Cyberpunk 2077’s Rough Start
Coming off the immense success of 2015s multi-award-winning The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, CD Projekt Red went for a more futuristic tech-focused locale that promised so much, but to most fans fell very far short.
Cyberpunk 2077 was one of the most anticipated games of 2020 so people had a lot of pretty high expectations for when it was released, and after multiple delays and radio silences, on Sept. 17, 2020, it finally arrived. Fanfares, rejoice, everyone is happy and enjoying it, right? Unfortunately not so much. The game released with numerous glitches, game-breaking bugs and lackluster visuals. The game of the future, it was not.
Again, personally, I have been enjoying the game and I know people who have also been enjoying it, but if you own a last-gen console, I would wait a little bit before buying it.
The hype around this game was some of the biggest hype I have seen for a game in a long time. The initial trailers looked amazing. I remember the first teaser trailer releasing and thinking, “I don’t really know what this is going to be, but I am here for it!” The game was delayed many times, as AAA games usually are, but with CD Projekt Red we all thought this was a good thing, especially since they kept saying they weren’t going to release anything further until they thought that it was absolutely perfect!
After the game was released, some of the developers came out with statements saying that the crunch for this game was awful. The number of delays kept adding up to longer work hours as mandatory overtime was introduced according to BBC. Crunch is an issue within the gaming industry that is really introduced as it comes down to the wire for the game to be released. There have been many developers within the industry that have come out recently talking about how bad the crunch conditions have been. It is a problem that needs to be fixed, and I believe is one of the biggest reasons the game launched in the state it did. It came down to satisfying the shareholders by over-focusing on the integrity of the game.
Opinion time. I bought the game on PC right when it launched and have been playing it extensively since day one. I experienced very minor glitches such as texture pop-ins, floating cigarettes, and bouncing motorcycles, but the game never crashed on me. I thought right off the bat, “why is everyone so mad at this game?” Come to find out that all of the issues seemed to be appearing on last-gen consoles like the Xbox One and PS4. I have a friend who got it for PS4, and he said every hour or so the game would just crash out of nowhere.
As of March 29, 2021, a 33.6GB update titled 1.2 was released. This update had an extensive, two-page list of fixes to the game. Fixes such as UI issues, quest-specific bugs and glitches, and graphical fixes. The list seemed to go on and on of things that they are still working on and fixing. A similar situation to this game is Hello Games’ No Man’s Sky. Hello Games promised the universe in their newest game and delivered a fraction of what was promised. Five years later, the game is exactly what was promised at launch and then some. Going from mostly negative reviews on Steam to Very Positive reviews. This just goes to show that games can be fixed if enough heat is on the developers and they care enough about the game. Let’s not forget that CD Projekt Red’s own Witcher 3 launched buggy and glitchy and went on to win Game of the Year.
The developers are already in talks to release some DLC for the game, even though I think that they need to make sure the game is stable before they start working on that. Again, personally, I have been enjoying the game and I know people who have also been enjoying it, but if you own a last-gen console, I would wait a little bit before buying it. I think that underneath all of the bugs it is a very good story with deep RPG skill trees and customization allowing you to build whatever character you would like. I will be keeping a close eye on this game as more news starts to come out. As always, stay safe and keep gaming.
