I didn't played Witcher 1-3 when they were released, I bought them 1-3 years later. But it isn't the same, because I think the direction/content of the games were ok since day one.
CP2077 not. Their is no chance that they can make a looter shooter/Action Adventure with gamemechanics of the 90s, to the high quality OpenWorld-RPG with non-linear story like the marketing pretented it would be.
The knew that "we" (RPG-Player) would buy this game, bc their reputation, Witcher, Storytelling etc.. And they knew, that "we" wouldn't be euphoric about the endproduct. But: Money is Money.
And the videos on YT comparing the marketing with the real game, shows me that I'm not stupid or senile. And this is nothing about hate, I'm really angry. I feel tricked in a way that no company had managed before.
It's hard to compare the Witcher 3 with Cyberpunk because expectations back then were not off the roof like they have been for Cyberpunk. Back then CDPR was known mostly to their fans only, and the Witcher 3 was the 3rd game of a series, which means, assets, general layout of the game, setting, characters, gameplay loop, general aesthetics... were very well established. Basically the Witcher 3 was just an improvement over the Witcher 2 on the open world area, but the quests mechanics were the same (and I remember when the Witcher 3 got released some folks here were hating it because it was straying too far away from the 1st and 2nd episode)..
Anyway, with Cyperpunk you're talking about a brand new IP (so new setting, new design, new general aesthetics) AND about a switch from a 3rd person RPG to a 1st person one (which means new gameplay loop, new assets and animations to render...). And with the notoriety CDPR has gained with the Witcher 3, tons of people expected tons of different stuff out from this game. CDPR marketing didn't help on this, but basically, the more you watch older marketing videos from them, the more you see they were advertising the game before even knowing what kind of game it was supposed to be. They were still trying to figure out how the game was supposed to be played and to feel in 2018, it's pretty obvious.
1. They first had to sell the game back then as a 1st person game (first controversy, they went back and forth on this internally, which took them so much time away from simply dropping content into the game)
2. Then they had to sell the game to FPS gamers who got interested (second controversy : those FPS fans were worried because it was an RPG the game would feel like The Division with sponges taking bullets over and over)
3. Then they had to win back their RPG fans who got afraid of this whole FPS controversy by selling them a game which was on par with the Witcher in terms of storytelling... which Cyberpunk is, to an extent.
All of this to say, the game wasn't as easy to develop as the Witcher. It has to be taken into consideration when comparing the two in terms of content and such.
I personally didn't expect anything from the game, so maybe that's why I find it to be very fun now. I can go beyond what "lacks" in the game without any issues and thus I'm able to see its inner beauty and clever moments/designs.
It was a half baked product. Plain and simple. I really want what was promised by CDPR and I think that what evertyone is wanting as well.
We do. And I'm saying this as someone who loves the game because I basically expected nothing of it until I played it, mainly because I was (wrongly) sure it wouldn't fit my taste because it was 1st person. I didn't expect the game to be to my taste because of that, but in the end I find it even better than what I had in mind thanks to the 1st person.
Now, what I'm mainly complaining about is that, we want a better game, with more content, etc, that's for sure. Everyone does. But because of that specifically, we should as a community of old followers here sort out our ideas and provide constructive feedback and criticism. Half the posts on these forums sound like the game is the worst game ever made. This isn't the case, objectively. I'm not talking about the marketing or the over-hype around it, but in a neutralway.
The game has strong assets. It has a strong foundation. It has great characters. It has a unique vision and a great setting. It just needs more content put into it and some polish over it.