The makers of Cyberpunk 2077 are clear that they have high hopes for their scattered canoe-toting RPG. But with the expected game lender Rugger (read: Buggyer), CD project executives chose to reconsider their bonus structure, promising to pay developers the full share of their bonuses, regardless of how well cyberpunk reviews were – giving employees back to extremely high performance expectations. That’s the kind of dystopian “corpo” attitude you’d expect from a fictional CEO of Night City.
According to a report by Bloomberg, the CDPRA plans to pay bonuses only if the game hits 90 or more on the review aggregation site Metacritic. Granted, it sits with the 90s right now, but especially with reviews of rough last-gen console versions sinking into the sub-50s, there’s a good chance the score could slip easily.
Given the technically troubled launch of the game, however, it seems inappropriate to give the upper management a gate bonus in this way, and it will now be distributed regardless of the crucial consensus.
“Initially we had a bonus system that focused on the game’s ratings and release date, but after consideration, we believe the move is not appropriate in the circumstances,” studio head Adam Badowski wrote in an internal email obtained by Bloomberg. “We underestimated the length and complexity to make this a reality. And yet you did everything you could to provide an ambitious, special game.”
The CD project will not be the first developer to receive a gate bonus in this way. Infamously, Bethesda promised to pay only a bs bsidian bonus for a failout: New Vegas at a metacritic score of 85 or higher. The game managed. This is a very formidable practice, honestly, and there are some surprising hubris in the CDPR demanding 90 or more – then even if they do, reject the idea.
Bloomberg itself also sheds light on CDPR’s bonus system, which sees the team give developers small “red bird” tokens who feel they deserve a “worthy honor” each month. While this is being speculated from me, the idea of competing for bonus tokens in this way only enhances the impression of the company’s culture that strongly encourages its developers to work.
We are still working on our own Cyberpunk 2077 review. Of course, we can’t do (reviews) properly here, but I’m not a fan of the idea that the use of scores by sites is critical to how well paid developers are.
