a panic the entire game opens up with how bloody long you've been looking giving the player the space to explore the world.
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Just bought the game last week at 50% discount on Steam sale. The game is awesome, the bugs (if any!) are very minor. Best quality visuals I've ever seen. Awesome gameplay. Recommend.
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Absolutely, on the surface it's a gorgeous shooter with a great core story. It's just not a compelling or exciting open world RPG game which is how it was sold to the public.
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It's boring.
Exactly. Once you take away all the technical problems what you're left with is essentially a pretty shit game with pretty graphics and cutscenes.
That is my main gripe with cyberpunk 2077. Not the technical problems but the fact that the game kindof sucks.
Ugh (Score:4, Interesting)
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Well competition, plus older games just don't generate as much. That's why they offer newer stuff.
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From what I've read, their profit margins are razor thin, but revenue is growing significantly. Generally, this type of performance is considered solid. The idea is that you are spending money to grow. Growing companies that have large profits are often seen as missing the boat. Why aren't you investing in growth?
Each business is different, but I can't find anything to suggest GOG is anything but the second biggest digital game distribution platform out there.
I'd like to see why people think it's "failing".
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Because a lot of these companies fall into the trap that infinite growth is not only possible, but mandatory. Sometimes they get lucky, but most of the time they become dependent on growth to survive, and that means short-term business plans and a shaky foundation. They can suddenly collapse overnight.
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Ummm - you have this exactly backwards. GOG is a boat anchor: https://www.theverge.com/2021/... [theverge.com]
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GoG is losing money and they are cutting scope on the GoG Galaxy client.
One thing is clear: (Score:3)
Their QA process is badly broken and their management is overconfident. It's stupid for companies to make big media splashes when they don't have a product that can be released immediately. How things should be done is that when it's in acceptable shape for release, you start marketing and work on fixing all the fine details until the release date. Too many managers in game companies seem to thinking that putting a turd game build out and then having weekly patch releases for the next six months is an acceptable practice and it shows.
Re: One thing is clear: (Score:2)
It probably usually has to do with funding. You estimate the game's gonna cost $10M or whatever to make, you secure $10M in funding, but then the game goes over budget and you're left with an unfinished product and no cash. You can put this off for a while with more funding or loans, but if the problem goes on long enough, you are forced to try to pull back some of those future profits into the present in order to finish the game and avoid insolvency.
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It's not just CD Projekt SA. It's like every companies these days. :(
Stock Price is a poor measure (Score:5, Interesting)
Tying things like stock price to the apparent value of the current state of a game is just plain stupid. The measures make no sense especially since sales measures have never been a true indication of a games quality (take a look at the sales of endless sports games for proof).
CDPR's current stock price makes a fair amount of sense and 'redemption' has nothing to do with a stocks performance once it lives outside of the unreality bubble of North American tech stocks whose valuations are completely disconnected from reality.
Stock went way too high prior to CP2077 launch based on the hype monster
Stockholders have already been paid a significant dividend from CP2077 sale and have exited or are exiting their positions, so new buyers expect a discount since there's no new properties coming
No new major releases in the pipeline that are anywhere close to release, no clear new sources of significant revenue to cause the stock to rise
In terms of CDPRs actual fiscal health... it's fine and they have plenty of cash to get them through. 5.3 million units a year, even at a discount, is still quite a bit of money and also a respectable move of product. Analysts were on crack about potential sales pre-release. It might get there, it will take longer and the cost per unit will be lower.
Those that love the game love it deeply and are eagerly waiting for expansions. Those that don't love it won't buy the expansions. Dead story is dead.
Note... all of this is irrespective of what you, personally, may think of their game.
Why announce a release date and then push back? (Score:2)
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Re: Why announce a release date and then push back (Score:2)
This is hard if you're relying on third party distribution. If you don't build demand and deliver massive sales, your title doesn't get pushed. Marketplaces that are always looking for the latest hotness (Steam, GameStop, etc) make it much harder to succeed with a sleeper hit.
From my perspective, CP has not been released yet (Score:2)
But I must say I'm wondering how - given all that talk about console and PC similarities - it is specifically the support for what is now the current generation of consoles that they seem to have a hard time implementing.
Re: From my perspective, CP has not been released (Score:2)
Trying to make it run on last gen consoles is what killed the game.
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that they seem to have a hard time implementing
Nothing hard about it. They simply flat out haven't done it. They focused on the PC gamers bug fixes first. Then tried to fix performance on the much larger last gen console market.
Next gen consoles are small players in the grand scheme of things.
Last Gen Consoles (Score:2, Informative)
Last gen consoles that are too weak to run the game is what killed it. The game ran fine on release if you were using a PC.
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No, optimisations not being appropriate for last gen consoles is what killed it. Clearly last gen were capable of running it as can be seen by the fact that they can run it now. Sure it's not an amazing well performing game, but at least now the world loads faster than you can drive through it.
Not putting the effort into getting your release right and simply ship ship SHIP! is what killed it.
The game was profitable (Score:2)
Why announce a release date and then push back? (Score:2)
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That's a good question, and I'd say that's the correct default position. For a game that is hyped as much as this, it may be strategic to announce release to avoid timing alongside other high-profile or similar genre games.
Apart from that, big releases may be scheduled around the biggest typical buying season (black friday, or early summer). It's clear now that if this was the strategy CDPR should have waited for that time a year (or more) later.
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Ahh, but they are public now. Gotta keep the money wheel turning for the investors. No more working on Valve time.
Not their fault (Score:2)
PS4/Xbox1 are still the same console, they aren't getting better.
CD Projekt no nearer Redemption (Score:2)
So what you're saying is that they're not Red Dead.