Is Project Orion heading towards a dark future?

[Prae255]

Maybe it's just my cyberpsychosis flaring up but is CDPR going to abandon a chunk of the community in favor of profit?
I know, totally crazy and unheard of, but there's a few recent things that I don't feel quite happy with when looking towards the future.

Chesapeak SMG: requires an Amazon Prime member$hip.
yes, you can get it 'free' by signing up for the trial but you still have to sign up and give payment information. Don't forget to cancel!
Yasha Sniper Rifle: Purchase 2 Twitch $ubscriptions of any tier to eligible Twitch partners and affiliates playing Cyberpunk 2077 for yourself or others.
Unreal Engine: The fear that Project Orion may have a year of exclusivity on the Epic Game $tore.
The worst part about this would be that modding on UE sound about as friendly as naked cartwheeling into a field of cacti ( or poison ivy ) whilst blindfolded.
Cyberpunk 2077 has received a ton of mods and I recon its one of the things that kept the game going on PC.

So... CDPR is now taking up sponsorship with Amazon and Twitch, each getting something from the playerbase in return.
Whether it's viewing time, money or personal/payment information.
These microtransactions are obviously a test to see whether or not it would be profitable in future projects.
And Epic being notorious for using exclusivity bribes is another red flag in my books.
I wouldn't be surprised if that's already the case. CDPR would probably not have said no to a cash injection from them.

So yeah...
Maybe I'm just seeing ghosts here.
Maybe we're heading towards a future where the next installment will be an Epic Games exclusive with more microtransactions than actual content.
Or maybe I'll get a cameo as the next Gary the Prophet. ( if so, please don't forget the tinfoil hat. )

 

[gregski]

I can agree about the platform-exclusive bonuses as being weird moves in CDPR's case, Twitch, Amazon etc. Meh.

However, the Epic Store Exclusivity is not something I see happening, because:

1. CDPR are sitting on a pile of cash so big they don't need any "bribes". They are not a small indie studio that needs funding to finish their project in exchange for exclusivity.
2. I don't know CDPR's internal platform breakdown numbers but I would bet that Epic Store is nowhere near Steam for example.
3. Cyberpunk is currently a global IP with a brand that does not need promotion & marketing money from Epic(see point 1)
4. Their move to UE does not guarantee any exclusivity rights to Epic. CDPR will actually customize UE and work on additional features for the engine that will suit CP2 and other games.(it was mentioned in one of the recent interviews, I think with PC Gamer).

So to sum up - I don't see ANY gains(financial or other) from such a move for CDPR and just losses - alienating a huge part of their PC fanbase.

So no, they won't go for this kind of exclusivity in the future IMO.

 

[Notserious80]

im some what sharing these concerns too but atm im just going too keep my eyes on it pretty much. If they start with the 10$ for blue skin ill be very worried tho We shall se is probably the best way to describe my feelings, i did not like the whole skins on platforms. It was kinda weird to see them do that. especially after admonising other companys for MTs (its not a pure MT i know but it still cost money).

 

[Draconifors]

5. GOG is CDPR's sister company, so it would make absolutely no sense for a CDPR game to be exclusive to a different platform.

 

[Prae255]

Well, that's actually quite reassuring.
I'm glad that the fear of exclusivity was just paranoia on my part then.

 

[manoj_k30]

Exclusivity won't happen, Steam is where they get reviews, GOG is where they get most money back.
Epic is just for fun xtra cash

 

[Bloodartist]

However, the Epic Store Exclusivity is not something I see happening, because:

I agree. I sincerely doubt CDPR would go for any kind of platform exclusivity deal.

1. Those are usually for developers who are pressed for money
2. Gog.com is a distribution platform and owned by CDPR. With exclusivity deal they would be shooting themselves in the foot.

You don't see a microsoft game company giving exclusivity deal to sony, do you? If anything, they would keep it to themselves.

 

[tavellone]

This isn't a defence and I don't really like it either, but the vast majority of games nowadays have fundamentally meaningless weapon/item bonuses with Twitch and Amazon accounts so I guess it is just the way of the industry and given that a large amount of people, particularly gamers, regularly use Amazon and Twitch it makes sense from a business perspective, essentially free marketing and it really doesn't affect the game at all.

As far as exclusivity goes, as Draconifors pointed out, CDPR have their own platform, it wouldn't even be a good business decision to sign up for exclusivity with another platform.

Ultimately though, CDPR is a multi million dollar corporation with investors and stockholder and whatever good intentions people in the company may have, it is beholden to them. It isn't a small indie company owned by a few people anymore and the few people who owned that small indie company made the choice to turn their company public for the sake of more money. Whether that was for the intention of their own profit or purely to make bigger, more grand designed games is something that only they can say and everyone else can speculate. It is ironic though, that a company that constantly prided itself with a 'I'm not like the other girls' attitude, even mocking big companies in their games, a company that created a game based on a media and an IP that directly criticises corporate power and capitalism in general has become that exact thing.

The point is, it's a big corporation so they're going to do what big corporations do and they have been already doing it for years to some degree, so don't get too disappointed if they do things that are purely business decisions because they are a business. Changing to UE5 is clearly a business decision for one.

 

[jeancastex]

Changing to UE5 is clearly a business decision for one

It's probably easier to find new devs with xp on UE5 + they don't have to dev the whole engine, just their tools/framework/etc...
It's probably easier for devs to find some help on UE5 online.

 

[Spockprime]

The Twitch and Amazon stuff is super weird. Not sure what's going on with that, other than maybe some folks in marketing going off the rails again.

Platform exclusivity is a different thing though. They're not going to abandon their own platform (GOG), or the biggest PC game platform (Steam) because of Unreal.

 

[Bloodartist]

The Twitch and Amazon stuff is super weird. Not sure what's going on with that, other than maybe some folks in marketing going off the rails again.

My gut feeling was that CDPR wanted, for some reason, to give something good to streamers. This twitch drop thing helped streamers (particularly the big ones given the exclusive stuff) more than anyone else.

 

[gregski]

My gut feeling was that CDPR wanted, for some reason, to give something good to streamers. This twitch drop thing helped streamers (particularly the big ones given the exclusive stuff) more than anyone else.

Well, that reason might have been that streamers are a marketing channel

 

[Tvaroog]

Ultimately though, CDPR is a multi million dollar corporation with investors and stockholder and whatever good intentions people in the company may have, it is beholden to them. It isn't a small indie company owned by a few people anymore and the few people who owned that small indie company made the choice to turn their company public for the sake of more money.

Those same guys who started the company in the 90s, even though they don't have a majority, have enough of shares to have full control over the company. CD Projekt became a public company in 2011 by the way, around the same time Witcher 2 came out.

 

[Notserious80]

My gut feeling was that CDPR wanted, for some reason, to give something good to streamers. This twitch drop thing helped streamers (particularly the big ones given the exclusive stuff) more than anyone else.

Except Twitch/amazon you mean. They take like 50% of the money for subs. For the big streamers i kinda think they dont need that help, for the smaller ones i kinda get it tho. Still dont like paying for skins and i wont do it but.. Its a marketing thing is my guess.

Those same guys who started the company in the 90s, even though they don't have a majority, have enough of shares to have full control over the company. CD Projekt became a public company in 2011 by the way, around the same time Witcher 2 came out.

Doesnt mean they have full controll when there a public traded company and they have obligations to the shareholders.

 

[tavellone]

Those same guys who started the company in the 90s, even though they don't have a majority, have enough of shares to have full control over the company. CD Projekt became a public company in 2011 by the way, around the same time Witcher 2 came out.

I don't follow how having less than 50% of the company gives them full control of the company.

even if we imagine for a second that it were true anyway, it doesn't negate the rest of my point.

Also, by the way, by 2011 CDPR was already a multi million dollar company. So again nothing you said negates anything I said so I don't understand what you're trying to say to me.

 

[Tvaroog]

Doesnt mean they have full controll when there a public traded company and they have obligations to the shareholders.

Their obligation is to make money and take care of the company. Retirement funds and investment banks and thousands of individual investors don't make decisions regarding company's strategy. It wasn't Nationale-Nederlanden who decided that there will be only one expansion, that a sequel will be made in US, or that the company will develop third IP.

Post automatically merged: Oct 2, 2023

Also, by the way, by 2011 CDPR was already a multi million dollar company.

Of course, how else would they be able to produce Witcher 3?

 

[tavellone]

Their obligation is to make money and take care of the company. Retirement funds and investment banks and thousands of individual investors don't make decisions regarding company's strategy. It wasn't Nationale-Nederlanden who decided that there will be only one expansion, that a sequel will be made in US, or that the company will develop third IP.

Post automatically merged: Oct 2, 2023

Of course, how else would they be able to produce Witcher 3?

Right, so I still don't understand what you're trying to say to me? Are you disagreeing that CDPR is a big corporation that makes decisions like a big corporation? Because it seems like that's exactly what you are saying, which is exactly what I am saying.

 

[Notserious80]

Their obligation is to make money and take care of the company.

Yea like every other gaming company thats public. Obligations causes compromises in they way your running the company. The more obligations you have the harder it is too please everyone. For making money in games nowdays MT is probably the best way, sadly. Even if you make a great game you will hit sales limits for the invested time/money. Sure you can still make billions but sometimes thats not enough it seems. Mts are pretty much free money unless you have a reputation too keep. So far its a marketing thing but i still dont like it. We shall se what happends in the future.