I'm tired of reading the excuse that last gen consoles are somehow holding this game back or are the cause of the problems with development for this game.
The devs have had full access to the X Box One and PS 4 hardware for the entirety of the development time of this game. Cyberpunk 2077 was initially announced right before the launch of the X Box One and PlayStation 4. Think about that - they've had the entire life cycle of this console generation to get this game running on those platforms. Games released at the end of a console's life are supposed to really showcase everything the console is capable of.
To give an example from years ago - somehow devs were able to cram Xenoblade Chronicles onto a cartridge for the New Nintendo 3DS. Yes, they scaled down the textures and only included one voice language. But they managed to get the whole game (MF-ing Xenoblade Chronicles!) in there and running well. I do not believe that the consoles that can run Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Metro Exodus, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Assassin's Creed Odyssey somehow can't handle Night City.
Now, maybe CDPR wasn't lying when they said the game ran 'surprisingly well'. It's possible management knew the game was borked and was expecting the consoles to simply melt into a pile of goo, and so were pleasantly surprised that none of the test systems got bricked. But I think the rest of us had somewhat higher expectations.
Granted, CDPR doesn't have a long history of developing for consoles, though the did manage it for The Witcher 3. It was, after all, The Witcher that spawned the terms "console peasants" and "PC Master Race". Knowing your limitations is part of management's job, and in this it appears they failed miserably. At this point, maybe they need to spend some of that money from one of the greatest game releases ever and hire a studio that specializes in console development to figure this all out.
But there was no reason it had to go down this way, and it absolutely doesn't have to end like this.
The devs have had full access to the X Box One and PS 4 hardware for the entirety of the development time of this game. Cyberpunk 2077 was initially announced right before the launch of the X Box One and PlayStation 4. Think about that - they've had the entire life cycle of this console generation to get this game running on those platforms. Games released at the end of a console's life are supposed to really showcase everything the console is capable of.
To give an example from years ago - somehow devs were able to cram Xenoblade Chronicles onto a cartridge for the New Nintendo 3DS. Yes, they scaled down the textures and only included one voice language. But they managed to get the whole game (MF-ing Xenoblade Chronicles!) in there and running well. I do not believe that the consoles that can run Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Metro Exodus, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Assassin's Creed Odyssey somehow can't handle Night City.
Now, maybe CDPR wasn't lying when they said the game ran 'surprisingly well'. It's possible management knew the game was borked and was expecting the consoles to simply melt into a pile of goo, and so were pleasantly surprised that none of the test systems got bricked. But I think the rest of us had somewhat higher expectations.
Granted, CDPR doesn't have a long history of developing for consoles, though the did manage it for The Witcher 3. It was, after all, The Witcher that spawned the terms "console peasants" and "PC Master Race". Knowing your limitations is part of management's job, and in this it appears they failed miserably. At this point, maybe they need to spend some of that money from one of the greatest game releases ever and hire a studio that specializes in console development to figure this all out.
But there was no reason it had to go down this way, and it absolutely doesn't have to end like this.
