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Tag: Cdpr

  • Cyberpunk 2077’s Incredible Turnaround Will Now Be Preserved Forever

    Cyberpunk 2077’s Incredible Turnaround Will Now Be Preserved Forever

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    Image: CD Projekt Red

    As Cyberpunk 2077 approaches its third anniversary, the beleaguered blockbuster is getting a send-0ff to immortalize its unlikely turnaround. CD Projekt Red announced an Ultimate Edition for the sci-fi RPG on November 21 that includes this year’s Phantom Liberty expansion and the massive 2.0 overhaul patch. There will even be a physical copy for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S owners.

    Phantom Liberty Is Undoing One Key Thing That Cyberpunk Got Right

    Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition will come to “next-gen” consoles and PC on December 5, and give players the chance to experience the open world story and years of fixes and upgrades all in one place for $60.

    “This new release is the perfect way to experience every story of the dark future; it also contains the free Update 2.0, which overhauled many of the game’s systems, introducing dynamic skill trees, high-octane vehicle combat, and enhanced enemy and police AI — as well as adding new weapons, vehicles, and clothes,” CDPR wrote in a press release.

    Game of the Year editions became something of a joke in the industry many years ago, but if any release deserved to get repackaged that way, it’s Cyberpunk 2077. Once pulled from the PlayStation Store for being so busted on PS4, the game is now pretty close to what players had hoped for based on years of trailers and E3 hype. Phantom Liberty, starring Idris Elba as FIA sleeper agent Solomon Reed, is the type of high-quality expansion fans have come to expect from the studio behind The Witcher 3‘s Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine DLC. The underlying gameplay has also markedly improved.

    Read More: Phantom Liberty’s New Ending Is The Perfect Coda To Cyberpunk 2077

    But the real significance of the new Ultimate Edition is that Cyberpunk 2077‘s definitive 2.0 version will now be the one included on physical discs for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S players. The Xbox version will even include the entire Phantom Liberty expansion incorporated into the base game. (PS5 owners will have to download it during installation.) That means that even in the actual year 2077, when the video game servers will have likely long since shut down, anyone who still has an ancient console and the Ultimate Edition disc will still be able to experience Cyberpunk 2077 in its complete form.

    Lots of games have managed to engineer live service-style redemption arcs these days, but very few get to see them memorialized in physical form. Now if only the Netflix spin-off Cyberpunk: Edgerunners could get a physical release as well.

               

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    Ethan Gach

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  • CD Projekt Red Spent Over $120 Million Saving Cyberpunk 2077’s Reputation

    CD Projekt Red Spent Over $120 Million Saving Cyberpunk 2077’s Reputation

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    Cyberpunk 2077’s highly acclaimed and massive expansion, Phantom Liberty, almost feels like its own game. That’s probably because the developers behind the expansion spent over $60 million on developing Phantom Liberty and $21 million on marketing it, bringing the total cost of producing the DLC to about half of what it cost to develop the entire Cyberpunk 2077 base game. And Cyberpunk’s costs rise even more when you factor in the fortune CD Projekt Red spent just plugging up the original release’s worst problems after its disastrous launch.

    Phantom Liberty Is Undoing One Key Thing That Cyberpunk Got Right

    After launching in a pretty awful state in 2020, CDProjeckt Red’s massive open-world RPG Cyberpunk 2077 has received numerous updates, bug fixes, and even a popular Netflix anime. All of this helped the futuristic RPG become more popular than ever. And while some say the game’s core problems can’t be fixed, CDPR hasn’t given up on Cyberpunk 2077. The RPG’s only planned DLC, Phantom Liberty (and the free 2.0 update) released on September 26 to rave reviews, and fans declaring the game “saved.” But building something like Phantom Liberty isn’t cheap.

    On October 5, during an investor’s presentation, CDPR revealed the total budget for Phantom Liberty. Its costs were split between zł275 million on “direct production expenditures” and another zł95 million on “marketing campaign costs.” If we do some converting, that equals out to just about $63 million and $21 million in USD, respectively, or roughly $84 million total.

    CD Projekt Red

    As a point of comparison, it reportedly cost $174 million to develop Cyberpunk 2077. That number gets ever larger when you factor in the $142 million CDPR spent on marketing the dystopian RPG. Looking at these numbers, it’s almost impressive how little money CDPR spent on marketing the new DLC compared to the main game.

    No matter how you slice it, spending nearly $85 million on developing and marketing a single expansion is wild and a sign of just how expensive game development is these days. It’s also a great example of how big, expensive games aren’t allowed to be flops.

    Cyberpunk 2077 had to be a beloved hit, no matter the cost

    Another interesting number revealed during the presentation is that CDPR spent zł178 million or about $40 million USD on bringing the game to next-gen consoles and building the sweeping 2.0 update. Add that number to the above Phantom Liberty figures and you could feasibly claim CDPR spent almost $125 million on fixing Cyberpunk 2077’s image and saving its reputation.

    However, based on how well Cyberpunk 2077 and its new expansion are selling after the update—CDPR claims there was a “surge” of sales following update 2.0—the company is likely going to wind up making a lot of money off the game. CDPR pointed out during the investor presentation that it is “confident” that the DLC and its main game will be “big sellers” for a long time, pointing toward the continued sales of The Witcher 3 and its DLC years after launch.

    With the development of the Cyberpunk 2077 sequel starting and news of a live-action spin-off in the works, it makes sense that CDPR would be willing to invest so much money into making sure Cyberpunk 2077’s legacy amounted to more than a failed launch and bad console ports. It needed the game to be a huge hit with millions of fans. And it got there, even if it cost a lot of money in the end.

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    Zack Zwiezen

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