Cyberpunk 2077 Finally Stable To Play?
The time for Cyberpunk 2077's return may now be here. This is what we know.
This article is more than 2 years old
Better polish those implants and ring your nearest ripperdoc, because the Night City experience is about to get a whole lot cooler. The manifold performance issues plaguing console versions of Cyberpunk 2077 are finally sorting out. CD Projekt CEO Adam Kiciński made the critical announcement at this year’s WSE (Warsaw Stock Exchange) Innovation Day. The company’s development team has been ironing out those kinks all year, with the most recent patches proving doubly adequate.
Polish 24-hour news channel TVN24 reported the much-awaited scoop with IGN Poland translating. Kiciński’s statement is as follows: “We have already reached a satisfactory level [of stability]. We have also worked on the overall performance and we are quite satisfied with that. Of course, we have also fixed bugs and glitches, and we will continue to do so. Over time, we will be introducing fixes to the general systems that players [have pointed out as needing improvement].” And it’s only just the beginning. System updates targeting the occasional glitch set the stone for months to years of remedial adjustments, the latter of which might focus on further streamlining the player experience for the game’s beleaguered console users.
Cyberpunk 2077 was the most anticipated game of 2020 when developers made the big trailer reveal in 2019. John Wick star Keanu Reeves went onstage to present the game — and the character he plays, rockstar Johnny Silverhand — during that year’s E3, much to the delight of longtime Cyberpunk fans. Unfortunately, the game’s release was wracked by performance issues of the worst kind, from annoying bugs to intermittent lags. It immediately became apparent that the problems only persisted on the PlayStation and Xbox, particularly older generation consoles. Cyberpunk 2077 was originally made for PC, with console versions basically being direct ports. CD Projekt assessed the complaints and explained the porting process hadn’t gone smoothly, with every modification, minor or major, inadvertently creating the bugs and resulting in several key performance elements backsliding. The engine used — CD Projekt’s very own REDengine — was reportedly ill-suited for consoles.
The studio received death threats — even sued by authorities for fraud — and shops were forced to accept copies of Cyberpunk 2077 back and issue large-scale refunds, including digital resellers like the PlayStation store. The title had eventually become unplayable, forcing online retailers like Sony to remove Cyberpunk 2077 from its catalog, at least until CD Projekt manages to amend it enough to qualify as a working video game. Cyberpunk 2077 was only reinstated on the PSN store last month. CD Projekt hadn’t addressed its audience yet, forcing Sony to include an alert to interested buyers, warning them of the game’s performance problems. Customers needn’t worry about that, now that sweeping alterations are already fast underway. Kiciński didn’t specify what changed, but CD Projekt wouldn’t be bragging about stability if the claims weren’t legitimate.
Cyberpunk 2077 was developed by the same team behind The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, but with twice the number of staff working on it. Berkeley-based R. Talsorian Games helmed the original Cyberpunk; CD Projekt, a Polish game studio, was chosen to spearhead the sequel on account of its impressive worldbuilding and narrative choices, having created The Witcher series. Cyberpunk 2077 may have become the industry’s “most conspicuous disaster” of 2020, but The Witcher is still one of the greatest marvels of the eighth gen. With patches already working their magic, it’s only a matter of time before Cyberpunk 2077 manages to reach the same pinnacle.
