28 ms·

Cyberpunk 2077 Refunds

379 points by Kapura 6y ago

sp332 6y ago
The seizure-inducing effect was fixed back on the 11th. https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-104-hotfix-released-for-pc-and-ps4 https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-104-hotfix-relea...
- falcolas 6y ago
  It should have never been in there in the first place. No matter how many disclaimers you pop up, you shouldn’t be intentionally showing a seizure-inducing pattern of lights.
  - oneeyedpigeon 6y ago
    I'm not sure there's any evidence to suggest it was intentional. What possible reason could there be for that?
    - falcolas 6y ago
      > I'm not sure there's any evidence to suggest it was intentional. From the original article calling out the problem. >>> When "suiting up" for a BD, especially with Judy, V will be given a headset that is meant to onset the instance. The headset fits over both eyes and features a rapid onslaught of white and red blinking LEDs, much like the actual device neurologists use in real life to trigger a seizure when they need to trigger one for diagnosis purposes. ... This is a pattern of lights designed to trigger an epileptic episode and it very much did that in my own personal playthrough. <<< Emphasis mine. > What possible reason could there be for that? Probably for the same reason devs model decapitations and other deadly effects off real world references: using real world lighting patterns that are known to effect the brain adds a sense of authenticity to the world. Even if the intent was not malicious, the device and lighting pattern are too spot-on to be mere coincidence.
      - oneeyedpigeon 6y ago
        Oh, I'm aware of the problem, and I agree that it was a terrible oversight. I'm just saying I don't think they actually intended/expected to cause players to suffer epileptic attacks because that would probably result in the biggest lawsuit in history.
  - bloody-crow 6y ago
    I've played through this section before and after the patch and I have to say that the original seizure inducing effect looked a lot cooler. I don't mind it being replaced with a milder version, and I would have never noticed if the game released with it from the start, but having seen the original I'd like an option to switch back to it based on just how cool the flashing lights looked. > you shouldn’t be intentionally showing a seizure-inducing pattern of lights I think the intention was to show a cool flickering that looks like it'd mess up your brain (which is somewhat the intent of BD in game). The fact that the flickering also caused seizures, is clearly an oversight.
djohnston 6y ago
Wow what a disaster. I hope leadership is held to account for such poor judgement.
- ramenstor 6y ago
  Right? Like how could you make this many bad calls to get your game to the point that one of the main platform holders has yanked the game off the store and issue refunds. CDPR rushed it out the door to get that end of fiscal year revenue (unless I'm mistaken) and satisfy impatient investors, only to lose a lot of good will with their fan base, miss out on game of the year awards and recognition, and to be a meme generator for people to poke fun at the game. Yikes, that's a series of unfortunate events and some really bad management. Someone should get the chop over there.
  - Hamuko 6y ago
    I imagine they're going to be losing a lot of goodwill with the investors as well, after saying that the game runs "surprisingly well" on the PS4 and Xbox One, and how that despite announcing that customers can choose to get a refund, they're not "encouraging gamers to get refunds". And now due to that announcement, Sony has pulled the game entirely from the store since CD Projekt just diverted their angry customers to Sony's customer service reps.
  - djohnston 6y ago
    Yeah I was tongue in cheek, I would bet that leadership will not be held to account, as that is by and large an anomaly in today's world. I'm going to buy some of their stock if it drops a little further, same as I did for Boeing.
- Ericson2314 6y ago
  The only way for that to happen is the workers to strike with whatever additional wind is now in their sails.
hindsightbias 6y ago
Can we get a Duke Nukem update now?
ProfessorLayton 6y ago
This is incredible, and must be devastating for the development team, especially after all that crunching. As someone who's worked on a (digital-only) title for Xbox One, I'm surprised this game got through the certification process in the first place. From our experience the platform holders are pretty involved, and we regularly gave MS updates on everything from monetization, to UX and controls, to extensive reviews for updates, which caused headaches when the client lagged behind our other platforms. Unfortunately for the developers, the fact of the matter is that there are tens of millions of base PS4s and Xbox Ones out there, and gamers got a bait and switch during this launch. As terrible as it is for them to get the rug pulled under them, Sony risks a lot more by not issuing refunds for incredibly broken products. A lot of the appeal of console gaming is the relative plug-and-play factor that comes with it, and the software regularly costs more to boot — via higher pricing, lack of sales, or both.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  Actually I see it as positive, because it proves that crunching isn't worth it, if this what happens coming out of burned developers. The industry keeps bleeding to many people that could have made huge contributions, but decided to invest into industries where crushing isn't part of the culture. For example, I rather do GUIs and 3D stuff for boring enteprise projects than spending endless nights and weekends fixing bugs on engine code.
  - drchopchop 6y ago
    Yup, left AAA a long time ago. Way more money, work-life balance, and job opportunities available when you leave the game industry. It exploits developers who are initially passionate about the field, and then leaves them in a state where it's very difficult to leave (because it's very specific skills that don't easily transfer to other industries)
    - alfalfasprout 6y ago
      If you work on game engines, trading is a fantastic transition since you'll already have high performance C++ experience.
spicymaki 6y ago
What a disaster. I feel sad for the staff that spent all of that crunch time on that quixotic fever dream.
- orbifold 6y ago
  On PC it is a pretty decent game, nice missions, very nice graphics and art. Personally I like it better than other open world games that I played. It feels more immersive than most of them, as long as you don't go out of your way to break the immersion. In GTA and Red Dead Redemption 2 it is far more fun to create havoc than to play any of the missions in Cyberpunk 2077 there is basically almost no point doing anything but the missions, but I still feel far more connected and invested in the character than in either of the two other games.
  - imiric 6y ago
    > In GTA and Red Dead Redemption 2 it is far more fun to create havoc than to play any of the missions While non-storyline gameplay is definitely more fun in Rockstar games, I think the mission and sidequest gameplay is way more fun than CP2077's as well. Consider this earlier mission in GTAV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ikop7td88ks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ikop7td88ks It involves a car chase, NPCs jumping in and out of moving vehicles, a boat mast swinging into traffic, shooting while driving, etc. This is all done smoothly, with no animation glitches or jankiness. A mission after that involves a bicycle race, swimming and boarding a boat, followed by an intense jet ski race: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcqvAgzr3To https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcqvAgzr3To So far in my admittedly short ~12h playtime of CP2077 on PC I haven't seen anything equally as engaging, well designed or just plain fun. Most of the missions involve shooting galleries interspersed by cutscenes to showcase action set pieces, and there's a lot of on-rails shooting from the passenger seat, which feels like gameplay from several generations ago, not from a next-gen title. I don't understand complaints that it shouldn't be compared to GTA given that CDPR themselves describe it as an "open-world action-adventure story", so comparing it to games that set the bar for open-world gameplay is only fair, and in my opinion it falls very, very short on those terms. Just like it does on its RPG elements. Like others mentioned, it falls short when compared to even the original Deus Ex, let alone the more recent installments. This is probably why CDPR decided to avoid marketing it primarily as an RPG in 2019: https://i.imgur.com/oDldUQQ.png https://i.imgur.com/oDldUQQ.png All in all this was a massive disappointment for me, and I actively avoided trailers and marketing to avoid the hype. Even if all the bugs and performance issues are fixed hopefully a few months from now, the gameplay will still be mediocre at best. The only thing I'm partially still interested in is the story, though from what I've read that seems to be underwhelming as well. This was the cherry on top of 2020. What a year.
trianglem 6y ago
They shouldn’t even bother offering it on the PS4 and the old XBox. It plays well on the PC and I presume the newer consoles.
- unstatusthequo 6y ago
  Running x570 chipset with 128gb RAM and RTX 3090 with AMD 5900x and updated non beta Windows. Crashes every ten minutes. Wish it played well....
  - ericlewis 6y ago
    You might want to check your thermals or OC settings. I’ve the same setup except running a 3080, hasn’t crashed once in the hours I’ve been playing it. Nary a glitch, but they do happen.
  - dexterlagan 6y ago
    i7-10k 1080Ti 32 Gb RAM latest nVidia drivers. Not a single crash since launch. Been playing many hours a day. I saw a few glitches, but overall extremely stable and bug-free considering the amount of detail on screen. It's too bad they weren't able to optimize for older gear on launch.
  - xondono 6y ago
    Seriously? Mine: X570, 3700x, 5700XT Cpu & GPU OC with watercooling. I’ve seen 3-4 crashes (in the same place) in about ~8h of gameplay.
  - orbifold 6y ago
    It crashed a few times on me but never in missions or while I was doing anything important. Have a 1080 GTX and 32gb RAM it runs very well at 1080p and pretty high graphics settings.
  - rado 6y ago
    Crashed once on my PC in a few hours of gameplay.
  - 6y ago
acdanger 6y ago
Incredible. And I don't think this is something a year of patches will be able to fix. Also, I hope this is a wake up for the review industry at large who has largely overlooked the glaring issues that extend far past the bugs. A good overview of the state of the game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bexA1Oolp0k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bexA1Oolp0k
- dogma1138 6y ago
  The performance issues might be fixable the gameplay issues won’t be. The combat is broken and gets really really boring, the AI is buggy as hell and too simple and it almost seems like they used the same AI from TW3 and it doesn’t understands guns. You can hide behind cover and headshot everyone with the sniper rifle on hard 10-15 levels above you can kill everyone with one shot. I’ve one shotted a boss with the sniper rifle (the kingpin looking pimp guy) whilst the quest was still rated as “very high danger”. Other things are also simply mind boggling for example you can get a rocket launcher upgrade instead of grenades that has infinite ammo and no cooldown basically allowing you to spam as much as you want, you can also replace the HE/incendiary warheads with a tranq dart allowing you to basically one shot all human enemies too. The narrative mechanics are also completely boring and they do not work. And there is an extremely obvious solution to that that not only works perfectly from a narrative and story progression perspective but also introduces a lot of interesting game mechanics.
  - krageon 6y ago
    Everything you've listed here is patchable. The problems with AI (while definitely present) are extremely overstated. The AI flanks, uses their weapons at ranges you expect (shotguns up close, approaching with walls at the side, etc) and generally appears to work together. They won't write you a treatise on the nature of human suffering, that is true.
    - dogma1138 6y ago
      The core narrative is broken, I don't want to go into too much spoilers. I don't know what AI you've encountered but it doesn't do squat it stays there to be picked off with a sniper rifle or a revolver especially if you use the slow time implant it's obnoxiously easy.
mkl95 6y ago
The entrepreneurs of 2077 will learn about this game as an example of poor corporate vision and why you shouldn't ship a dysfunctional product.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
  Unlikely. This is hardly the first dysfunctional AAA videogame rushed out before it was ready causing a PR disaster.
  - mkl95 6y ago
    - This is the first time ever Sony has pulled a game from Playstation Store. The game has literally caused Sony to review their policies. - CDProjekt worked on this game for 8 years, with employees crunching for several months in exchange for a share of the company's yearly profits. It's worth mentioning that the latter happened during a global pandemic. - The game's release was delayed several times, leading to more crunch. - The game infamously failed to add seizure warnings at launch. Other huge failures I can think of are Brink back in 2011 and No Man's Sky more recently, but this is orders of magnitude worse.
- izacus 6y ago
  CDProjekt reported that they've recouped the cost of development in hours after sales started. Financially, it's a smashing success. What's the lesson here?
  - neaden 6y ago
    That was before refunds though. It may no longer be true.
  - oneeyedpigeon 6y ago
    Well, their share price has dropped and they've taken a huge reputational hit — it's not just about one-off sales.
    - 6y ago
pjmlp 6y ago
Another good example that crunching doesn't pay out.
- Hamuko 6y ago
  Considering how prelevant crunching is in the games industry, I wouldn't really draw conclusions. Apparently Red Dead Redemption 2 (among other Rockstar titles) also had massive crunch and it was released to critical acclaim.
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    Unfortunely those are the ones that keep the crunshing culture alive and push people aside from the industry, feeding on 20-somethings that want to prove themselves. My sympathy goes to the iGDA members trying to fix this.
h_anna_h 6y ago
I keep reading the worst about cyberpunk on hn but when my soulmate played it (on pc) they really enjoyed it and only stumbled upon very few bugs. As for seizures apparently it had a warning at the start about them.
- Rebelgecko 6y ago
  The console versions are supposedly significantly worse than PC, to the point of being unplayable
  - ian0 6y ago
    4-5 hours through on a ps4 and it crashed twice, with one or two graphics glitches. Im really enjoying it and think it looks amazing, but then again I walk around slowly so maybe missing the rendering issues. Obviously though there are some issues effecting some players far more than others, could have got lucky.
  - maroonblazer 6y ago
    I'm playing it on an Xbox Series X and have only run into a couple bugs that weren't game-breaking. What surprises me is how lackluster the visuals are compared to last-gen games like Horizon Zero Dawn and Ghost of Tsushima. I'm playing both on a PS4 Pro and Cyberpunk doesn't hold a candle to either of them graphically.
    - patja 6y ago
      I just finished playing The Witcher 3 on Xbox and feel Cyberpunk is far far below the visual quality of The Witcher. Partly because the HDR is so washed out, but there simply isn't nearly as much detail to it.
    - d3nj4l 6y ago
      The game looks gorgeous on PC. Probably doesn't look as good on the consoles.
  - dfox 6y ago
ReDeiPirati 6y ago
The game seems really cool, but is way too rushed. I'm sure that for Dec 2021 it will be very cool to play. The Witcher 3 was full of bugs as well when released, but at least was 90% playable.
- willis936 6y ago
  Well, you see, Cyberpunk 2077 is based off of a 1988 tabletop RPG named “Cyberpunk” that took place in 2020. They wanted to release in 2020 to honor this significance. It has nothing to do with lying to consumers and maximizing profits from a holiday season during a pandemic with new consoles and hot new GPUs. /s
  - ReDeiPirati 6y ago
    > It has nothing to do with lying to consumers and maximizing profits from ... CD Project Red is a For-Profit company (like EA, Ubisoft, etc...), please stop defending them when they have clearly lied to old-gen gamers. They are not the paladins of gaming as their great marketing reinforced when waved the success of The Witcher 3 (btw great narrative, but what a shitty combat system). Missing the holiday season for them would have impacted their short-term revenue and deflated the hype-train. Actually, they did something worst, but I'm 100% sure that they will recover: they know how to do games. Their brand is clearly damaged and their message "look we are the saviour of gaming" is lost forever.
    - seba_dos1 6y ago
      "/s" denotes sarcasm.
      - ReDeiPirati 6y ago
        lol, thank you! I didn't know.
  - msh 6y ago
    That's the second edition. The original took place in 2013.
IronRanger 6y ago
They're not pulling it due to seizures, they're pulling it due to CDPR offer refunds, when the Sony policy is explicitly no-refunds if you have already played the game.
- wing-_-nuts 6y ago
  >Sony policy is explicitly no-refunds if you have already played the game. Oh, it's worse than that. Sony policy is no refunds if you've even downloaded the game. I bought the last of us 2 over the summer, and reading more about the story line, I wasn't ready for it. I tried to get a refund, and sony denied it. I hadn't even started the game.
traveler01 6y ago
Obviously CDPR is more directed to the PC Gaming scene, where the game actually excels apart from some bugs. Most people who critizise this game are in the gaming scene for the trends or just failed to see other RPGs being launched. RPGs are games very complex, every one launched until now that is considered good also had a rough launch like this one (being hyped AF also didn't helped...). Also, people shoulnd't expect a next-gen game to run well on prev-gen hardware, specially when we're speaking on the PS4 flat released back at 2013.
- dagw 6y ago
  Also, people shoulnd't expect a next-gen game to run well on prev-gen hardware That's the whole point of consoles. I absolutely expect to be able to buy any game where the box says "PS4" and have it be playable on a "PS4".
  - traveler01 6y ago
    I mean that's the thing, some people say it's playable others say it isnt. I mean haven't tried it and played on my Xbox Series X and it's fine. I'm not the usual console gamer, I just bought my first console and afaik these consoles aren't just plug and play anymore. Refund policies need to change IMO.
    - overkalix 6y ago
      If a game is marketed towards PC and multiple consoles, I expect the game to run equally well on all platforms. This isn't the case. Stop relativizing the issues, please.
      - traveler01 6y ago
        I just love how people are so selective with Cyberpunk even though other triple-A titles get away with worse. Specially since the game was released 2 weeks ago and still receiving updates very fast which means in a month it will run fine.
- 6y ago
deleted 6y ago
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v4dok 6y ago
The problem were the expectations. CDPR built such high expectations from the game that it was ridiculous. And they were in high-estee, W3 was amazing so people thought that such a gamer-centric company will keep their word. Of course everyone with half a brain knew that a lot of these were infeasible in such a depth as they advertised but on the other hand, the game was in dev for 8 years, so why not? Then the game came out and people (like me) waiting for it for 7 years got half-baked game that had so many things obviously cut really late that is painfully obvious. Features sitting there, teasing something you were promised but don't get. Adding this to the debacle of last gen consoles issues, and ridiculous AI, zero replayability and you get a lot of angry gamers. And I believe rightfully so.
- MattRix 6y ago
  The expectations have nothing to do with this. It’s 100% due to the issues on the last gen consoles, and specifically the PS4 in this case. Horrible graphics and performance, tons of bugs, and way too many actual crashes.
- throw_m239339 6y ago
  > The problem were the expectations. No, the problem is CDPR building all the expectations with lies. I'm not going to link to reddit but there is a thread on the cyberpunk sub listing all the lies Cyberpunk said before release. Nobody forced CDPR to lie about the content of the game, especially all the unique NPC scripting stuff that doesn't exist. It's not just the bugs and the performance. CDPR sold something that wasn't in the game at release. It must have been an horror for the developers pressured by management to do the impossible, only to be met with contempt by both the management and the gamers in the end because management can always blame developers "for not doing enough" even though every dev must have crunched for 2 years straight. Also these dev sweatshops usually have high turnover, so they are incapable of retaining experienced developers because they don't value that, only rookies they can squeeze to the bone then throw away when they are burned out. The state of that game is the result of all that culture.
- panpanna 6y ago
  CDPR didn't create the hype. Witcher 3 did that. Also, it's just a game folks. Get your refund and move on. (In response to the guy who wrote he was crying himself to sleep every night after the cyberpunk disappointment)
pawelos 6y ago
It looks that this was agreed with CDPR: https://twitter.com/CyberpunkGame/status/1339846154176126976 https://twitter.com/CyberpunkGame/status/1339846154176126976
shadowgovt 6y ago
I'll be interested to see whether the Stadia version is more like a console experience or more like a PC.
- CydeWeys 6y ago
  It's already out and apparently it works fine. You're basically remoting into a PC version of the game.
  - garretraziel 6y ago
    Interestingly, I've read somewhere here on HN that Stadia (which runs on Linux) version is basically a PS version (= FreeBSD version), stripped from dependency on Sony's libraries (and, from what I've got from the reactions, also with better graphical settings).
    - CydeWeys 6y ago
      You might know more about this than I do. Regardless, it does sound like the Stadia version is running well, which is probably a result of it running on hardware that is actually capable of running it, unlike the previous gen consoles. The current gen consoles are also having better luck running it.
- Grazester 6y ago
  Publications already indicated that the Stadia version is good, if that is what you are alluding to. "It may be hard to believe, but the Google Stadia version of Cyberpunk 2077 may be the best way to play for most players right now. Unless you have a 20 or 30 Series Nvidia GPU or comparable AMD card or you were lucky enough to get a PS5 or Xbox Series X / S, this game will not be performing anywhere close to how it was designed to." https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/10/22167303/cyberpunk-2077-ps5-console-google-stadia https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/10/22167303/cyberpunk-2077-...
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    Interesting. This was, essentially, one of the goals of Stadia---consolidating the software and computation centrally should allow the Stadia version to run on whatever hardware is necessary to make it run well.
aequitas 6y ago
I'm playing this game on Google's Stadia and must say I'm impressed and having a blast. Besides some minor bugs this game streams flawless in 4k to my Mac (which technically isn't even a supported platform for the game, but is for Stadia). I bought the game during last weeks promotion with a free Chromecast Ultra and controller, so I would have at least had some hardware for cheap should the game itself suck, but the game is fun as well. I also no longer have any doubt that streamed gaming has a future and am actually looking forward to 5G coverage so I can play on mobile.
- dobladov 6y ago
  Same case for me, I never do preorders but the offer of Chromecast + controller was good enough, the game runs amazing, I don't have to bother with updates, space on my device, all games can be played in any screen I have without having to worry about hardware requirements. Honestly the only case where I don't see this having adoption is for competitive gaming.
- validuser 6y ago
  Is my adblocker broken?
- sgtnasty 6y ago
  Runs great on Stadia compared to PC (in my experience playing on both platforms). Google needs to make something of this. I even tried running it from Chrome on my old MacBookPro 2015 and was thrilled it worked and was a great experience.
  - chaostheory 6y ago
    Out of curiosity what are your PC’s specs?
    - sgtnasty 6y ago
      Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-7960X CPU @ 2.80GHz 32.0 GB RAM Windows 10 Pro, 64-bit 20H2 GeForce GTX 1080 Ti, ver 460.89
keiferski 6y ago
Ultimately I think the rushed launch will turn out to have been a correct decision, or at least not as horrible as it seems. The holiday season, especially during a pandemic when millions are stuck at home, is simply a financial opportunity too good to pass up. Launching in a few months would have lost those sales, while delaying the game (again) until holiday season 2021 would have destroyed a lot of hype and anticipation. From what I’ve seen, the game is still doing well in terms of sales. Tough situation, but considering the options, an understandable move. It’s a classic example of being forced to choose between two bad decisions because you failed to make an adequate plan in the first place.
- Kapura 6y ago
  It's difficult to view this as a rushed launch when the game was originally scheduled to release in April, and has received multiple delays, supposedly to fix the last remaining bugs.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    No, it's not. Multiple delays mean that not only couldn't they set enough time initially, they were repeatedly incapable of setting enough time when extending the timeline, or unwilling to do so. Which makes it quite easy to view as rushed. Its a pretty common pattern for rushed releases.
- mywittyname 6y ago
  I highly doubt it. The gaming industry today is very different from what it was even ten years ago. It used to be that games made a healthy chunk of their income in the first month of launch. Back then it made total sense to rush a crappy game out before the holiday season. However, today, the best selling games do so at steady rates over the span of years. The first month or so of sales may only represent 10-20% of total sales over five years. The Witcher 3 looks like it sold around 1.5 million preorders, but almost 30 million units in total. All the bad publicity around this game is going to reduce gross sales of CP2077 and ensure that the public is leery of pre-ordering a CDPR in the future.
aranelsurion 6y ago
I think most of the negative sentiment against Cyberpunk 2077 comes from three sources: 1) Some players expected this to be cyberpunk-themed RDR2/GTA5. It turns out it's nothing like that, it's more like a new Deus Ex game. 2) It just doesn't run on consoles. It's a very inferior experience, unless you're the type who can be happy with 2020 movies in .3gp format in your old Nokia phone. Having watched a video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5pHpQqhmR4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5pHpQqhmR4) of how it runs on PS4, I now clearly see where all this hate comes from. 3) There are some bugs and quirks, depending on your platform and luck. I haven't had any major issues, though I know for some it's just unplayable at the moment. This will likely get much better after patches hit. On a personal note, I like the game a lot. Yes it has its quirks, and I generally feel it's a less refined/polished game compared to what Witcher 3 was, but still it's an extremely fun, really well-made game. Combat is great, world is enticing, story-telling swings between good enough and great. For one reason or another whenever I launch the game another 5 hours passes without me noticing. FPS camera and general art direction also helps with suspension of disbelief, and the game is as immersive as it gets. It's a shame that this game now has such a bad reputation for relatively minor & mostly avoidable reasons.
- dustingetz 6y ago
  we expect what was advertised to us. It turns out the marketing was all lies! Companies should be held accountable for lying.
  - Pet_Ant 6y ago
    Honestly just curious, but I when played on PC/next-gen what do you feel was advertised but not delivered?
    - LeoNatan25 6y ago
      https://i.imgur.com/vtdxe02.png https://i.imgur.com/vtdxe02.png This is what was promised by CDP. None of that has been delivered. It’s a shallow, juvenile experience, with very little depth, bad story, repetitive and useless side missions, non-consequential choices, brain dead AI, barren city with zero point in exploration, terrible inventory system, bad shooting mechanics, bad skill system, ridiculously retarded driving and racing mechanics—just to name a few things. And it’s ridiculously unoptimized and buggy.
mongrelion 6y ago
Can somebody post a tldr of what's going on? Like, why are people pissed and why are they giving refunds?
- Hamuko 6y ago
  Cyberpunk 2077 was released on PC, Stadia, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It performs quite poorly on the base PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, and basically to get a good console experience, you need a PlayStation 5 or an Xbox Series, where you'd play the game in backwards-compatible mode (there's no PlayStation 5 / Xbox Series versions yet). CD Projekt Red never showed any footage shot on the consoles and didn't send out any review codes out for the console versions before release. All of the reviews that came out before the release were for the PC version and even the PC version wasn't allowed to show any recorded footage in their videos (only the publisher-provided B-roll). The game is also quite buggy and unfinished as well, on every platform. Many were also disappointed by the actual game. There's for example some talk about the AI, which is rather subpar. Combine the poor performance on the consoles it came out on, the deliberate attempt at hiding the true state of the console versions, the multitude of bugs and glitches and some of the lackluster aspects of the game, and you'll find yourself with a lot of upset people. As to why Sony is giving refunds, I'm guessing it's because CD Projekt Red made a statement promising big patches for console versions next year. However, in the same statement, they said that people who didn't want to wait could "opt for a refund" and should contact Microsoft and Sony for digital refunds. However, we later learned that there was not agreement between CDPR and Microsoft/Sony, and they were just talking about the standard store refund policies. In Sony's case, you can't get a refund if you've already downloaded the game. This lead to a lot of people being angry at Sony for not getting the refund they were "promised". On Microsoft's side, people were getting mixed, but slightly better results. Seems like Sony decided to go with the nuclear option after getting bombarded with refund requests after CDPR's statement about refunds.
- aranelsurion 6y ago
  tl;dr game performs very badly on consoles, and in an attempt to save face CDPR promised refunds to players.
LeicaLatte 6y ago
Early access. It’s a great way to release software. CD Projekt missed a trick here by not taking this route.
- cplantijn 6y ago
  Early access is usually great for multiplayer games. For single player, story driven games, early access serves as a way to spoil the game for customers who intend to buy at release.
  - Quarrelsome 6y ago
    ye but for sandbox games I feel like its pretty important because the scope of them is far too broad (especially if you add in all the platforms and languages). Maybe save the main questline as the first major piece of DLC to avoid that problem?
  - cygx 6y ago
    Note that Larian's been doing it for Original Sin and Baldur's Gate. It seems to have worked out ok for them so far.
- LeicaLatte 6y ago
  All software is early access in my opinion. Time to embrace that rather than run away.
jvanderbot 6y ago
FWIW, I tried it on Stadia, NVIDIA, and a reasonably recent gaming PC. Local (even on minimum settings) > NVIDIA > Stadia and there's a big gap on each of those. The game is already a little spongey / laggy, and an internet connection exacerbates that.
- 0-_-0 6y ago
  By NVIDIA do you mean GeForce NOW?
- benhurmarcel 6y ago
  It depends heavily on your connection though
mrkramer 6y ago
I think the game is good, it is just bugged a lot.
lsiunsuex 6y ago
-- What was the purpose of the crunch / rushing this out the door ? -- What was to be gained from it? Holiday sales? Delivering a product not delayed again? Management bonuses? Did the developers get bonuses for delivering "on time"? -- At what cost did the crunch / delivering the product cause the team of developers? Now they need to keep working; fix the bugs; get this back in the store(s) and try to make everyone happy? We go through our share of crunches. Bugs always get through and we have to fix them of course, but nothing as bad as some of the stuff I've read about this. Management never realizes burnout is a real thing. I feel for these developers. It's double sided. Keep delaying the game / product and people get pissed off it's delayed. Ship it, and now they're pissed off its buggy. So now, everyone (programmers) are burned out; management is probably fuming over being removed from the store(s) and everyone needs to smile and get back to it, probably as a worse crunch than before. What a shitty way to spend the holidays. It's like getting made at a company building your house that your water pipes leak but you rushed them to get it done because of some arbitrary move in date. Take the time; do it right; do a good job. Cut corners and rush stuff and deal with the consequences.
- nebulous1 6y ago
  > Holiday sales? Ding ding ding. Missing christmas would be a huge deal. That said, I think there's a tendency for conversations around this to ignore the finances and suggest that financial concerns shouldn't have any impact on the game's release. There's no doubt that CDPR got the balance on this wrong, but the need to find a balance is just reality.
  - Der_Einzige 6y ago
    They said in an investors call that there was no pressure to release for the holidays. They could have spent more time fixing this but choose not to
    - ketzo 6y ago
      I mean.. they can say that all they want, but they're a game studio that releases one game at a time. This game was "supposed" to release 8 months ago. Financially speaking, it just doesn't make sense that they have any room here.
apexalpha 6y ago
For all the negativity surrounding this game I have mostly positivity for Google Stadia. I bought the game + free chromecast & controller and Stadia has truly surprised me. It's amazing how low the input lag is on a streamed game. For this game in particular the bugs and performance issues don't seem present as they are on PS4 and Xbox One.
lubesGordi 6y ago
I'm so not surprised. I've worked in a mobile game shop before and seen how pushing ends up with devs getting burnt out. They've been pushing now for years, probably since the very beginning. That kind of thing will just grind everyone to a crawl and if it doesn't ever let up then your team will just be crawling forever. You have to let people get into the rhythm of development and the key is setting reasonable expectations of your team based on what you know that rhythm to be. All the hype here, all the pressure to put out a great game, can be detrimental to development without proper leadership filtering/framing it.
umvi 6y ago
It pays to be a patient gamer. I'm sure the $5 steam sale version of Cyberpunk 2077 5 years from now will be much better than the $60 release day version.
- shrimp_emoji 6y ago
  Less bugs, all DLCs, runnable on mediocre hardware, and even more amenable to Wine/Proton. It's an insane marshmallow test.
- ipnon 6y ago
  Even 1 year from now. Witcher 3 was also a buggy mess on launch.
- hydroreadsstuff 6y ago
  The landscape around sales seems to be changing. Specifically Square Enix and From Software are putting their games on sale extremely late or only lightly discounted. Final Fantasy 7 and 8 (21+ years old) are still 13€, Sekiro (1.5 Years old) is 40€. I waited 3 years for Dark Souls 3 (mainly because I didn't care enough) to be on sale for ~20€. I remember I got Dark Souls 1 for 3€. Just some anecdata. I think publishers are aware that their games are valueable longer longer, and they don't need those $5 buyers really. Perhaps this only applies to very popular games. TLDR: I wouldn't bet on this being on sale for $5 ever
  - umvi 6y ago
    I threw out the $5 figure because I recently purchased Doom (2016) for $5 at a sale, which is a AAA title that sold for a premium on release day. I wouldn't have bought it if it weren't so cheap because I'm not usually into gory shooters.
  - baumandm 6y ago
    Agreed, but there will be a GOTY edition on sale for $30 a year from now.
  - nitwit005 6y ago
    What those two companies have in common is that they have made remakes or remasterings of their old titles. They may be worried that lowering the price may effect the perceived value of those releases. A Demon Souls remake being sold at full price might seem shockingly expensive if the origional was selling for $5.
trey-jones 6y ago
Does anyone remember The Witcher: Enhanced Edition ? This strikes me as similar, potentially. For those that weren't around back in 2008, if memory serves CDPR earned a lot of good faith in the video game community by investing heavily into making an already released game (The Witcher) much, much better, and then releasing it for free to anyone who bought the original. I know that AMP contains stories about how reviewers were misled, or duped into misleading prospective buyers of the game. Maybe it's true, but I take anything that shows up from AMP with a good pinch of salt. All I'm trying to say is not to write it off yet. It doesn't seem to be an irrecoverable disaster, not that I have played it or will play it in the next decade, probably.
pwthornton 6y ago
I was planning on holding off on getting this for my Xbox One X until I can get ahold of a Series X, but I wasn't sure if I'd be able to hold out. But now there is no way I am playing this game for six months or whatever it takes to make it a good game on consoles.
Asmod4n 6y ago
It's the first game which brings the Nintendo Switch PC Port experience to Playstation and Xbox.
am_lu 6y ago
Been watching someone play the game, recorded stuff on youtube, and i`m really enjoying it. Better than movies. Anyway i`m there for the art and lore, the full experience is not worth spending thousands on a dedicated gaming hardware. Skilled player is using a high end gaming PC to run the game, there are some bugs but nothing too serious. the stream i`m wathching here, this from original soundtrack for the game in Polish (yes in been created by Polish studio) https://www.youtube.com/user/Corle1st/videos?disable_polymer=1 https://www.youtube.com/user/Corle1st/videos?disable_polymer...
LeoNatan25 6y ago
The jokes write themselves with this game: https://www.reddit.com/r/cyberpunkgame/comments/kflkud/i_am_now_certified_bug_free/ https://www.reddit.com/r/cyberpunkgame/comments/kflkud/i_am_...
renewiltord 6y ago
People who make playing games part of their identity seem to be an overwrought bunch. Very hard to relate to their emotional response.
f6v 6y ago
People here argue whether it's a terrible game or not. I think such a division is a sign there's something seriously wrong with a game. I don't remember anything like that when RDR2 came out. Fallout 76 or No Mans Sky on the other hand...
kfarr 6y ago
Devilering a great game is harder than it looks!
emmanueloga_ 6y ago
This game seems like the perfect candidate to buy late. Just wait a few months, maybe a year, it will probably be discounted at some point and it will include tens or hundreds of patches by then.
nx7487 6y ago
I've played ~20 hours on PC, and what I dislike most is the long, downright tiring dialog sequences. It's like, half of the game is just sitting there, watching a movie, where you press "1" or "2" to decide what V says.
- Miraste 6y ago
  What were you expecting? That's one of the main selling points.
itslennysfault 6y ago
Guess I'm one of the lucky ones. I'm 40+ hours in on PS4 with no major issues except for a hard crash every few hours. Which is SUPER annoying when it happens, but I'm not seeing a ton of glitches otherwise outside of little things like talking corpses.
oarabbus_ 6y ago
Someone or a few at CDPR should lose their jobs over this. Why they didn't make this a PS5/XSX exclusive is absolutely beyond me. It was very, very clear this game did not run on last-gen console hardware.
- lambda_obrien 6y ago
  No one needs to lose a job over a game, let's chock it up to a mistake, learn a lesson, and move on. Losing a job shouldn't be a threat to be perfect.
  - wincy 6y ago
    Is it chock like in “chock full” or chalk like “chalk it up” (like on a chalk board?) Sorry this isn’t adding to the conversation, but I’m genuinely curious.
    - oarabbus_ 6y ago
      It's "chalk it up" as in on a board or on the sidewalk.
      - lambda_obrien 6y ago
        I learned something new today, thanks.
  - oarabbus_ 6y ago
    I never said a game developer should lose their job. Someone, or several people in Product and Marketing absolutely should though. CDPR share price is down an absolutely staggering 40%+, absolutely massive hit to the company valuation, Sony has an egg on their face and has to issue refunds for this unplayable mess, and all for what, because management decided the game had to be released prior to the holiday season rather than a working product because they wanted holiday sales, which they're now losing money on via refunds? I don't work in game development but in my industry, that is absolutely grounds for putting some heads on the chopping block.
twblalock 6y ago
The amazing thing to me is that a game that has been in development for so long runs so badly on consoles that were new when development started. I bet they spent a lot of time updating the engine and graphics over the past 8 years, and as a result the game barely runs on the hardware they were using when they started writing it.
- sedatk 6y ago
  I don't think they've been developing for the past 8 years. The Witcher 3 came out in 2015, and its DLCs in 2016. I think it's been developed in the last four years.
- fulafel 6y ago
  A lot of performance work often happens in the later stages of production, and said work is not something that has a very predictable payoff per time or money invested.
linkdd 6y ago
The whining about this game is becoming annoying. Why are people so entitled ? "But it's not what they promised" don't buy it then "But the game is bugged" don't buy it then "But the game is expensive and it should not be" don't buy it then There are tons of game stores, and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM provide a refund policy. Why would you whine about your game ? Just. Get. A. Refund. "But they lied about the game" It's a game, go scream with the same energy at your lying politicians. I will probably get downvoted for this comment, but the buzz around this game is lasting too long IMHO. I freaking hate yellow now.
- mynameisvlad 6y ago
  > There are tons of game stores, and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM provide a refund policy. Why would you whine about your game ? Just. Get. A. Refund. Uh, what? Until this announcement, SIE flat out refused people getting refunds. On Steam, you have to have played for less than 2 hours to qualify for a refund. Returns become extremely limited or downright impossible for opened physical games. https://www.polygon.com/2020/12/17/22179460/cyberpunk-2077-refunds-requested-refused-cd-projekt-red-xbox-playstation-gamestop https://www.polygon.com/2020/12/17/22179460/cyberpunk-2077-r... The fanboy army defending CDPR is honestly more annoying than people justifiably being upset with an unfinished, overhyped game.
  - linkdd 6y ago
    I'm not defending CDPR. What they did as a business is not honest, viable, and does not profit to anybody. What you describe is flat out illegal in some countries.
    - mynameisvlad 6y ago
      And yet there's multiple articles about retailers either sticking to or making exceptions to their policies for the game: https://psxextreme.com/news/gamestop-to-refuse-cyberpunk-2077-refunds-redirects-customers-to-cdpr/ https://psxextreme.com/news/gamestop-to-refuse-cyberpunk-207... https://www.pcgamer.com/microsoft-and-best-buy-are-now-offering-cyberpunk-2077-refunds/ https://www.pcgamer.com/microsoft-and-best-buy-are-now-offer... Or the fact that CDPR is going to pay for refunds out of their own pockets: https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-cdpr-says-it-will-refund-copies-if-players-cant-get-them-from-stores https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-cdpr-says-it-wil...
afrcnc 6y ago
Ubisoft execs laughing their asses off right now
AsyncAwait 6y ago
I find the strong backlash weird considering how customer-friendly CDP generally is and how well regarded Sky rim, a vastly buggier game from a predatory company, is.
hfkldjsjfkdj 6y ago
If you aren't happy with the bugs, just pretend it is delayed again. Problem solved.
cwkoss 6y ago
I don't think Cyberpunk requires an internet connection. Can anyone who has it on PS disconnect from network, refund, and then continue playing? (Maybe it's too bad on console for anyone to want to keep playing though)
cblconfederate 6y ago
I'm not a gamer but now kind of interested. Is that the intented effect?
ptcampbell 6y ago
Anyone know if GOG will process refunds? My cloud-sync has been munted from the get-go. Via Geforce Now the files have gone missing between sessions. Not to mention the numerous bugs I've encountered making certain missions unplayable (unable to advance, AI stuck behind cover etc.)

379 points by Kapura 6y ago

The seizure-inducing effect was fixed back on the 11th. https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-104-hotfix-released-for-pc-and-ps4 https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-104-hotfix-relea...

falcolas 6y ago
It should have never been in there in the first place. No matter how many disclaimers you pop up, you shouldn’t be intentionally showing a seizure-inducing pattern of lights.
- oneeyedpigeon 6y ago
  I'm not sure there's any evidence to suggest it was intentional. What possible reason could there be for that?
  - falcolas 6y ago
    > I'm not sure there's any evidence to suggest it was intentional. From the original article calling out the problem. >>> When "suiting up" for a BD, especially with Judy, V will be given a headset that is meant to onset the instance. The headset fits over both eyes and features a rapid onslaught of white and red blinking LEDs, much like the actual device neurologists use in real life to trigger a seizure when they need to trigger one for diagnosis purposes. ... This is a pattern of lights designed to trigger an epileptic episode and it very much did that in my own personal playthrough. <<< Emphasis mine. > What possible reason could there be for that? Probably for the same reason devs model decapitations and other deadly effects off real world references: using real world lighting patterns that are known to effect the brain adds a sense of authenticity to the world. Even if the intent was not malicious, the device and lighting pattern are too spot-on to be mere coincidence.
    - oneeyedpigeon 6y ago
      Oh, I'm aware of the problem, and I agree that it was a terrible oversight. I'm just saying I don't think they actually intended/expected to cause players to suffer epileptic attacks because that would probably result in the biggest lawsuit in history.
- bloody-crow 6y ago
  I've played through this section before and after the patch and I have to say that the original seizure inducing effect looked a lot cooler. I don't mind it being replaced with a milder version, and I would have never noticed if the game released with it from the start, but having seen the original I'd like an option to switch back to it based on just how cool the flashing lights looked. > you shouldn’t be intentionally showing a seizure-inducing pattern of lights I think the intention was to show a cool flickering that looks like it'd mess up your brain (which is somewhat the intent of BD in game). The fact that the flickering also caused seizures, is clearly an oversight.

djohnston 6y ago

Wow what a disaster. I hope leadership is held to account for such poor judgement.

ramenstor 6y ago
Right? Like how could you make this many bad calls to get your game to the point that one of the main platform holders has yanked the game off the store and issue refunds. CDPR rushed it out the door to get that end of fiscal year revenue (unless I'm mistaken) and satisfy impatient investors, only to lose a lot of good will with their fan base, miss out on game of the year awards and recognition, and to be a meme generator for people to poke fun at the game. Yikes, that's a series of unfortunate events and some really bad management. Someone should get the chop over there.
- Hamuko 6y ago
  I imagine they're going to be losing a lot of goodwill with the investors as well, after saying that the game runs "surprisingly well" on the PS4 and Xbox One, and how that despite announcing that customers can choose to get a refund, they're not "encouraging gamers to get refunds". And now due to that announcement, Sony has pulled the game entirely from the store since CD Projekt just diverted their angry customers to Sony's customer service reps.
- djohnston 6y ago
  Yeah I was tongue in cheek, I would bet that leadership will not be held to account, as that is by and large an anomaly in today's world. I'm going to buy some of their stock if it drops a little further, same as I did for Boeing.
Ericson2314 6y ago
The only way for that to happen is the workers to strike with whatever additional wind is now in their sails.

hindsightbias 6y ago

Can we get a Duke Nukem update now?

ProfessorLayton 6y ago

This is incredible, and must be devastating for the development team, especially after all that crunching. As someone who's worked on a (digital-only) title for Xbox One, I'm surprised this game got through the certification process in the first place. From our experience the platform holders are pretty involved, and we regularly gave MS updates on everything from monetization, to UX and controls, to extensive reviews for updates, which caused headaches when the client lagged behind our other platforms. Unfortunately for the developers, the fact of the matter is that there are tens of millions of base PS4s and Xbox Ones out there, and gamers got a bait and switch during this launch. As terrible as it is for them to get the rug pulled under them, Sony risks a lot more by not issuing refunds for incredibly broken products. A lot of the appeal of console gaming is the relative plug-and-play factor that comes with it, and the software regularly costs more to boot — via higher pricing, lack of sales, or both.

pjmlp 6y ago
Actually I see it as positive, because it proves that crunching isn't worth it, if this what happens coming out of burned developers. The industry keeps bleeding to many people that could have made huge contributions, but decided to invest into industries where crushing isn't part of the culture. For example, I rather do GUIs and 3D stuff for boring enteprise projects than spending endless nights and weekends fixing bugs on engine code.
- drchopchop 6y ago
  Yup, left AAA a long time ago. Way more money, work-life balance, and job opportunities available when you leave the game industry. It exploits developers who are initially passionate about the field, and then leaves them in a state where it's very difficult to leave (because it's very specific skills that don't easily transfer to other industries)
  - alfalfasprout 6y ago
    If you work on game engines, trading is a fantastic transition since you'll already have high performance C++ experience.

spicymaki 6y ago

What a disaster. I feel sad for the staff that spent all of that crunch time on that quixotic fever dream.

orbifold 6y ago
On PC it is a pretty decent game, nice missions, very nice graphics and art. Personally I like it better than other open world games that I played. It feels more immersive than most of them, as long as you don't go out of your way to break the immersion. In GTA and Red Dead Redemption 2 it is far more fun to create havoc than to play any of the missions in Cyberpunk 2077 there is basically almost no point doing anything but the missions, but I still feel far more connected and invested in the character than in either of the two other games.
- imiric 6y ago
  > In GTA and Red Dead Redemption 2 it is far more fun to create havoc than to play any of the missions While non-storyline gameplay is definitely more fun in Rockstar games, I think the mission and sidequest gameplay is way more fun than CP2077's as well. Consider this earlier mission in GTAV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ikop7td88ks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ikop7td88ks It involves a car chase, NPCs jumping in and out of moving vehicles, a boat mast swinging into traffic, shooting while driving, etc. This is all done smoothly, with no animation glitches or jankiness. A mission after that involves a bicycle race, swimming and boarding a boat, followed by an intense jet ski race: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcqvAgzr3To https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcqvAgzr3To So far in my admittedly short ~12h playtime of CP2077 on PC I haven't seen anything equally as engaging, well designed or just plain fun. Most of the missions involve shooting galleries interspersed by cutscenes to showcase action set pieces, and there's a lot of on-rails shooting from the passenger seat, which feels like gameplay from several generations ago, not from a next-gen title. I don't understand complaints that it shouldn't be compared to GTA given that CDPR themselves describe it as an "open-world action-adventure story", so comparing it to games that set the bar for open-world gameplay is only fair, and in my opinion it falls very, very short on those terms. Just like it does on its RPG elements. Like others mentioned, it falls short when compared to even the original Deus Ex, let alone the more recent installments. This is probably why CDPR decided to avoid marketing it primarily as an RPG in 2019: https://i.imgur.com/oDldUQQ.png https://i.imgur.com/oDldUQQ.png All in all this was a massive disappointment for me, and I actively avoided trailers and marketing to avoid the hype. Even if all the bugs and performance issues are fixed hopefully a few months from now, the gameplay will still be mediocre at best. The only thing I'm partially still interested in is the story, though from what I've read that seems to be underwhelming as well. This was the cherry on top of 2020. What a year.

trianglem 6y ago

They shouldn’t even bother offering it on the PS4 and the old XBox. It plays well on the PC and I presume the newer consoles.

unstatusthequo 6y ago
Running x570 chipset with 128gb RAM and RTX 3090 with AMD 5900x and updated non beta Windows. Crashes every ten minutes. Wish it played well....
- ericlewis 6y ago
  You might want to check your thermals or OC settings. I’ve the same setup except running a 3080, hasn’t crashed once in the hours I’ve been playing it. Nary a glitch, but they do happen.
- dexterlagan 6y ago
  i7-10k 1080Ti 32 Gb RAM latest nVidia drivers. Not a single crash since launch. Been playing many hours a day. I saw a few glitches, but overall extremely stable and bug-free considering the amount of detail on screen. It's too bad they weren't able to optimize for older gear on launch.
- xondono 6y ago
  Seriously? Mine: X570, 3700x, 5700XT Cpu & GPU OC with watercooling. I’ve seen 3-4 crashes (in the same place) in about ~8h of gameplay.
- orbifold 6y ago
  It crashed a few times on me but never in missions or while I was doing anything important. Have a 1080 GTX and 32gb RAM it runs very well at 1080p and pretty high graphics settings.
- rado 6y ago
  Crashed once on my PC in a few hours of gameplay.
- 6y ago

acdanger 6y ago

Incredible. And I don't think this is something a year of patches will be able to fix. Also, I hope this is a wake up for the review industry at large who has largely overlooked the glaring issues that extend far past the bugs. A good overview of the state of the game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bexA1Oolp0k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bexA1Oolp0k

dogma1138 6y ago
The performance issues might be fixable the gameplay issues won’t be. The combat is broken and gets really really boring, the AI is buggy as hell and too simple and it almost seems like they used the same AI from TW3 and it doesn’t understands guns. You can hide behind cover and headshot everyone with the sniper rifle on hard 10-15 levels above you can kill everyone with one shot. I’ve one shotted a boss with the sniper rifle (the kingpin looking pimp guy) whilst the quest was still rated as “very high danger”. Other things are also simply mind boggling for example you can get a rocket launcher upgrade instead of grenades that has infinite ammo and no cooldown basically allowing you to spam as much as you want, you can also replace the HE/incendiary warheads with a tranq dart allowing you to basically one shot all human enemies too. The narrative mechanics are also completely boring and they do not work. And there is an extremely obvious solution to that that not only works perfectly from a narrative and story progression perspective but also introduces a lot of interesting game mechanics.
- krageon 6y ago
  Everything you've listed here is patchable. The problems with AI (while definitely present) are extremely overstated. The AI flanks, uses their weapons at ranges you expect (shotguns up close, approaching with walls at the side, etc) and generally appears to work together. They won't write you a treatise on the nature of human suffering, that is true.
  - dogma1138 6y ago
    The core narrative is broken, I don't want to go into too much spoilers. I don't know what AI you've encountered but it doesn't do squat it stays there to be picked off with a sniper rifle or a revolver especially if you use the slow time implant it's obnoxiously easy.

mkl95 6y ago

The entrepreneurs of 2077 will learn about this game as an example of poor corporate vision and why you shouldn't ship a dysfunctional product.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
Unlikely. This is hardly the first dysfunctional AAA videogame rushed out before it was ready causing a PR disaster.
- mkl95 6y ago
  - This is the first time ever Sony has pulled a game from Playstation Store. The game has literally caused Sony to review their policies. - CDProjekt worked on this game for 8 years, with employees crunching for several months in exchange for a share of the company's yearly profits. It's worth mentioning that the latter happened during a global pandemic. - The game's release was delayed several times, leading to more crunch. - The game infamously failed to add seizure warnings at launch. Other huge failures I can think of are Brink back in 2011 and No Man's Sky more recently, but this is orders of magnitude worse.
izacus 6y ago
CDProjekt reported that they've recouped the cost of development in hours after sales started. Financially, it's a smashing success. What's the lesson here?
- neaden 6y ago
  That was before refunds though. It may no longer be true.
- oneeyedpigeon 6y ago
  Well, their share price has dropped and they've taken a huge reputational hit — it's not just about one-off sales.
  - 6y ago

pjmlp 6y ago

Another good example that crunching doesn't pay out.

Hamuko 6y ago
Considering how prelevant crunching is in the games industry, I wouldn't really draw conclusions. Apparently Red Dead Redemption 2 (among other Rockstar titles) also had massive crunch and it was released to critical acclaim.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  Unfortunely those are the ones that keep the crunshing culture alive and push people aside from the industry, feeding on 20-somethings that want to prove themselves. My sympathy goes to the iGDA members trying to fix this.

h_anna_h 6y ago

I keep reading the worst about cyberpunk on hn but when my soulmate played it (on pc) they really enjoyed it and only stumbled upon very few bugs. As for seizures apparently it had a warning at the start about them.

Rebelgecko 6y ago
The console versions are supposedly significantly worse than PC, to the point of being unplayable
- ian0 6y ago
  4-5 hours through on a ps4 and it crashed twice, with one or two graphics glitches. Im really enjoying it and think it looks amazing, but then again I walk around slowly so maybe missing the rendering issues. Obviously though there are some issues effecting some players far more than others, could have got lucky.
- maroonblazer 6y ago
  I'm playing it on an Xbox Series X and have only run into a couple bugs that weren't game-breaking. What surprises me is how lackluster the visuals are compared to last-gen games like Horizon Zero Dawn and Ghost of Tsushima. I'm playing both on a PS4 Pro and Cyberpunk doesn't hold a candle to either of them graphically.
  - patja 6y ago
    I just finished playing The Witcher 3 on Xbox and feel Cyberpunk is far far below the visual quality of The Witcher. Partly because the HDR is so washed out, but there simply isn't nearly as much detail to it.
  - d3nj4l 6y ago
    The game looks gorgeous on PC. Probably doesn't look as good on the consoles.
- dfox 6y ago

ReDeiPirati 6y ago

The game seems really cool, but is way too rushed. I'm sure that for Dec 2021 it will be very cool to play. The Witcher 3 was full of bugs as well when released, but at least was 90% playable.

willis936 6y ago
Well, you see, Cyberpunk 2077 is based off of a 1988 tabletop RPG named “Cyberpunk” that took place in 2020. They wanted to release in 2020 to honor this significance. It has nothing to do with lying to consumers and maximizing profits from a holiday season during a pandemic with new consoles and hot new GPUs. /s
- ReDeiPirati 6y ago
  > It has nothing to do with lying to consumers and maximizing profits from ... CD Project Red is a For-Profit company (like EA, Ubisoft, etc...), please stop defending them when they have clearly lied to old-gen gamers. They are not the paladins of gaming as their great marketing reinforced when waved the success of The Witcher 3 (btw great narrative, but what a shitty combat system). Missing the holiday season for them would have impacted their short-term revenue and deflated the hype-train. Actually, they did something worst, but I'm 100% sure that they will recover: they know how to do games. Their brand is clearly damaged and their message "look we are the saviour of gaming" is lost forever.
  - seba_dos1 6y ago
    "/s" denotes sarcasm.
    - ReDeiPirati 6y ago
      lol, thank you! I didn't know.
- msh 6y ago
  That's the second edition. The original took place in 2013.

IronRanger 6y ago

They're not pulling it due to seizures, they're pulling it due to CDPR offer refunds, when the Sony policy is explicitly no-refunds if you have already played the game.

wing-_-nuts 6y ago
>Sony policy is explicitly no-refunds if you have already played the game. Oh, it's worse than that. Sony policy is no refunds if you've even downloaded the game. I bought the last of us 2 over the summer, and reading more about the story line, I wasn't ready for it. I tried to get a refund, and sony denied it. I hadn't even started the game.

traveler01 6y ago

Obviously CDPR is more directed to the PC Gaming scene, where the game actually excels apart from some bugs. Most people who critizise this game are in the gaming scene for the trends or just failed to see other RPGs being launched. RPGs are games very complex, every one launched until now that is considered good also had a rough launch like this one (being hyped AF also didn't helped...). Also, people shoulnd't expect a next-gen game to run well on prev-gen hardware, specially when we're speaking on the PS4 flat released back at 2013.

dagw 6y ago
Also, people shoulnd't expect a next-gen game to run well on prev-gen hardware That's the whole point of consoles. I absolutely expect to be able to buy any game where the box says "PS4" and have it be playable on a "PS4".
- traveler01 6y ago
  I mean that's the thing, some people say it's playable others say it isnt. I mean haven't tried it and played on my Xbox Series X and it's fine. I'm not the usual console gamer, I just bought my first console and afaik these consoles aren't just plug and play anymore. Refund policies need to change IMO.
  - overkalix 6y ago
    If a game is marketed towards PC and multiple consoles, I expect the game to run equally well on all platforms. This isn't the case. Stop relativizing the issues, please.
    - traveler01 6y ago
      I just love how people are so selective with Cyberpunk even though other triple-A titles get away with worse. Specially since the game was released 2 weeks ago and still receiving updates very fast which means in a month it will run fine.
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v4dok 6y ago

The problem were the expectations. CDPR built such high expectations from the game that it was ridiculous. And they were in high-estee, W3 was amazing so people thought that such a gamer-centric company will keep their word. Of course everyone with half a brain knew that a lot of these were infeasible in such a depth as they advertised but on the other hand, the game was in dev for 8 years, so why not? Then the game came out and people (like me) waiting for it for 7 years got half-baked game that had so many things obviously cut really late that is painfully obvious. Features sitting there, teasing something you were promised but don't get. Adding this to the debacle of last gen consoles issues, and ridiculous AI, zero replayability and you get a lot of angry gamers. And I believe rightfully so.

MattRix 6y ago
The expectations have nothing to do with this. It’s 100% due to the issues on the last gen consoles, and specifically the PS4 in this case. Horrible graphics and performance, tons of bugs, and way too many actual crashes.
throw_m239339 6y ago
> The problem were the expectations. No, the problem is CDPR building all the expectations with lies. I'm not going to link to reddit but there is a thread on the cyberpunk sub listing all the lies Cyberpunk said before release. Nobody forced CDPR to lie about the content of the game, especially all the unique NPC scripting stuff that doesn't exist. It's not just the bugs and the performance. CDPR sold something that wasn't in the game at release. It must have been an horror for the developers pressured by management to do the impossible, only to be met with contempt by both the management and the gamers in the end because management can always blame developers "for not doing enough" even though every dev must have crunched for 2 years straight. Also these dev sweatshops usually have high turnover, so they are incapable of retaining experienced developers because they don't value that, only rookies they can squeeze to the bone then throw away when they are burned out. The state of that game is the result of all that culture.
panpanna 6y ago
CDPR didn't create the hype. Witcher 3 did that. Also, it's just a game folks. Get your refund and move on. (In response to the guy who wrote he was crying himself to sleep every night after the cyberpunk disappointment)

pawelos 6y ago

It looks that this was agreed with CDPR: https://twitter.com/CyberpunkGame/status/1339846154176126976 https://twitter.com/CyberpunkGame/status/1339846154176126976

shadowgovt 6y ago

I'll be interested to see whether the Stadia version is more like a console experience or more like a PC.

CydeWeys 6y ago
It's already out and apparently it works fine. You're basically remoting into a PC version of the game.
- garretraziel 6y ago
  Interestingly, I've read somewhere here on HN that Stadia (which runs on Linux) version is basically a PS version (= FreeBSD version), stripped from dependency on Sony's libraries (and, from what I've got from the reactions, also with better graphical settings).
  - CydeWeys 6y ago
    You might know more about this than I do. Regardless, it does sound like the Stadia version is running well, which is probably a result of it running on hardware that is actually capable of running it, unlike the previous gen consoles. The current gen consoles are also having better luck running it.
Grazester 6y ago
Publications already indicated that the Stadia version is good, if that is what you are alluding to. "It may be hard to believe, but the Google Stadia version of Cyberpunk 2077 may be the best way to play for most players right now. Unless you have a 20 or 30 Series Nvidia GPU or comparable AMD card or you were lucky enough to get a PS5 or Xbox Series X / S, this game will not be performing anywhere close to how it was designed to." https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/10/22167303/cyberpunk-2077-ps5-console-google-stadia https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/10/22167303/cyberpunk-2077-...
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  Interesting. This was, essentially, one of the goals of Stadia---consolidating the software and computation centrally should allow the Stadia version to run on whatever hardware is necessary to make it run well.

aequitas 6y ago

I'm playing this game on Google's Stadia and must say I'm impressed and having a blast. Besides some minor bugs this game streams flawless in 4k to my Mac (which technically isn't even a supported platform for the game, but is for Stadia). I bought the game during last weeks promotion with a free Chromecast Ultra and controller, so I would have at least had some hardware for cheap should the game itself suck, but the game is fun as well. I also no longer have any doubt that streamed gaming has a future and am actually looking forward to 5G coverage so I can play on mobile.

dobladov 6y ago
Same case for me, I never do preorders but the offer of Chromecast + controller was good enough, the game runs amazing, I don't have to bother with updates, space on my device, all games can be played in any screen I have without having to worry about hardware requirements. Honestly the only case where I don't see this having adoption is for competitive gaming.
validuser 6y ago
Is my adblocker broken?
sgtnasty 6y ago
Runs great on Stadia compared to PC (in my experience playing on both platforms). Google needs to make something of this. I even tried running it from Chrome on my old MacBookPro 2015 and was thrilled it worked and was a great experience.
- chaostheory 6y ago
  Out of curiosity what are your PC’s specs?
  - sgtnasty 6y ago
    Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-7960X CPU @ 2.80GHz 32.0 GB RAM Windows 10 Pro, 64-bit 20H2 GeForce GTX 1080 Ti, ver 460.89

keiferski 6y ago

Ultimately I think the rushed launch will turn out to have been a correct decision, or at least not as horrible as it seems. The holiday season, especially during a pandemic when millions are stuck at home, is simply a financial opportunity too good to pass up. Launching in a few months would have lost those sales, while delaying the game (again) until holiday season 2021 would have destroyed a lot of hype and anticipation. From what I’ve seen, the game is still doing well in terms of sales. Tough situation, but considering the options, an understandable move. It’s a classic example of being forced to choose between two bad decisions because you failed to make an adequate plan in the first place.

Kapura 6y ago
It's difficult to view this as a rushed launch when the game was originally scheduled to release in April, and has received multiple delays, supposedly to fix the last remaining bugs.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  No, it's not. Multiple delays mean that not only couldn't they set enough time initially, they were repeatedly incapable of setting enough time when extending the timeline, or unwilling to do so. Which makes it quite easy to view as rushed. Its a pretty common pattern for rushed releases.
mywittyname 6y ago
I highly doubt it. The gaming industry today is very different from what it was even ten years ago. It used to be that games made a healthy chunk of their income in the first month of launch. Back then it made total sense to rush a crappy game out before the holiday season. However, today, the best selling games do so at steady rates over the span of years. The first month or so of sales may only represent 10-20% of total sales over five years. The Witcher 3 looks like it sold around 1.5 million preorders, but almost 30 million units in total. All the bad publicity around this game is going to reduce gross sales of CP2077 and ensure that the public is leery of pre-ordering a CDPR in the future.

aranelsurion 6y ago

I think most of the negative sentiment against Cyberpunk 2077 comes from three sources: 1) Some players expected this to be cyberpunk-themed RDR2/GTA5. It turns out it's nothing like that, it's more like a new Deus Ex game. 2) It just doesn't run on consoles. It's a very inferior experience, unless you're the type who can be happy with 2020 movies in .3gp format in your old Nokia phone. Having watched a video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5pHpQqhmR4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5pHpQqhmR4) of how it runs on PS4, I now clearly see where all this hate comes from. 3) There are some bugs and quirks, depending on your platform and luck. I haven't had any major issues, though I know for some it's just unplayable at the moment. This will likely get much better after patches hit. On a personal note, I like the game a lot. Yes it has its quirks, and I generally feel it's a less refined/polished game compared to what Witcher 3 was, but still it's an extremely fun, really well-made game. Combat is great, world is enticing, story-telling swings between good enough and great. For one reason or another whenever I launch the game another 5 hours passes without me noticing. FPS camera and general art direction also helps with suspension of disbelief, and the game is as immersive as it gets. It's a shame that this game now has such a bad reputation for relatively minor & mostly avoidable reasons.

dustingetz 6y ago
we expect what was advertised to us. It turns out the marketing was all lies! Companies should be held accountable for lying.
- Pet_Ant 6y ago
  Honestly just curious, but I when played on PC/next-gen what do you feel was advertised but not delivered?
  - LeoNatan25 6y ago
    https://i.imgur.com/vtdxe02.png https://i.imgur.com/vtdxe02.png This is what was promised by CDP. None of that has been delivered. It’s a shallow, juvenile experience, with very little depth, bad story, repetitive and useless side missions, non-consequential choices, brain dead AI, barren city with zero point in exploration, terrible inventory system, bad shooting mechanics, bad skill system, ridiculously retarded driving and racing mechanics—just to name a few things. And it’s ridiculously unoptimized and buggy.

mongrelion 6y ago

Can somebody post a tldr of what's going on? Like, why are people pissed and why are they giving refunds?

Hamuko 6y ago
Cyberpunk 2077 was released on PC, Stadia, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It performs quite poorly on the base PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, and basically to get a good console experience, you need a PlayStation 5 or an Xbox Series, where you'd play the game in backwards-compatible mode (there's no PlayStation 5 / Xbox Series versions yet). CD Projekt Red never showed any footage shot on the consoles and didn't send out any review codes out for the console versions before release. All of the reviews that came out before the release were for the PC version and even the PC version wasn't allowed to show any recorded footage in their videos (only the publisher-provided B-roll). The game is also quite buggy and unfinished as well, on every platform. Many were also disappointed by the actual game. There's for example some talk about the AI, which is rather subpar. Combine the poor performance on the consoles it came out on, the deliberate attempt at hiding the true state of the console versions, the multitude of bugs and glitches and some of the lackluster aspects of the game, and you'll find yourself with a lot of upset people. As to why Sony is giving refunds, I'm guessing it's because CD Projekt Red made a statement promising big patches for console versions next year. However, in the same statement, they said that people who didn't want to wait could "opt for a refund" and should contact Microsoft and Sony for digital refunds. However, we later learned that there was not agreement between CDPR and Microsoft/Sony, and they were just talking about the standard store refund policies. In Sony's case, you can't get a refund if you've already downloaded the game. This lead to a lot of people being angry at Sony for not getting the refund they were "promised". On Microsoft's side, people were getting mixed, but slightly better results. Seems like Sony decided to go with the nuclear option after getting bombarded with refund requests after CDPR's statement about refunds.
aranelsurion 6y ago
tl;dr game performs very badly on consoles, and in an attempt to save face CDPR promised refunds to players.

LeicaLatte 6y ago

Early access. It’s a great way to release software. CD Projekt missed a trick here by not taking this route.

cplantijn 6y ago
Early access is usually great for multiplayer games. For single player, story driven games, early access serves as a way to spoil the game for customers who intend to buy at release.
- Quarrelsome 6y ago
  ye but for sandbox games I feel like its pretty important because the scope of them is far too broad (especially if you add in all the platforms and languages). Maybe save the main questline as the first major piece of DLC to avoid that problem?
- cygx 6y ago
  Note that Larian's been doing it for Original Sin and Baldur's Gate. It seems to have worked out ok for them so far.
LeicaLatte 6y ago
All software is early access in my opinion. Time to embrace that rather than run away.

jvanderbot 6y ago

FWIW, I tried it on Stadia, NVIDIA, and a reasonably recent gaming PC. Local (even on minimum settings) > NVIDIA > Stadia and there's a big gap on each of those. The game is already a little spongey / laggy, and an internet connection exacerbates that.

0-_-0 6y ago
By NVIDIA do you mean GeForce NOW?
benhurmarcel 6y ago
It depends heavily on your connection though

mrkramer 6y ago

I think the game is good, it is just bugged a lot.

lsiunsuex 6y ago

-- What was the purpose of the crunch / rushing this out the door ? -- What was to be gained from it? Holiday sales? Delivering a product not delayed again? Management bonuses? Did the developers get bonuses for delivering "on time"? -- At what cost did the crunch / delivering the product cause the team of developers? Now they need to keep working; fix the bugs; get this back in the store(s) and try to make everyone happy? We go through our share of crunches. Bugs always get through and we have to fix them of course, but nothing as bad as some of the stuff I've read about this. Management never realizes burnout is a real thing. I feel for these developers. It's double sided. Keep delaying the game / product and people get pissed off it's delayed. Ship it, and now they're pissed off its buggy. So now, everyone (programmers) are burned out; management is probably fuming over being removed from the store(s) and everyone needs to smile and get back to it, probably as a worse crunch than before. What a shitty way to spend the holidays. It's like getting made at a company building your house that your water pipes leak but you rushed them to get it done because of some arbitrary move in date. Take the time; do it right; do a good job. Cut corners and rush stuff and deal with the consequences.

nebulous1 6y ago
> Holiday sales? Ding ding ding. Missing christmas would be a huge deal. That said, I think there's a tendency for conversations around this to ignore the finances and suggest that financial concerns shouldn't have any impact on the game's release. There's no doubt that CDPR got the balance on this wrong, but the need to find a balance is just reality.
- Der_Einzige 6y ago
  They said in an investors call that there was no pressure to release for the holidays. They could have spent more time fixing this but choose not to
  - ketzo 6y ago
    I mean.. they can say that all they want, but they're a game studio that releases one game at a time. This game was "supposed" to release 8 months ago. Financially speaking, it just doesn't make sense that they have any room here.

apexalpha 6y ago

For all the negativity surrounding this game I have mostly positivity for Google Stadia. I bought the game + free chromecast & controller and Stadia has truly surprised me. It's amazing how low the input lag is on a streamed game. For this game in particular the bugs and performance issues don't seem present as they are on PS4 and Xbox One.

lubesGordi 6y ago

I'm so not surprised. I've worked in a mobile game shop before and seen how pushing ends up with devs getting burnt out. They've been pushing now for years, probably since the very beginning. That kind of thing will just grind everyone to a crawl and if it doesn't ever let up then your team will just be crawling forever. You have to let people get into the rhythm of development and the key is setting reasonable expectations of your team based on what you know that rhythm to be. All the hype here, all the pressure to put out a great game, can be detrimental to development without proper leadership filtering/framing it.

umvi 6y ago

It pays to be a patient gamer. I'm sure the $5 steam sale version of Cyberpunk 2077 5 years from now will be much better than the $60 release day version.

shrimp_emoji 6y ago
Less bugs, all DLCs, runnable on mediocre hardware, and even more amenable to Wine/Proton. It's an insane marshmallow test.
ipnon 6y ago
Even 1 year from now. Witcher 3 was also a buggy mess on launch.
hydroreadsstuff 6y ago
The landscape around sales seems to be changing. Specifically Square Enix and From Software are putting their games on sale extremely late or only lightly discounted. Final Fantasy 7 and 8 (21+ years old) are still 13€, Sekiro (1.5 Years old) is 40€. I waited 3 years for Dark Souls 3 (mainly because I didn't care enough) to be on sale for ~20€. I remember I got Dark Souls 1 for 3€. Just some anecdata. I think publishers are aware that their games are valueable longer longer, and they don't need those $5 buyers really. Perhaps this only applies to very popular games. TLDR: I wouldn't bet on this being on sale for $5 ever
- umvi 6y ago
  I threw out the $5 figure because I recently purchased Doom (2016) for $5 at a sale, which is a AAA title that sold for a premium on release day. I wouldn't have bought it if it weren't so cheap because I'm not usually into gory shooters.
- baumandm 6y ago
  Agreed, but there will be a GOTY edition on sale for $30 a year from now.
- nitwit005 6y ago
  What those two companies have in common is that they have made remakes or remasterings of their old titles. They may be worried that lowering the price may effect the perceived value of those releases. A Demon Souls remake being sold at full price might seem shockingly expensive if the origional was selling for $5.

trey-jones 6y ago

Does anyone remember The Witcher: Enhanced Edition ? This strikes me as similar, potentially. For those that weren't around back in 2008, if memory serves CDPR earned a lot of good faith in the video game community by investing heavily into making an already released game (The Witcher) much, much better, and then releasing it for free to anyone who bought the original. I know that AMP contains stories about how reviewers were misled, or duped into misleading prospective buyers of the game. Maybe it's true, but I take anything that shows up from AMP with a good pinch of salt. All I'm trying to say is not to write it off yet. It doesn't seem to be an irrecoverable disaster, not that I have played it or will play it in the next decade, probably.

pwthornton 6y ago

I was planning on holding off on getting this for my Xbox One X until I can get ahold of a Series X, but I wasn't sure if I'd be able to hold out. But now there is no way I am playing this game for six months or whatever it takes to make it a good game on consoles.

Asmod4n 6y ago

It's the first game which brings the Nintendo Switch PC Port experience to Playstation and Xbox.

am_lu 6y ago

Been watching someone play the game, recorded stuff on youtube, and i`m really enjoying it. Better than movies. Anyway i`m there for the art and lore, the full experience is not worth spending thousands on a dedicated gaming hardware. Skilled player is using a high end gaming PC to run the game, there are some bugs but nothing too serious. the stream i`m wathching here, this from original soundtrack for the game in Polish (yes in been created by Polish studio) https://www.youtube.com/user/Corle1st/videos?disable_polymer=1 https://www.youtube.com/user/Corle1st/videos?disable_polymer...

LeoNatan25 6y ago

The jokes write themselves with this game: https://www.reddit.com/r/cyberpunkgame/comments/kflkud/i_am_now_certified_bug_free/ https://www.reddit.com/r/cyberpunkgame/comments/kflkud/i_am_...

renewiltord 6y ago

People who make playing games part of their identity seem to be an overwrought bunch. Very hard to relate to their emotional response.

f6v 6y ago

People here argue whether it's a terrible game or not. I think such a division is a sign there's something seriously wrong with a game. I don't remember anything like that when RDR2 came out. Fallout 76 or No Mans Sky on the other hand...

kfarr 6y ago

Devilering a great game is harder than it looks!

emmanueloga_ 6y ago

This game seems like the perfect candidate to buy late. Just wait a few months, maybe a year, it will probably be discounted at some point and it will include tens or hundreds of patches by then.

nx7487 6y ago

I've played ~20 hours on PC, and what I dislike most is the long, downright tiring dialog sequences. It's like, half of the game is just sitting there, watching a movie, where you press "1" or "2" to decide what V says.

Miraste 6y ago
What were you expecting? That's one of the main selling points.

itslennysfault 6y ago

Guess I'm one of the lucky ones. I'm 40+ hours in on PS4 with no major issues except for a hard crash every few hours. Which is SUPER annoying when it happens, but I'm not seeing a ton of glitches otherwise outside of little things like talking corpses.

oarabbus_ 6y ago

Someone or a few at CDPR should lose their jobs over this. Why they didn't make this a PS5/XSX exclusive is absolutely beyond me. It was very, very clear this game did not run on last-gen console hardware.

lambda_obrien 6y ago
No one needs to lose a job over a game, let's chock it up to a mistake, learn a lesson, and move on. Losing a job shouldn't be a threat to be perfect.
- wincy 6y ago
  Is it chock like in “chock full” or chalk like “chalk it up” (like on a chalk board?) Sorry this isn’t adding to the conversation, but I’m genuinely curious.
  - oarabbus_ 6y ago
    It's "chalk it up" as in on a board or on the sidewalk.
    - lambda_obrien 6y ago
      I learned something new today, thanks.
- oarabbus_ 6y ago
  I never said a game developer should lose their job. Someone, or several people in Product and Marketing absolutely should though. CDPR share price is down an absolutely staggering 40%+, absolutely massive hit to the company valuation, Sony has an egg on their face and has to issue refunds for this unplayable mess, and all for what, because management decided the game had to be released prior to the holiday season rather than a working product because they wanted holiday sales, which they're now losing money on via refunds? I don't work in game development but in my industry, that is absolutely grounds for putting some heads on the chopping block.

twblalock 6y ago

The amazing thing to me is that a game that has been in development for so long runs so badly on consoles that were new when development started. I bet they spent a lot of time updating the engine and graphics over the past 8 years, and as a result the game barely runs on the hardware they were using when they started writing it.

sedatk 6y ago
I don't think they've been developing for the past 8 years. The Witcher 3 came out in 2015, and its DLCs in 2016. I think it's been developed in the last four years.
fulafel 6y ago
A lot of performance work often happens in the later stages of production, and said work is not something that has a very predictable payoff per time or money invested.

linkdd 6y ago

The whining about this game is becoming annoying. Why are people so entitled ? "But it's not what they promised" don't buy it then "But the game is bugged" don't buy it then "But the game is expensive and it should not be" don't buy it then There are tons of game stores, and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM provide a refund policy. Why would you whine about your game ? Just. Get. A. Refund. "But they lied about the game" It's a game, go scream with the same energy at your lying politicians. I will probably get downvoted for this comment, but the buzz around this game is lasting too long IMHO. I freaking hate yellow now.

mynameisvlad 6y ago
> There are tons of game stores, and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM provide a refund policy. Why would you whine about your game ? Just. Get. A. Refund. Uh, what? Until this announcement, SIE flat out refused people getting refunds. On Steam, you have to have played for less than 2 hours to qualify for a refund. Returns become extremely limited or downright impossible for opened physical games. https://www.polygon.com/2020/12/17/22179460/cyberpunk-2077-refunds-requested-refused-cd-projekt-red-xbox-playstation-gamestop https://www.polygon.com/2020/12/17/22179460/cyberpunk-2077-r... The fanboy army defending CDPR is honestly more annoying than people justifiably being upset with an unfinished, overhyped game.
- linkdd 6y ago
  I'm not defending CDPR. What they did as a business is not honest, viable, and does not profit to anybody. What you describe is flat out illegal in some countries.
  - mynameisvlad 6y ago
    And yet there's multiple articles about retailers either sticking to or making exceptions to their policies for the game: https://psxextreme.com/news/gamestop-to-refuse-cyberpunk-2077-refunds-redirects-customers-to-cdpr/ https://psxextreme.com/news/gamestop-to-refuse-cyberpunk-207... https://www.pcgamer.com/microsoft-and-best-buy-are-now-offering-cyberpunk-2077-refunds/ https://www.pcgamer.com/microsoft-and-best-buy-are-now-offer... Or the fact that CDPR is going to pay for refunds out of their own pockets: https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-cdpr-says-it-will-refund-copies-if-players-cant-get-them-from-stores https://www.ign.com/articles/cyberpunk-2077-cdpr-says-it-wil...

afrcnc 6y ago

Ubisoft execs laughing their asses off right now

AsyncAwait 6y ago

I find the strong backlash weird considering how customer-friendly CDP generally is and how well regarded Sky rim, a vastly buggier game from a predatory company, is.

hfkldjsjfkdj 6y ago

If you aren't happy with the bugs, just pretend it is delayed again. Problem solved.

cwkoss 6y ago

I don't think Cyberpunk requires an internet connection. Can anyone who has it on PS disconnect from network, refund, and then continue playing? (Maybe it's too bad on console for anyone to want to keep playing though)

cblconfederate 6y ago

I'm not a gamer but now kind of interested. Is that the intented effect?

ptcampbell 6y ago

Anyone know if GOG will process refunds? My cloud-sync has been munted from the get-go. Via Geforce Now the files have gone missing between sessions. Not to mention the numerous bugs I've encountered making certain missions unplayable (unable to advance, AI stuck behind cover etc.)