A field with the Sony PlayStation four Cyberpunk 2077 Collector’s Version on the counter.
Alexander Sayganov | SOPA Photos | LightRocket through Getty Photos
LONDON — The builders of Cyberpunk 2077 are pushing again the discharge of recent content material for the sport to deal with fixing bugs and crashes.
Polish sport developer and writer CD Projekt launched the highly-anticipated sci-fi epic final month. It has been the goal of fierce criticism for releasing what many followers and critics noticed as an unfinished sport.
Cyberpunk was considered one of 2020’s most hyped big-budget video video games. However it was beset by a large number of bugs and drops in efficiency on older consoles like Sony’s PlayStation four and Microsoft’s Xbox One.
CD Projekt sought to placate followers with the promise of refunds and enhancements to the sport. However that did not cease Sony from eradicating Cyberpunk from its digital PlayStation Retailer, a transfer that many trade analysts mentioned was unprecedented for a triple-A title.
Marcin Iwiński, co-founder of CD Projekt, apologized in a video posted to the sport’s YouTube channel Wednesday.
“Regardless of good evaluations on PC, the console model of Cyberpunk 2077 didn’t meet the standard customary we needed it to fulfill,” Iwiński mentioned. “I and all the management workforce are deeply sorry for this and this video is me publicly proudly owning as much as that.”
“Please do not fault any of our groups for what occurred,” he added. “All of them are extremely gifted and laborious working.
“Myself and the board are the ultimate choice makers, and it was our name to launch the sport. Though, imagine me, we by no means ever supposed for something like this to occur.”
Iwiński defined that a lot of the sport’s points on older {hardware} resulted from its grand ambitions on PC. Cyberpunk is “big in scope,” he mentioned, packing a “multitude of customized objects, interacting methods and mechanics” into “one massive metropolis and in a comparatively loading-free surroundings.”
“We made it much more tough for ourselves by eager to make the sport look epic on PCs after which adjusting it to consoles, particularly outdated gens” just like the PS4 and Xbox One, he added.
Iwiński mentioned that CD Projekt’s deliberate launch of free downloadable content material, or DLC, to accompany the primary sport could be delayed because the builders race to patch the numerous glitches and crashes gamers have skilled.
“We determined to deal with a very powerful fixes and updates first and we’ll be releasing the DLCs afterwards,” the CD Projekt co-founder mentioned.
He added that variations of the sport for Sony and Microsoft’s next-gen consoles will likely be launched within the latter half of the yr. Players are at present solely in a position to play the PS4 and Xbox One variations of Cyberpunk on the brand new PlayStation 5 and Xbox Sequence X methods.
CD Projekt shares have been up 2% Thursday morning. The sport maker’s inventory worth has fallen about 38% since Cyberpunk was launched on Dec. 10.
“We deal with this complete scenario very severely and are working laborious to make it proper,” Iwiński mentioned Wednesday. “The guiding rules of our firm are nonetheless core to what we will we nonetheless wish to make wonderful video games and have an open communication with you our gamers.”
Along with the controversy over Cyberpunk’s botched launch, CD Projekt has additionally confronted accusations of “crunch tradition,” a standard problem within the gaming trade that sees builders working lengthy hours to complete a sport in time. Cyberpunk was delayed 3 times earlier than its launch.
“The workforce is working to carry related fixes to the sport with none compulsory additional time,” CD Projekt Crimson you add Crimson right here? mentioned in a news update Wednesday. “Avoiding crunch on all of our future initiatives is considered one of our prime priorities.”
