- Status
So what? "Based on" doesn't automatically mean it uses the same mechanics as a table top game. Preview say that it feels like a Deus Ex (Human Revolution) game. Even considering level gating.
I'm a new user so I can't create a new thread, so I'm posting here. Interesting article in the Atlantic magazine about Mike Pondsmith and Cyberpunk: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/12/mike-pondsmith-cyberpunk-2077/616924/
Great article! Thanks for sharing. Also this is the perfect thread for it, so good job!
The Witcher 3 is the bedrock of CD Projekt Red's financials one last time
CD Projekt Red reported a modest rise in revenue for the third calendar quarter -- the final quarter before the launch …
www.gamesindustry.biz
EDIT: https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/sex-relationships-cyberpunk-2077-160000709.html
Previewer impressions on how relationships work:
- More time you spend with people and help them, the deeper a relationship comes.
- Game pays attention to your dialogue choices and how you treat people.
- If an NPC thinks you're trustworthy, it can open up additional side-quests and encounters.
- Quests do not seem to be timed according the previewer. However, he's not sure if skipping content will eventually meet a point where the quest disappears.
- Previewer didn't see any "let's just hang out missions." Most had a favor to cash in. There are some lengthy conversations.
- All of the conversation and gameplay choices seem to be going in an aggregate pile.
- There is no "Jackie liked that" or "Judy didn't like that" sort of warning like DA:I, Telltale, or Fallout 4 so far as he can tell. No meter that shows where you stand in a relationship, it's more organic than that.
- You can make calls and get in touch with people that you've previously interacted with. You can ignore calls as well. There's both calls and texts.
- Johnny will pop into dialogue scenes sometimes, and V can choose to ignore him or not. He wont always show up, but it's pretty clear he's always paying attention to what V is doing.
- Johnny's relationship with V is at least somewhat antagonistic. It's not clear if he is a friend or foe overall. The chip in V's head is definitely a danger to V.
- Sex is tackled in the game in a similar way to TW3. Perhaps a little more graphic, but not by much. There is nudity, and optional cutscenes of 30 seconds of canoodles.
- There aren't stat buffs or anything from making the nookie. It's more of a narrative affecting element than a gameplay affecting element.
Last edited:
CDPR Q3 Financial Call Transcript [skipping some of the more boring parts and parts not relevant to Cyberpunk]:
Company Participants
Adam Kiciński - President, Joint CEO
Piotr Nielubowicz - Chief Financial Officer
...
Adam Kiciński
Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the PROJEKT's conference calls dedicated to Q3, 2020. My name is Adam Kiciński and I will run this call together with Piotr Nielubowicz, CFO. Please note that the presentation is posted on our corporate website cdprojekt.com. After the call, we'll also post the audio recording of this -- of the call and its transcript.
... Even though the circumstances are less than perfect, we continue to work hard on delivering top quality content for our fans. The game went gold in early October, and will hit stores around the world in 15 days ... The game will be launched on PC, Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and Stadia. Just days ago, next-gen consoles were released and our title will run great on Xbox Series X and S, as well as PlayStation 5 from the very beginning, thanks to their backward compatibility. We are excited to be able to bring our game to more players than ever before.
...
We want to reach as many fans as possible, which is why our app appear in 55 countries and 34 different languages. Our goal is to be wherever gamers are and we want to talk to them in their mother tongues.
As for the game itself, it has been localized into 18 languages, including 10 fully adopt fashions, light event. What's even cooler mimics and facial performance are unique and fully natural in every voiceover language.
... We've begun October on a high note. At the opening game of this year's NBA finals, we add new Cyberpunk commercial, starring Keanu Reeves, which kick off our CD marketing campaign. We also carried on with the Night City Wire series ... Each episode presents new faces of Cyberpunk, including trailers, behind the scenes footage, the game world, and key characters. Interest has been huge with each episode attracting more and more viewers. The gameplay trailer doing the final few episode last week was viewed a record 23 million times over just three days following its release.
... Piotr, the floor is yours.
Piotr Nielubowicz
Thank you, Adam. Let's go to the first financial slide, profit and loss account ... (lots of numbers stuff ... good 3rd quarter, GoG revenues up 25%).
...
Adam Kiciński
Thanks, Piotr. We are 15 days away from launch. We are entering the most intensive phase of our marketing and PR campaign. On top of that in the next two weeks, we'll be sending review copies of the game to journalists around the world, enabling them to publish their impressions and reviews of Cyberpunk before its release. We are very excited and we eagerly await the moment gamers can finally lay their hands on the game.
That's all from us. That's all from me. We will now proceed with the Q&A session.
Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Thank you. So, we will now begin the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions]
The first question is from Omar Sheikh of Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open.
Omar Sheikh
Good evening, everyone. I've got three questions, if I could. The first is on preorders presales, 15 days out. I guess you have some visibility on -- a meaningful kind of view, I guess, on preorders at this stage. I wonder if you could maybe first of all tell us, what you think about the overall numbers that you're seeing. And then also, maybe about the mix between console, PC, and GOG. That's the first question.
Secondly, I wonder if you could give us a sense of what impact going into home office mode until March 21 will have on your -- I guess, your schedule for next year in particular for releases of things -- of expansions in 2021. So, specifically, could you give us a sense of how many expansions you expect to publish next year?
And then finally a question for you, Adam. I mean, we all know you're a perfectionist. The whole company is full of perfectionists. I guess the question is, how satisfied are you with the current quality of the game is you see it today. And where you expected to be in terms of quality by the time you release it on December the 10. Thanks very much.
Piotr Nielubowicz
Hello, Omar. This is Piotr Nielubowicz. Yeah. Thanks for trying to get some extra info on preorders. As you know, we are not revealing much information on that. We believe at this stage, we do not have full and complete data that we could share. And it's not easy to say how any data should be applied on the final sales. Therefore, unfortunately, I can't give you any more details than the total increase of deferred revenues that was presented in the financial statement, I just refers to.
Adam Kiciński
All right. Adam, on the second -- I'll take the second, the third one. So, it seems that home office now -- will not impact our schedule. We haven't revealed any dates regarding expansions, but so far so good. So, none of no home office mode the last delay is impacting our schedule in this industry we got. And bear in mind that part of the team is working from the office. I mean, smaller part, but it helps a bit as well. So, we can organize things here internally and then collaborate with people who are at homes.
And the last question, well, it's tricky. It's tricky to share our impressions before reviews and before gamers are able to play the game. Well, we are satisfied. But we are never fully satisfied and don't get me wrong. It's not like we are not sure, but let's wait just 15 days. Let's wait again even let's because reviews will be published earlier. So, let's wait for the external judgment. And then everything will be clear.
...
Operator
The next question is from Matthew Walker of Credit Suisse. Your line is now open.
Matthew Walker
Thanks a lot. Good evening. The first question is on the release. Can you update us on what your thoughts are on the percentage, which will be digital for December quarter and then for the other quarters after that, if you could give it a feel for why you think that will be helpful?
The second question is on the multiplayer. Do you think that's still coming in 2022? And would you say on monetization levels because you care about the gamers is going to be -- the same level of peers for online games, or do you think is going to be below or significantly below in terms of monetization to keep the gamers happy?
And then the last question is on the PS4. I think there was some press stuff saying that maybe it wasn't working quite as well as it could on PS4. Have we seen any gameplay on PS4? Maybe you could give us a bit of an update on how it performs on PS4. Thanks.
Piotr Nielubowicz
So, Piotr Nielubowicz. First, the expected ratio between digital and physical on our sales, as we see it on preorders digital is very strong, so definitely we are more into moving potential split digital/physical, and more on the digital side. How far we'll go? We honestly speaking do not know, definitely farther than we had on the Witcher 3 and definitely more than 50% should come from the digital channel.
And then the history of Witcher 3 shows the longer the game is on the markets, the more -- the split shifts towards digital again. On Witcher 3, it's vast majority. And on Witcher 2 and 1, it's -- let's say 99% of the revenues we generate are digital. So, this is the only direction that can be expected in that near and longer term.
Adam Kiciński
All right. Adam again, and I'll take the second and the third one. Regarding multiplayer, we haven't announced any date so far and actually, right now, it's not the -- I mean, it's not the moment to talk about any business model for multiplayer, even though we had discussing before, but to avoid any fast in our gaming community, we -- I will skip it, because we'll share our thoughts about next year once we will update our strategy. It will happen in Q1 next year, and that will be after releasing Cyberpunk and that will be the right moment to discuss deeper or all key aspects around future releases.
And PS4, yesterday we released the gameplay both on PS4 and PS5. So, you can see the difference. And on both -- I mean, PS5 is great. PS4 is still very good. I mean, we had those extra three weeks and we achieved a lot by -- within this final stretch. So, we believe that the game is performing great on every platform. Of course, accordingly to platform capabilities, but not every platform should be great.
...
Operator
The next question is from Vladimir Bespalov of VTB Capital. Your line is now open.
Vladimir Bespalov
Hello. Thanks for taking my questions. My first question will be on Cyberpunk. As I read the hands-on reviews that were released recently, one of the most frequent comments was that the game was quite buggy, even though not critically, but still. Could you maybe provide some color how different is the current version, I would say, from what you provided, you said you hit viewers, how many are those bugs have been fixed because you were pretty aware of those bugs as far as I understood from the preview.
...
Adam Kiciński
So, in terms of bugs, we are all aware of them. Of course, such a big ga[me] can't be just bug free. That's the kind of obvious, but we believe that the level will be as low as to let gamers not see them. And fortunately, some bugs extended previous were caused by some general -- I would say general features and many of them are already fixed. So, what gamers will get will be different from what -- and what we viewers will get in this final review is it's better than what previewers, got.
...
Operator
The next question is from Robert Berg of Berenberg. Your line is now open.
Robert Berg
Hi. Thanks. Just one left. One of the advantages, I guess, of going last or after your peers is that you can actually see their reception -- the reception of the hardware sales, et cetera. And I'm sure you have some good contacts in the industry. You get to hear color of how things have been progressing. Without talking about any particular games or consoles, which I'm sure you aren't wants to do, how are you feeling about the health of the video game industry this holiday season, perhaps compared to what you might score last time we spoke? Thanks.
Adam Kiciński
It seems the industry is very healthy, even though circumstances -- pandemic circumstances are generally tough for most industries, our industry seems to be healthy. And for us releasing on the actually previous current/previous gen and the current/next-gen NPC and Stadia at the same time is a unique opportunity. I mean, we are reaching unprecedented number of potential gamers, potential customers. So for us, this window seems to be very sweet.
...
Operator
The next question is from Matti Littunen of Bernstein. Your line is now open.
Matti Littunen
Good evening. First question on back catalog sales. So, it looks like the year-on-year growth rate has slowed down quite a bit from H1, but the revenue drivers you listed seem to be pretty similar. Could you give us a bit more color into as to why that growth rate has slowed down year-on-year and sequentially as well from Q2?
And the other one relates to the marketing efforts you mentioned that. So, as advertising spend kicks off properly in start of December, I was specifically asking about the TV investments between yourselves and your publisher partners. On an absolute level, will this part of the marketing mix be much higher than it was for Witcher 3? Thank you very much.
Adam Kiciński
So, first answering about back catalog sales, I would say that the first and the second quarter were spectacularly strong, especially the time -- by the end of April, May. And I see three major reasons behind it. First of all, The Witcher franchise got more popular, thanks to The Witcher series release on Netflix. Secondly, we had the pandemic situation, which in general supports sales of video games. And that was one of the few forms of entertainment available to people being locked down at home. And thirdly, at the end of last year, we've dropped the Witcher 3 on Switch. That was a nice revenue driver for us and that performed really well comparing to the previous times.
The third quarter is always the dry season, as I mentioned already. The lockdown ended so people have finally and things got, we're able to leave homes and probably this is also somehow affected let's say, we had likely the affects every year, I would say, but this time it also included the fact of finishing the lockdowns all over the world, basically. So, I would say this is the major reason behind the disproportionality between the first and the second quarter and the third one finally.
But what's worth mentioning this was the best third quarter in recent years for us, both on the revenue side and on the net profitability side. So, I would rather say that we are happy about it, especially. The whole company was focused on Cyberpunk on preparing the launch of this game. And definitely that's what most people were thinking about and being involved in.
I'm not sure if I properly understand the second question. The standard scheme for our marketing campaign arrange to by us together with our distributors is that we are responsible for preparing most of the assets. So in case of TV commercial, we created, we finance it. And then this TV commercial is broadcasted territory by territory. And this is prefinanced by local distributors. And then just expense on promotion of our game is deducted in our royalty reports -- or in the royalty reports that the distributors sends us after each quarter. And it's one of the deductible costs. So, it's prefinanced by them, but at the final calculation, we will be made liable for all of the costs of the marketing, supporting the revenues on our games.
And I cannot -- some about comparing Witcher 3 to Cyberpunk. Obviously, this time we are gravitating to online, definitely. So that's the major change. In terms of TV, it depends on territory because we are not only -- we think assets, we are those who create whole campaigns. I mean, we are those who decides where money spent. So depending on the territory we're working with professionals, we decide what would give us the best effects. So, for examples, TV is fairly strong in the U.S., not necessarily across Europe. And the whole campaign of Cyberpunk, it's, multi-cloud Witcher campaign, but it's hard to generalize how to compose TV of -- the TV campaign of Cyberpunk to Witcher 3.
...
Operator
If there are no further questions, I hand it to the speakers.
Adam Kiciński
So we have a couple of questions on chat. The first one from Rubil [ph] is good evening everyone. Could you tell us what are your plans for the multiplayer mode?
So, first, we don't call it modes. It's a separate dedicated production, a big production. And we plan -- we think about it as a standalone product. Obviously, it's not entirely standalone as it comes from the universe of Cyberpunk and is very much related to the concept of single player Cyberpunk we -- I came up with. But from our perspective, it's -- is another independent production and independent team of people works on it. And there's -- I said already we are not focusing right now on talking too much about other future products, products that are to be released after Cyberpunk. So please be with us in the first quarter of next year when we plan to share some strategy update. And I believe Cyberpunk multiplayer will be possible.
The question is from Piotr Łopaciuk DM PKO BP. When exactly embargo, no reviews will be lifted? Before release, but we are not revealing the exact date -- the exact day, actually. So far -- but definitely before we release we let gamers read about the game. Before the buy -- before they buy the game.
And I can take the next one from Piotr as well. The game has been not presented on basic, not pro console PS4 and Xbox 1 so far. What is the performance of the game on this machine?
Of course, a bit lower than on pros, but surprisingly good, I would say for such a huge world. So, bit lower, but very good. That's the answer.
Another question comes from Albert. Long-term, what percentage of CP preorders comes from GOG.com and how many more CP preorders were sold compared to preorders of Witcher percentage wise. So, first, GOG operates on just one platform on PC, and the PC will have some physical sales and some digital sales. And within the digital sphere, steam is definitely the dominant platform. So from the perspective of all our expected sales, GOG is sort of presenting some single number percent of -- all of the sales, including preorders. But in general, I may say that GOG's representation in preorders of our Cyberpunk is naturally higher than GOG's market share in the global video gaming business.
How many more CP preorders were sold comparing to the Witcher? We were not revealing this info. But as I said, we are very happy and Cyberpunk preorders are visibly higher than -- and seeing what we achieved on the Witcher 3 for comparable time.
Operator
We continue at the moment.
Adam Kiciński
...
[Indiscernible], when do you plan to announce and start selling season pass for CP 2027? The initial plan was to do before release, but after the recent delay, we decided to wait for the release to provide gamers with the game and then start talking about future projects. So, after release.
...
What part of costs is to be allocated to international campaign of Cyberpunk? I am not sure how to understand it. Absolutely vast majority of our sales 96%, 97% comes from exports international sales. Poland, our domestic territories are responsible usually for 2%, 3%, 4% of our revenues. So by far most of the expenses for Cyberpunk promotion are related to the international markets as we sell the game really on the global sphere. I hope I managed to answer all of the questions.
All right. I'll take this the next one. Łukasz Kosiarski from Pekao, Łukasz is asking, did you receive conditional or full certification from Microsoft and Sony? If conditional, did you fulfill all their conditions? We got full unconditional certification from both platforms because we won the gold. So, the game is certified. But having said that, we have to bear in mind that every patch has to be certified. It's a simplified truck. So, the zero patch will go through simplifies certification, but the game is already certified.
The Next question, what are the general player feedback on the game trailer? Is the feedback in line with your expectations or above your expectations? What is the anticipated impact from recent alleged gameplay leak? The next question probably is for you and the third is for you. So I'll stop here, for you Piotr. So, I'll stop here.
So, the feedback is great. I mean, we are really happy. We're always happy with number of viewers. So, it's a little above our expectations, I would say, but we try to stay humble. So -- but it's obviously great.
And regarding the leak, fortunately, there were not too many spoilers because this is the ugliest thing installing the game before it is released. So, it was not harmful, even though every leak is backed. But as I'm concerned, there are no impacts -- no negative impact from the leak.
...
Adam Kiciński
So, it seems that are all of the questions. If anyone wants to add additional one, that's last call. All right. The last one, I'll take this. Piotr Łopaciuk from DM PKO BP. When after the lease, are you planning to release the first sales numbers of Cyberpunk? Same like with preorders. We'll see what we'll have on the table in terms of reliable data. We have to have a global picture. And of course, in terms of digital, we have them almost on fly. In terms of physical, sometimes take some time. Bear in mind that we use local distributors. So there's a middle man between retail and us. So, we'll work on having as fresh data as possible -- and as possible and to release them as soon as possible we'll have the whole picture.
All right. Thank you very much. Thank you for joining the call. And you ready to play the game in 15 days. Thank you.
Company Participants
Adam Kiciński - President, Joint CEO
Piotr Nielubowicz - Chief Financial Officer
...
Adam Kiciński
Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the PROJEKT's conference calls dedicated to Q3, 2020. My name is Adam Kiciński and I will run this call together with Piotr Nielubowicz, CFO. Please note that the presentation is posted on our corporate website cdprojekt.com. After the call, we'll also post the audio recording of this -- of the call and its transcript.
... Even though the circumstances are less than perfect, we continue to work hard on delivering top quality content for our fans. The game went gold in early October, and will hit stores around the world in 15 days ... The game will be launched on PC, Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and Stadia. Just days ago, next-gen consoles were released and our title will run great on Xbox Series X and S, as well as PlayStation 5 from the very beginning, thanks to their backward compatibility. We are excited to be able to bring our game to more players than ever before.
...
We want to reach as many fans as possible, which is why our app appear in 55 countries and 34 different languages. Our goal is to be wherever gamers are and we want to talk to them in their mother tongues.
As for the game itself, it has been localized into 18 languages, including 10 fully adopt fashions, light event. What's even cooler mimics and facial performance are unique and fully natural in every voiceover language.
... We've begun October on a high note. At the opening game of this year's NBA finals, we add new Cyberpunk commercial, starring Keanu Reeves, which kick off our CD marketing campaign. We also carried on with the Night City Wire series ... Each episode presents new faces of Cyberpunk, including trailers, behind the scenes footage, the game world, and key characters. Interest has been huge with each episode attracting more and more viewers. The gameplay trailer doing the final few episode last week was viewed a record 23 million times over just three days following its release.
... Piotr, the floor is yours.
Piotr Nielubowicz
Thank you, Adam. Let's go to the first financial slide, profit and loss account ... (lots of numbers stuff ... good 3rd quarter, GoG revenues up 25%).
...
Adam Kiciński
Thanks, Piotr. We are 15 days away from launch. We are entering the most intensive phase of our marketing and PR campaign. On top of that in the next two weeks, we'll be sending review copies of the game to journalists around the world, enabling them to publish their impressions and reviews of Cyberpunk before its release. We are very excited and we eagerly await the moment gamers can finally lay their hands on the game.
That's all from us. That's all from me. We will now proceed with the Q&A session.
Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Thank you. So, we will now begin the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions]
The first question is from Omar Sheikh of Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open.
Omar Sheikh
Good evening, everyone. I've got three questions, if I could. The first is on preorders presales, 15 days out. I guess you have some visibility on -- a meaningful kind of view, I guess, on preorders at this stage. I wonder if you could maybe first of all tell us, what you think about the overall numbers that you're seeing. And then also, maybe about the mix between console, PC, and GOG. That's the first question.
Secondly, I wonder if you could give us a sense of what impact going into home office mode until March 21 will have on your -- I guess, your schedule for next year in particular for releases of things -- of expansions in 2021. So, specifically, could you give us a sense of how many expansions you expect to publish next year?
And then finally a question for you, Adam. I mean, we all know you're a perfectionist. The whole company is full of perfectionists. I guess the question is, how satisfied are you with the current quality of the game is you see it today. And where you expected to be in terms of quality by the time you release it on December the 10. Thanks very much.
Piotr Nielubowicz
Hello, Omar. This is Piotr Nielubowicz. Yeah. Thanks for trying to get some extra info on preorders. As you know, we are not revealing much information on that. We believe at this stage, we do not have full and complete data that we could share. And it's not easy to say how any data should be applied on the final sales. Therefore, unfortunately, I can't give you any more details than the total increase of deferred revenues that was presented in the financial statement, I just refers to.
Adam Kiciński
All right. Adam, on the second -- I'll take the second, the third one. So, it seems that home office now -- will not impact our schedule. We haven't revealed any dates regarding expansions, but so far so good. So, none of no home office mode the last delay is impacting our schedule in this industry we got. And bear in mind that part of the team is working from the office. I mean, smaller part, but it helps a bit as well. So, we can organize things here internally and then collaborate with people who are at homes.
And the last question, well, it's tricky. It's tricky to share our impressions before reviews and before gamers are able to play the game. Well, we are satisfied. But we are never fully satisfied and don't get me wrong. It's not like we are not sure, but let's wait just 15 days. Let's wait again even let's because reviews will be published earlier. So, let's wait for the external judgment. And then everything will be clear.
...
Operator
The next question is from Matthew Walker of Credit Suisse. Your line is now open.
Matthew Walker
Thanks a lot. Good evening. The first question is on the release. Can you update us on what your thoughts are on the percentage, which will be digital for December quarter and then for the other quarters after that, if you could give it a feel for why you think that will be helpful?
The second question is on the multiplayer. Do you think that's still coming in 2022? And would you say on monetization levels because you care about the gamers is going to be -- the same level of peers for online games, or do you think is going to be below or significantly below in terms of monetization to keep the gamers happy?
And then the last question is on the PS4. I think there was some press stuff saying that maybe it wasn't working quite as well as it could on PS4. Have we seen any gameplay on PS4? Maybe you could give us a bit of an update on how it performs on PS4. Thanks.
Piotr Nielubowicz
So, Piotr Nielubowicz. First, the expected ratio between digital and physical on our sales, as we see it on preorders digital is very strong, so definitely we are more into moving potential split digital/physical, and more on the digital side. How far we'll go? We honestly speaking do not know, definitely farther than we had on the Witcher 3 and definitely more than 50% should come from the digital channel.
And then the history of Witcher 3 shows the longer the game is on the markets, the more -- the split shifts towards digital again. On Witcher 3, it's vast majority. And on Witcher 2 and 1, it's -- let's say 99% of the revenues we generate are digital. So, this is the only direction that can be expected in that near and longer term.
Adam Kiciński
All right. Adam again, and I'll take the second and the third one. Regarding multiplayer, we haven't announced any date so far and actually, right now, it's not the -- I mean, it's not the moment to talk about any business model for multiplayer, even though we had discussing before, but to avoid any fast in our gaming community, we -- I will skip it, because we'll share our thoughts about next year once we will update our strategy. It will happen in Q1 next year, and that will be after releasing Cyberpunk and that will be the right moment to discuss deeper or all key aspects around future releases.
And PS4, yesterday we released the gameplay both on PS4 and PS5. So, you can see the difference. And on both -- I mean, PS5 is great. PS4 is still very good. I mean, we had those extra three weeks and we achieved a lot by -- within this final stretch. So, we believe that the game is performing great on every platform. Of course, accordingly to platform capabilities, but not every platform should be great.
...
Operator
The next question is from Vladimir Bespalov of VTB Capital. Your line is now open.
Vladimir Bespalov
Hello. Thanks for taking my questions. My first question will be on Cyberpunk. As I read the hands-on reviews that were released recently, one of the most frequent comments was that the game was quite buggy, even though not critically, but still. Could you maybe provide some color how different is the current version, I would say, from what you provided, you said you hit viewers, how many are those bugs have been fixed because you were pretty aware of those bugs as far as I understood from the preview.
...
Adam Kiciński
So, in terms of bugs, we are all aware of them. Of course, such a big ga[me] can't be just bug free. That's the kind of obvious, but we believe that the level will be as low as to let gamers not see them. And fortunately, some bugs extended previous were caused by some general -- I would say general features and many of them are already fixed. So, what gamers will get will be different from what -- and what we viewers will get in this final review is it's better than what previewers, got.
...
Operator
The next question is from Robert Berg of Berenberg. Your line is now open.
Robert Berg
Hi. Thanks. Just one left. One of the advantages, I guess, of going last or after your peers is that you can actually see their reception -- the reception of the hardware sales, et cetera. And I'm sure you have some good contacts in the industry. You get to hear color of how things have been progressing. Without talking about any particular games or consoles, which I'm sure you aren't wants to do, how are you feeling about the health of the video game industry this holiday season, perhaps compared to what you might score last time we spoke? Thanks.
Adam Kiciński
It seems the industry is very healthy, even though circumstances -- pandemic circumstances are generally tough for most industries, our industry seems to be healthy. And for us releasing on the actually previous current/previous gen and the current/next-gen NPC and Stadia at the same time is a unique opportunity. I mean, we are reaching unprecedented number of potential gamers, potential customers. So for us, this window seems to be very sweet.
...
Operator
The next question is from Matti Littunen of Bernstein. Your line is now open.
Matti Littunen
Good evening. First question on back catalog sales. So, it looks like the year-on-year growth rate has slowed down quite a bit from H1, but the revenue drivers you listed seem to be pretty similar. Could you give us a bit more color into as to why that growth rate has slowed down year-on-year and sequentially as well from Q2?
And the other one relates to the marketing efforts you mentioned that. So, as advertising spend kicks off properly in start of December, I was specifically asking about the TV investments between yourselves and your publisher partners. On an absolute level, will this part of the marketing mix be much higher than it was for Witcher 3? Thank you very much.
Adam Kiciński
So, first answering about back catalog sales, I would say that the first and the second quarter were spectacularly strong, especially the time -- by the end of April, May. And I see three major reasons behind it. First of all, The Witcher franchise got more popular, thanks to The Witcher series release on Netflix. Secondly, we had the pandemic situation, which in general supports sales of video games. And that was one of the few forms of entertainment available to people being locked down at home. And thirdly, at the end of last year, we've dropped the Witcher 3 on Switch. That was a nice revenue driver for us and that performed really well comparing to the previous times.
The third quarter is always the dry season, as I mentioned already. The lockdown ended so people have finally and things got, we're able to leave homes and probably this is also somehow affected let's say, we had likely the affects every year, I would say, but this time it also included the fact of finishing the lockdowns all over the world, basically. So, I would say this is the major reason behind the disproportionality between the first and the second quarter and the third one finally.
But what's worth mentioning this was the best third quarter in recent years for us, both on the revenue side and on the net profitability side. So, I would rather say that we are happy about it, especially. The whole company was focused on Cyberpunk on preparing the launch of this game. And definitely that's what most people were thinking about and being involved in.
I'm not sure if I properly understand the second question. The standard scheme for our marketing campaign arrange to by us together with our distributors is that we are responsible for preparing most of the assets. So in case of TV commercial, we created, we finance it. And then this TV commercial is broadcasted territory by territory. And this is prefinanced by local distributors. And then just expense on promotion of our game is deducted in our royalty reports -- or in the royalty reports that the distributors sends us after each quarter. And it's one of the deductible costs. So, it's prefinanced by them, but at the final calculation, we will be made liable for all of the costs of the marketing, supporting the revenues on our games.
And I cannot -- some about comparing Witcher 3 to Cyberpunk. Obviously, this time we are gravitating to online, definitely. So that's the major change. In terms of TV, it depends on territory because we are not only -- we think assets, we are those who create whole campaigns. I mean, we are those who decides where money spent. So depending on the territory we're working with professionals, we decide what would give us the best effects. So, for examples, TV is fairly strong in the U.S., not necessarily across Europe. And the whole campaign of Cyberpunk, it's, multi-cloud Witcher campaign, but it's hard to generalize how to compose TV of -- the TV campaign of Cyberpunk to Witcher 3.
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Operator
If there are no further questions, I hand it to the speakers.
Adam Kiciński
So we have a couple of questions on chat. The first one from Rubil [ph] is good evening everyone. Could you tell us what are your plans for the multiplayer mode?
So, first, we don't call it modes. It's a separate dedicated production, a big production. And we plan -- we think about it as a standalone product. Obviously, it's not entirely standalone as it comes from the universe of Cyberpunk and is very much related to the concept of single player Cyberpunk we -- I came up with. But from our perspective, it's -- is another independent production and independent team of people works on it. And there's -- I said already we are not focusing right now on talking too much about other future products, products that are to be released after Cyberpunk. So please be with us in the first quarter of next year when we plan to share some strategy update. And I believe Cyberpunk multiplayer will be possible.
The question is from Piotr Łopaciuk DM PKO BP. When exactly embargo, no reviews will be lifted? Before release, but we are not revealing the exact date -- the exact day, actually. So far -- but definitely before we release we let gamers read about the game. Before the buy -- before they buy the game.
And I can take the next one from Piotr as well. The game has been not presented on basic, not pro console PS4 and Xbox 1 so far. What is the performance of the game on this machine?
Of course, a bit lower than on pros, but surprisingly good, I would say for such a huge world. So, bit lower, but very good. That's the answer.
Another question comes from Albert. Long-term, what percentage of CP preorders comes from GOG.com and how many more CP preorders were sold compared to preorders of Witcher percentage wise. So, first, GOG operates on just one platform on PC, and the PC will have some physical sales and some digital sales. And within the digital sphere, steam is definitely the dominant platform. So from the perspective of all our expected sales, GOG is sort of presenting some single number percent of -- all of the sales, including preorders. But in general, I may say that GOG's representation in preorders of our Cyberpunk is naturally higher than GOG's market share in the global video gaming business.
How many more CP preorders were sold comparing to the Witcher? We were not revealing this info. But as I said, we are very happy and Cyberpunk preorders are visibly higher than -- and seeing what we achieved on the Witcher 3 for comparable time.
Operator
We continue at the moment.
Adam Kiciński
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[Indiscernible], when do you plan to announce and start selling season pass for CP 2027? The initial plan was to do before release, but after the recent delay, we decided to wait for the release to provide gamers with the game and then start talking about future projects. So, after release.
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What part of costs is to be allocated to international campaign of Cyberpunk? I am not sure how to understand it. Absolutely vast majority of our sales 96%, 97% comes from exports international sales. Poland, our domestic territories are responsible usually for 2%, 3%, 4% of our revenues. So by far most of the expenses for Cyberpunk promotion are related to the international markets as we sell the game really on the global sphere. I hope I managed to answer all of the questions.
All right. I'll take this the next one. Łukasz Kosiarski from Pekao, Łukasz is asking, did you receive conditional or full certification from Microsoft and Sony? If conditional, did you fulfill all their conditions? We got full unconditional certification from both platforms because we won the gold. So, the game is certified. But having said that, we have to bear in mind that every patch has to be certified. It's a simplified truck. So, the zero patch will go through simplifies certification, but the game is already certified.
The Next question, what are the general player feedback on the game trailer? Is the feedback in line with your expectations or above your expectations? What is the anticipated impact from recent alleged gameplay leak? The next question probably is for you and the third is for you. So I'll stop here, for you Piotr. So, I'll stop here.
So, the feedback is great. I mean, we are really happy. We're always happy with number of viewers. So, it's a little above our expectations, I would say, but we try to stay humble. So -- but it's obviously great.
And regarding the leak, fortunately, there were not too many spoilers because this is the ugliest thing installing the game before it is released. So, it was not harmful, even though every leak is backed. But as I'm concerned, there are no impacts -- no negative impact from the leak.
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Adam Kiciński
So, it seems that are all of the questions. If anyone wants to add additional one, that's last call. All right. The last one, I'll take this. Piotr Łopaciuk from DM PKO BP. When after the lease, are you planning to release the first sales numbers of Cyberpunk? Same like with preorders. We'll see what we'll have on the table in terms of reliable data. We have to have a global picture. And of course, in terms of digital, we have them almost on fly. In terms of physical, sometimes take some time. Bear in mind that we use local distributors. So there's a middle man between retail and us. So, we'll work on having as fresh data as possible -- and as possible and to release them as soon as possible we'll have the whole picture.
All right. Thank you very much. Thank you for joining the call. And you ready to play the game in 15 days. Thank you.
Very recent interview with Game Director, Adam Badowski, who talks with more details about the world, story, themes and some previously unmentioned inspirations. Really interesting stuff for people interested in those aspects of the game.
It's in Polish, but subtitles are in English
EDIT: And the interview with The Man himself from the same event.
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And what exactly is wrong with a photo mode? It's not as if you're forced to use it, it means those who like to take neat screenshots can do so, like the amazing work people have done with Rockstar Editor in taking screenshots of GTA V.
I think Kat's still mad there's no TPP, and saying that if they were going for "immersion" (one of the justifications for FPP only), then they shouldn't include a photo mode either. I could be wrong, but that's what I think they're getting at.
CE box dimensions:
@Shavod, thank you as always! Very insightful. (I was surprised that Adam knew Tekkonkinkreet)
One question: do you know anything about the 27-second rule that the interviewer and Adam mentioned at 17:48?
Thank you (and ofc ネオン himself) for sharing it! I'm personally very fond of this kinda breakdown vids.
@Shavod, thank you as always! Very insightful. (I was surprised that Adam knew Tekkonkinkreet)
One question: do you know anything about the 27-second rule that the interviewer and Adam mentioned at 17:48?
I take it you're a sidekick or something of Neon
Thank you (and ofc ネオン himself) for sharing it! I'm personally very fond of this kinda breakdown vids.
Since The Witcher 3 was their first attempt at open world game, design team decided to impose 27-second rule on themselves, meaning that in order to prevent the exploration from feeling boring and uneventful, every 27 seconds there should be something that will grab player's attention in the world. It varied from big things, like some ancient ruins or small settlements, to minor ones, like a pack of wild animals wandering around, some monsters prowling in the area or elements of visual storytelling, for example local deity statue or stone altar with offerings. They believed that more then 27 seconds of nothing happening would make the world feel empty, while less then that too packed. But of course, seeing how Cyberpunk takes place mostly within the urban setting, naturally there will be always more things going on around you, thus this rule also might be shorter, as Adam said.
I take it you're a sidekick or something of Neon
Thank you (and ofc ネオン himself) for sharing it! I'm personally very fond of this kinda breakdown vids.
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I like these vids as well and no ones better than Neon ( sidekick )
Thank you (and ofc ネオン himself) for sharing it! I'm personally very fond of this kinda breakdown vids.
[/QUOTE]
I like these vids as well and no ones better than Neon ( sidekick
)
I love seeing an anime such as that one being a source of inspiration for the game. The design of Treasure Town is extremely beautiful in its own semi-dystopian way.
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