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Tech2 news teamDecember 16, 2020 1:22:27 pm
“The game is actually playable right now; that may be an important thing to say because it’s not that the game won’t start or can’t be played,” said Michał Nowakowski, vice president of business development and board member of CD Projekt, at the investor conference on Monday. Based on the transcript of the call, he added: “I fully understand that the experience is far from satisfying for many people, and we acknowledge it, but ‘not playable’ sounds like it didn’t start at all, which is not the case.”
Is Cyberpunk 2077 ‘playable’?
Technically, Nowakowski is not wrong.
Cyberpunk 2077 it starts up and actually has a really nice home screen.
And the experience was “ far from satisfying ” for many people: According to CD Projekt, 41 percent of the eight million pre-orders came from console owners. That’s around 3.28 million games, most of which are apparently next-gen console owners.
We’ll get into the rest of the investor call momentarily, but for now, let’s continue with this comment from Nowakowski that raises a couple of questions:
First, when asked about the game’s performance on the PlayStation 4 and based Xbox One in the CD Projekt group’s audio webcast on November 30 (related to Q3 2020 financial results), the President and CEO Company deputy Adam Kiciński noted: “Of course a little lower than on professional consoles, but I’d say surprisingly good for such a big world. That’s the answer.” This, in turn, raises two other questions: Was the fact that the game could be run was a surprise to Kiciński, or did they not think they should take a more than superficial look at the performance? After all, as Nowakowski admitted Monday, “We definitely didn’t spend enough time looking at [last-gen performance]. “
Second, it is understandable that you felt the need to make the comment at the top of this article. After all, when the world, or a significant part of it anyway, is attacking the work of his company, he will be forced to find a middle ground between issuing a mea culpa and defend the hard work that has undoubtedly gone into the game. But was it wise, or indeed sensible (to disgruntled consumers), to do so at this time? Surely being pedantic about what constitutes and does not constitute ‘unplayable’ is best saved for a better place and time, and will also not really ease the concerns of players who are unable to get a satisfactory gaming experience. Cyberpunk 2077.
‘There is nothing wrong … there is optimization to handle’
It has been more than evident for a while that the main reason people are up in arms in Cyberpunk 2077The release was the litany of bugs and glitches the game was (and still is) packed with. On Monday, joint CEO and co-founder of CD Projekt Marcin Iwiński said: “It’s a gigantic world, so at launch there will always be some glitches and issues in various settings, but regarding the console experience, we already fixed a lot. of glitches with the latest patch, and this time again we’ll be looking primarily for game-breaking glitches and bugs. “
That he acknowledged ‘game-breaking’ mistakes is interesting, because just a couple of weeks earlier, Kiciński had claimed, “[We] believes that the level of errors will be low enough that they do not stand out from the players’ perspective. Unfortunately, some bugs that appeared in the extended previews were related to the general features of the game, so to speak, and many of them are already fixed. “
Whether this was simply insincere or wishful thinking is unknown, but what is known is that gameplay footage from the next-gen base consoles was never shown to the public. “The reason is that we were updating the game on next-gen consoles until the last minute, and we thought we would be on time … we were just fixing the game until the last moment,” said Iwiński.
There seems to be some incongruity here, because in June of last year, lead mission designer Paweł Sasko said: “Right now we are focusing on PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One … One of the things we learned with The witcher 3 era, it should never delay working on console versions. So at all times we have a version running for everything. “As for the performance on the next generation consoles, he added,” but the important thing for us is that it will be fluid, it will play on your machine. “
A month later, Alvin Liu from CD Projekt said in a post that “the graphics are pretty amazing for what you’ll get. Cyberpunk 2077 on consoles and low-end PCs “and told another”[We’re] focusing on delivering a really good experience on current generation consoles. When the next generation happens, we will evaluate and find the best way forward. I would say that we are not a greedy company, so fans should expect a very fair offer with whatever we decide to do. “
By the way and as recently as the teleconference of October 28 after the announcement that Cyberpunk 2077 it would be delayed until December 10, Nowakowski had said, “I wouldn’t say there is a ‘problem’ because there is nothing wrong with the Xbox or PS4 versions, there is optimization to handle.” Seconds later, he repeated: “To be honest, there is no problem with Xbox or PlayStation 4.”
Somewhere something went wrong. But what? The jury is still out … we guess.
Should I get a refund?
A little before the investor call, CD Projekt issued a statement via their social media channels apologizing for the game’s state-of-the-art performance and offering pre-order customers the option of getting a refund. “We are not encouraging players to return the game,” Iwiński said on the call, adding: “[We] I hope they give us the opportunity to improve it on the older generation consoles. A fix was released last weekend; another will be coming in seven days … we’ve just started the process and we sincerely hope that players would rather wait for updates as they had waited so long for the game, but again this is our humble hope. “
When asked if special provisions should be made for Cyberpunk 2077 refunds, Nowakowski said, “Anyone who has bought a title on the PlayStation Network or the Microsoft store can request a refund, and if it is done within certain limits, usually related to time, use, etc., they can request that refund. Our procedure here with Microsoft and Sony is no different from any other title released in any of those windows. “
If contacting the store (if you have a physical copy) or Microsoft / PSN (if it is a digital copy) doesn’t work, dissatisfied customers have until December 21 to contact CD Projekt ([email protected] ) to get your money back.
Should you wait and play the game?
“We definitely want to fix the game; we made a promise to the players and we will do everything we can to deliver,” Nowakowski promised on Monday’s call, adding: “In terms of the form of the game after optimization …, the game will be free of crashes, major bugs will be removed and we are looking to improve both performance and graphical fidelity, that will be distributed in several patches and of course there will be quite a major update. month. “
Kiciński explained that, “the first substantial set of fixes was released over the weekend (January 12 and 13). The next set of fixes will be released in the next seven days. Big updates are planned for January and February together. with smaller arrangements. “
So what did we learn?
Essentially, the investor call revealed a mixture of contrition, optimism, optimism, the kind of consumer-centric approach that has made CD Projekt a favorite with gamers around the world, and a bit of petulance. The most important conclusion was that the developers clearly neglected the next-gen consoles, not that the game works perfectly on the PS5 or Xbox Series X either, in the development process and tried to rush for a photographic finish.
Considering Cyberpunk 2077 Originally scheduled for release in April 2020, one shudders to imagine the kind of deterioration it must have been in back then. This raises the biggest question of all: What did CD Projekt do in the eight years since the game was announced?
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