Created by Carmine Medeiros
Cyberpunk 2077 launched as a disaster, but CD Projekt Red turns it into a five star game along with a show, pending a sequel in the near future.
During January of 2013, the first teaser for Cyberpunk 2077 was released. It was a short and simple cinematic that gave no further insight into the future of the game. It was still enough to get people more than ready for the game.
At E3 2019, The release date of April 16th 2020 was given, and people everywhere were buzzing with excitement. The game was delayed several times before its final release date of December 10th 2020.
The release version of Cyberpunk was a mess to say the least, especially on last generation consoles, such as the PS4 and Xbox One.
The game was riddled with bugs, constantly crashed, and hailed a variety of visual issues. People who purchased the game on last gen consoles were understandably frustrated at being sold a product that was unusable. The game was eventually optimized for last gen, but stopped receiving updates.
Many people review bombed the game on all platforms, talking about spending $60 on a game that was in development for seven years, just to end up being disappointed.
Fixing the Game
Many people believed that Cyberpunk 2077 would just become another failed game to end up forgotten in the coming years. But CD Projekt wasn’t done yet.
After the rocky release of the game, the developers at CD Projekt Red started getting to work on fixing the game and making it more playable. Many praised them for taking the initiative to fix the game instead of letting it die.
By the end of 2021, the game was a lot more playable as well as looking much better than its launch version.
A New Start
Come around 2022 and CD Projekt Red finally releases the show “Cyberpunk Edgerunners”.
The show takes place a year prior to the events of the game, as well as being in the exact same location.
The show won the “Anime of the Year” Award and received outstanding reception from the player base as well as just random viewers. Mike Pondsmith, the creator of Cyberpunk, stated “It's like seeing my brain in a big screen anime.”
Most people were unaware of the game's fixes and several patches since they dropped the game after its release, but the show drew attention to the game which led to a spike in player activity.
People started to see the changes the game had, and actually enjoyed it this time around. New players didn’t just linger for a bit either, they mostly stuck around.
Cyberpunk Edgerunners gave CD Projekt Red the leverage they needed to make their one final move.
The Final Product
While the state of the game was good and playable, that's just not the future that CD Projekt envisioned for the game they worked on for so long.
A DLC was in the works for the game before the game even released back in 2020. Which was released on September 25, 2023.
The original idea at the time was to create an exciting expansion to the game, which would recast Keanu Reeves for his role as “Johnny Silverhand”. As well as casting famous actor Idris Elba.
However, the newer plan for the release of the DLC was much more ambitious. CD Projekt came out on several occasions and said themselves that several elements of the game needed to be reworked. In which they alleviated the concerns of many by assuring they would make the change happen.
With the release of Phantom Liberty, CD Projekt also released “Update 2.0”, which revamped almost everything in the game. A police wanted system was added, the perk tree was redone, vehicle combat was introduced, etc.
It would be an understatement to say people loved the DLC combined with the revamped mechanics. The game won several awards shortly after the release and gave Cyberpunk the second wind it deserved.
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