Is it too little too late?

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Is it too late? Hell no. It's been 40 days since the release. If they manage to resolve some of the most glaring issues (police system, driving in general, revamp crafting), optimize the performance and fix the most annoying bugs a lot of people would restart playing just to experience the game as "it was supposed to be released in the first place".

Hell, I haven't touched the game in like two weeks. I started my second playthrough and wasted 30-40 hours wasting every quest, enemy and encounter of any kind in Watson before even visiting Vic for the first time. And now I've registered a forum account and I'm just waiting for the "first big patch".

Then comes modding - if in couple of months CDPR manages to release some modding tools combined with continuous support for the modding community in general it can breathe so much new life in the game. Consider vanilla Skyrim vs how much you can change the game with custom modifications. The thing that kept (and arguably still is) Elder Scrolls V alive for so long is the mod support. Apply the same for CP2077.

I guess that the above does not apply in full for consoles, but I have zero experience with any of those.

If the bugfixes and mod support come in time it should buy enough time for CDPR to work on actual expansions (god I hate the term DLC)
 
With the amount of things intentionally removed/left out from the game, the amount of time passed after the initial hype, and the amount of player drop offs after the first month of play;

Is it too little too late for Cyberpunk 2077 to make a single player comeback?

Is adding multiplayer the only thing that will draw the crowd back after everything is fixed?
FYI the "player dropoff" came when people simply completed the game to their satisfaction. It is not an online grindfest. Some stopped after finishing the story and others (like myself) stopped after doing everything. This is completely normal.
 
FYI the "player dropoff" came when people simply completed the game to their satisfaction. It is not an online grindfest. Some stopped after finishing the story and others (like myself) stopped after doing everything. This is completely normal.
This is also only taking into account PC players correct? For me I completed the game to my satisfaction somewhere in chapter 2.
 
It's worth mentioning that's it's not just two IP. It's two highly lucrative IPs. Regardless of anyone's opinion of the game, unless the numbers have drastically changed, CP2077 is a huge commercial success that probably made twice it's budget in sales. So is TW3
I don't know about the success of CP2077. It is a singleplayer game with not to much content. Almost everyone, ok 41%, who bought it had the chance to refund it. So why not play through, refund it and buy it in march, april for the half price after the patches drop? And IF they are ok. Or buy it if you can grab a next gen console? So then you can wait to fall to the upgrade and who knows how many new blockbusters are ready until then.
W3 had a steady income fullprice, GoTY, then Story-DLCs and so on. The "lifecycle" was far different.
I saw CP 2077 PC-copies for 30-35,- € three weeks after release.

With the money they making now they have to pay the bugfixes, Upgrades, DLCs for CP2077, the MP-Part and Witcher 4.
And they have to find experienced people to help them. Not so easy in this phase.
 
I don't know about the success of CP2077. It is a singleplayer game with not to much content. Almost everyone, ok 41%, who bought it had the chance to refund it. So why not play through, refund it and buy it in march, april for the half price after the patches drop? And IF they are ok. Or buy it if you can grab a next gen console? So then you can wait to fall to the upgrade and who knows how many new blockbusters are ready until then.
W3 had a steady income fullprice, GoTY, then Story-DLCs and so on. The "lifecycle" was far different.
I saw CP 2077 PC-copies for 30-35,- € three weeks after release.

With the money they making now they have to pay the bugfixes, Upgrades, DLCs for CP2077, the MP-Part and Witcher 4.
And they have to find experienced people to help them. Not so easy in this phase.

Well...

  1. 13 million estimated sales 10 days after release, including refunds and pending refunds received by that point not including those sent to them directly by e-mail in the wake of their "help me refund" campaign.
  2. 3-4 week where it occupied #1 top seller on Steam except for 2-3 days. 3 of those weeks during a Steam winter sale (thus it sold a lot to retain/regain that #1 spot).
  3. Still within top 5 a month after release on Steam.
As I said, unless the sales/refund ratio has drastically changed the game is doing extremely well financially.

Furthermore, TW3 went on sales plenty of times and it's paid expansions came later than a month after the game's release. TW3 has apparently sold about 28 million copies by May 2020, so 5 years. Assuming the numbers haven't changed, CP2077 probably has half that a month after release.

Also, don't get your hopes up for the next Witcher game. They've already stated that work would only begin AFTER CP2077's release. They also said they were re-evaluating all their future plans during the investors call. My guess is the next game set in the Witcher universe is on hold for the time being.
 
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Well...

  1. 13 million estimated sales 10 days after release, including refunds and pending refunds received by that point not including those sent to them directly by e-mail in the wake of their "help me refund" campaign.
  2. 3-4 week where it occupied #1 top seller on Steam except for 2-3 days. 3 of those weeks during a Steam winter sale (thus it sold a lot to retain/regain that #1 spot).
  3. Still within top 5 a month after release on Steam.
As I said, unless the sales/refund ratio has drastically changed the game is doing extremely well financially.

Furthermore, TW3 went on sales plenty of times and it's paid expansions came later than a month after the game's release. TW3 has apparently sold about 28 million copies by May 2020, so 5 years. Assuming the numbers haven't changed, CP2077 probably has half that a month after release.

Also, don't get your hopes up for the next Witcher game. They've already stated that work would only begin AFTER CP2077's release. They also said they were re-evaluating all their future plans during the investors call. My guess is the next game set in the Witcher universe is on hold for the time being.

They're planning multiplayer, which will probably not come until 2023 now. Hopefully the multiplayer game means that improvements to cyberpunk 2077 will be seen as a valid investment.
 
With the amount of things intentionally removed/left out from the game, the amount of time passed after the initial hype, and the amount of player drop offs after the first month of play;

Is it too little too late for Cyberpunk 2077 to make a single player comeback?

Is adding multiplayer the only thing that will draw the crowd back after everything is fixed?

Honest question: where are people getting the impression that the game is a disappointment?

I heard that there was a big drop off on Steam, but I also heard that it was a bit of mirage because the very initial concurrency numbers were obscenely through the roof, and have since gone to a "normal" level that is still very high.

I'm in a few Facebook Cyberpunk groups. There are dozens of them, and I think the largest have almost 60k members at this point. Most of what I see there is pretty positive and suggests a high engagement level among those players. The general consensus that I see is that people are sucked into the game to a huge degree and are enjoying it immensely, despite the bugs. There's a lot of optimism that, if the game is this good as a buggy mess, it will be amazing when the bugs are fixed.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it?
 
The biggest problem is what I hear around me. no need for me to read polls, players who feel (rightly so) cheated by the CDPR franchise will not come back. or few of them.
I continue to support CP-2077 but it is in this perspective that the problems arise. I restarted the game for the 3rd time, I am strongly criticized around me.
Yes, I want to know what it's like to be Streetkid, Nomad and Corpo. Also to follow different vectors.
graphics, money management; how to make money in the game, the interest, the numerous problems are the keystone of the criticism against CP-2077. I stay faithful at the post until the game becomes more than adequate.
if this would not be the case, I would be very angry, like this day of December 10, 2020, after seeing the result, I listened to RATM's Killing In the name for an hour.
despite this, the anger passed, I gave CDPR- Cyberpunk 2077 a chance. to be continued,
 
Honest question: where are people getting the impression that the game is a disappointment?

I heard that there was a big drop off on Steam, but I also heard that it was a bit of mirage because the very initial concurrency numbers were obscenely through the roof, and have since gone to a "normal" level that is still very high.

I'm in a few Facebook Cyberpunk groups. There are dozens of them, and I think the largest have almost 60k members at this point. Most of what I see there is pretty positive and suggests a high engagement level among those players. The general consensus that I see is that people are sucked into the game to a huge degree and are enjoying it immensely, despite the bugs. There's a lot of optimism that, if the game is this good as a buggy mess, it will be amazing when the bugs are fixed.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it?

Only time will tell...
 
My hope at this point is that they will greatly improve the game beyond bugs, glitches and performance etc but their internal plan is simply to avoid publicly acknowledging that what they released is a bare bones early access game which while very annoying from a customer perspective makes sense from a business standpoint. The truth is we don't need the weatherman to tell us it's raining outside, we can look outside for ourselves and see the torrential downpour and it's raining fire and brimstone but it's only a preview of an even worse long term effect potential perpetual acid shit storm.

Ultimately all that will matter will be if they seriously improve the game or not. That said, when Hello Games was in a similar situation they didn't try to rationalize, defend and present themselves in such an unbelievable state of denial as CDPR has. Either way though just from a business standpoint it's clear to me that they desperately need some kind of competent PR person because while someone like myself will look for the truth and ask questions by default, they've handled things so badly so far that even people who otherwise just consume product and get excited for next product are experiencing light bulbs going off over their heads and asking questions.
Yeah, if Iwinski's speech was typical PR damage control (say something without saying anything), Badowski's response was really alarming with it's excuses.
 
Honest question: where are people getting the impression that the game is a disappointment?

I heard that there was a big drop off on Steam, but I also heard that it was a bit of mirage because the very initial concurrency numbers were obscenely through the roof, and have since gone to a "normal" level that is still very high.

I'm in a few Facebook Cyberpunk groups. There are dozens of them, and I think the largest have almost 60k members at this point. Most of what I see there is pretty positive and suggests a high engagement level among those players. The general consensus that I see is that people are sucked into the game to a huge degree and are enjoying it immensely, despite the bugs. There's a lot of optimism that, if the game is this good as a buggy mess, it will be amazing when the bugs are fixed.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it?

well said.

Honest question: where are people getting the impression that the game is a disappointment?

will go down as one of the worlds greatest mysteries.

there is belief among some that "everything shown between 2012 and 2020 was in the game"

but according to the dev

 
13 million estimated sales 10 days after release, including refunds and pending refunds received by that point not including those sent to them directly by e-mail in the wake of their "help me refund" campaign.
They made the 13 mio. with refund public 1-3 days after big sellers like Bestbuy, MS, Gamestop said that they will refund. At that time never ever, they already had valid numbers. And 1 day before the timeline for this Gog-refundwhatever ran out.
If they had said that we've sold "13 mio. with refunds, but we still have to wait how much customers take the offer." that would've been a honest. But they didn't. And like calculated everyone is saying "But 13 mio.!". And everytime I say "But..."
For me the 13 mio is PR. Sorry, but I'm now really suspicous if CDPR give out success messages.

And Topseller: How many AAA-Wonders released in the last 4-5 weeks? Maybe I missed some. Activision-Blizzard, Ubisoft they all throw their games on the marked weeks earlier. EA had nothing, as far I remember.

You can get TW3+DLCs for 15,- € since years, it isn't new. I bought it 2019 for PS and 2020 year for XBox. 15,- €

Edit: Jesus, I really shouldn't write something before I had my first coffee.
 
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Honest question: where are people getting the impression that the game is a disappointment?

I heard that there was a big drop off on Steam, but I also heard that it was a bit of mirage because the very initial concurrency numbers were obscenely through the roof, and have since gone to a "normal" level that is still very high.

I'm in a few Facebook Cyberpunk groups. There are dozens of them, and I think the largest have almost 60k members at this point. Most of what I see there is pretty positive and suggests a high engagement level among those players. The general consensus that I see is that people are sucked into the game to a huge degree and are enjoying it immensely, despite the bugs. There's a lot of optimism that, if the game is this good as a buggy mess, it will be amazing when the bugs are fixed.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it?
There are certain aspects of the game that is really top notch, but there are also some which are of really low standard, even if one look passed the bugs.

Good things
- Visual presentation of Night city can be very impressive.
- The characters are really well done.
- Sound/music is really good.

Bad things
- The AI is really not good, whether it comes to the NPC or the traffic.
- Loot system is not good.
- Character progression is not really balanced.
- Combat is sort of a mess especially mid and end game.
- Crafting system is broken.
- Features in the open world environment is not good.
- Lots of missing features.
- The branching stories and how it affects your game, is not really good.

The problem as I see it, is that a lots of people simply get hooked on the theme of the game and therefore care less about the actual game mechanics or are willing to look passed or ignore the things that from a gameplay point of view is not working. And obviously that is fair enough, but other people including myself, really like this theme as well, but also like the RPG and open world genre a lot, so that part of the game also need to be working in order to get the best experience.

Not saying that CP can't become a game that really shine in the long run and live up to what they said it would originally. But the issue is that we haven't really heard anything from CDPR in regards to whether or not that will happen or if they just intend to patch it up and fix the bugs. Because let's be honest, some of these missing features are quite severe and would require a lot of fundamental changes to the game overall.

Also I think a lot of people that critic the game gets a bit misunderstood as not having enjoyed the game. For instance I can be quite critical about it, but I did spend a total of 168 hours or so in the game, and I wouldn't have done that if I didn't enjoy it. But at the same time, I also want to be realistic and say that I don't feel there is a lot of replayability in the game in its current state, due to a lot of the missing features and poorly designed mechanics.
So I want CDPR to add them so the experience can be as good as possible, because it has so much potential of really being an amazing game, that if fixed, could be expanded on for a very long time. But I think, if it is left as it is now and just the bugs are fixed, then the game will die off, unless modders are given access to fixing and adding stuff to it.
 
well said.

Honest question: where are people getting the impression that the game is a disappointment?

Easy : people are crying about the state of the game, so they'll want it to be a disappointment in sales and numbers, just to be in position to tell "I told you so". If you look hard enough for disappointment, you'll find it everywhere.

It's all over the internet. Reviews, videos exposing advertised vs. delivered, various issues with the launch of the game, lawsuits, apologies after apologies etc.

And we know "the internet" to be a very reliable, objective, neutral, well documented and friendly place, especially when it comes down to ones opinion, right ?
 
I don't know what you know, but evidence is in both the promos and in the game.

Ever thought there are also people who play, don't come to post whatever their thoughts are on the internet, and just stay silent enjoying (or not) a product ?
Not everything relies on what transpires online.
Look at the sales number for example, even with refunds counted in. 13 millions + consumers and yet, all we hear about is maybe 0.5% of them arguing about whether the game is good or not. And the game is still #1 on steam so... if you listen closely enough, I think you'll hear the sweet sound of the majority of people not caring at all about this backlash. We play the game, enjoy it/or not, then move on.

Whatever you find online isn't representative at all in my book.
 
And we know "the internet" to be a very reliable, objective, neutral, well documented and friendly place, especially when it comes down to ones opinion, right ?

By your logic we are wasting our time in an ocean of subjectivity discussing anything here... in a internet forum.

Ever thought there are also people who play, don't come to post whatever their thoughts are on the internet, and just stay silent enjoying (or not) a product ?

Congratulations to those that do this but I don't think this should preclude those that have criticisms to speak their minds.

all we hear about is maybe 0.5% of them arguing about whether the game is good or not. And the game is still #1 on steam so... if you listen closely enough, I think you'll hear the sweet sound of the majority of people not caring at all about this backlash. We play the game, enjoy it/or not, then move on.

Interesting statistical analysis, I wonder where all this data is coming from.

Whatever you find online isn't representative at all in my book.

I know, right? XD
 
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By your logic we are wasting our time in an ocean of subjectivity discussing anything here... in a internet forum.

Not by any stretch saying that we're wasting our time (I don't consider it wasting my time since I enjoy debating over topics I like). But we are in an ocean of subjectivity for sure. Taking what you're finding on one forum on the internet gathering about 0.1% of a games population doesn't make it the objective truth. Seems obvious to me.
To give an example, it's that old Wow trope : go on World of Warcraft forums and check the subclasses forums. You'll only see people crying about their class being underpowered and every other class being overpowered.

Just as it is obvious internet economy is centered around creating buzz and milking content, so the amount of videos bashing / praising one product doesn't mean it's objectively a good / bad product.

As shocking as it may sound to some people, internet isn't representative of a population's opinion.
 
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