Cyberpunk 2077 Developers Reportedly Didn't Want to Release the Game In 2020

In the wake of Cyberpunk 2077’s rough release last month, many wondered why developer CD Projekt [...]

In the wake of Cyberpunk 2077's rough release last month, many wondered why developer CD Projekt Red even opted to launch the game given how poorly it ran on consoles. Well, according to a new report that has now come about, many developers at the studio actively didn't want to release the game in 2020 and would have liked to have had much more time to work on it.

Coming by way of Bloomberg, a new report has been released that says many staff members at CD Projekt Red were baffled to learn that studio heads wanted to release Cyberpunk 2077 in 2020. The game's initial release date, which was scheduled for April 2020, was one that many developers internally found to be outside of the realm of possibility given the game's current state when that date was announced. Cyberpunk 2077 would go on to be delayed two additional times after this but the additional eight months of development still didn't result in an ideal product despite the amount of overtime that many put in on the project.

The article goes on to say that one developer specifically said that based on internal development timelines, Cyberpunk 2077 shouldn't have been ready to be released until 2022. Those who worked on the game at CDPR were said to have even started creating memes and taking bets about when the studio's heads would demand that the game be shipped.

So why did CD Projekt Red push to release Cyberpunk 2077 last month anyway? Well, it sounds like it all comes down to poor planning and lofty ideals. Because of the success of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, those in charge at CD Projekt Red believed that Cyberpunk would always just naturally come together in the end. Of course, this couldn't have been further from the truth. Even though the game ended up doing well on PC, the console iteration on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One is another story entirely.

Now, instead of celebrating the game's launch and continuing to iterate on it from here, CD Projekt Red is trying to "save" Cyberpunk 2077, in a sense. Marcin Iwinski, the CEO of CD Projekt, announced extensive plans for the future of the game over this past week. Alongside a number of future updates that are in the works, it was also revealed that the game's free next-gen upgrade for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X isn't coming until the second half of the year.

It remains to be seen if CD Projekt Red can turn around the narrative on Cyberpunk 2077 at this point. Given the studio's pedigree, it's hard to think that the game won't one day be an excellent video game across all platforms. For now, though, it's hard to disagree with some of the studio's developers that the game should have been pushed back even further.

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