Adam Badowski, the head of studio CD Projekt Red, has put out an official statement againstthe recent reportwritten by Jason SchreierfromBloomberg. The report itself detailed the various development issuesCyberpunk 2077has faced over the past years, with details provided by former and current employees who remained anonymous.Judging from Badowski’s response, however, he’s taken issue with several of the points brought up in said report. The studio head responded to a few of them in a long response posted onhis personal Twitter account:
Here’s the screenshot up close:
Badowski first addressed the claim that the E3 2018 trailer and demo was faked by stating that a finished project having significant changes compared to earlier versions is commonplace, and is covered by the “work in progress” watermark but that the finished game looks and plays far better than that demo. He also stated that many of the promised features made it into the game anyway and that he’s proud ofCyberpunk 2077as their artistic vision.
He then moved on to cast doubt on the claim ofCyberpunk 2077not being ready for release in 2020 by rebutting that speaking to 20 people was not enough to gain a full picture of the situation, especially out of 500+ employees. Finally he extrapolated on the company policy by stated that only mandated staffers were required to speak English during meetings, company wide emails, and announcements. But that other languages could be spoken elsewhere and during non business related matters.
The report referenced in this rebuttal followed the public apology made by one of CD Projekt Redâs co-founders, Marcin IwiÅski,on Twitterlast week. The studio is currently facing two possible lawsuits: theNew York Timesreported that the studio behindCyberpunk 2077could be facing a lawsuitfrom a regulatory filing from Warsaw, Poland. Now according toKotaku,another lawsuitis brewing against CD Projekt Red â this one originating from the US.
The launch ofCyberpunk 2077has been riddled withcontroversy and bugs, with the first update being introduced last week that fixed some issues. The most notable of these problems saw playerâssave files corrupt if they reached over 8MBbut fortunatelyCyberpunk 2077âslatest patch (1.06)has removed the PC versionâs8MB save file limit. This is good news going forward, however, for those who had already lost their saves, CD Projekt Red says that unfortunately âthis wonât fix save files corrupted before the update.â
Alongside the bugs that plagued its launch, Liana Ruppert from GameInformer suffered a major seizurewhile playing the game. This was due to light patterns similar to those used by neurologists to help induce seizures in patients. It was also later noted that the game didnât have a clear epilepsy warning at the start of gameplay, something which has now been remedied.
This same RPG has seen its share of other controversies even before launch withreportsoftransphobia, and crunch culture, as well as the studio also refusing to share information about the gameâs accessibility. Read up on why we think CD Projekt Redshould have confirmedCyberpunk 2077â²s accessibility options sooner.
According to a new report from theBloomberg, executives at CD Projekt took responsibility for the buggy release ofCyberpunk 2077and told staff thatthey will receive their full bonusesno matter how the game is reviewed. Previously, the developers were told they would receive extra pay based on the gameâs aggregated critical performance represented by Metacritic.
Areport released by Bloombergfound that the game’s glitches and rocky launch have cost the founders of CD Projekt Redover $1 billion. Over the course of the past week, the companyâs stock has plummeted, although not to record lows. That being said in anote to investors, CD Projekt Red’s Management Board has stated that the game has sold a further five million copies on top of the8 million preorder sales, bringing the total units sold to over 13 million. This figure takes into account “returns submitted by retail clients in brick-and-mortar as well as digital storefronts.”
Cyberpunk 2077is currently available for PC, Xbox One, and Google Stadia. As for PS4, retail copies are still around butSony has removed the gamefrom the PSN Store. Meanwhile the official Microsoft storefeatures a statement warning playersof performance issues until the Xbox One version is updated. The game is also playable on theXbox Series X|SandPS5thanks to backward compatibility. You can read our review of the gamehere: “Cyberpunk 2077is a deeply conflicting game, one that youâll end up loving but will also hate and feel profoundly disappointed by.”
