Cyberpunk 2077

Summary

Cyberpunk 2077 is a 2020 action role-playing video game developed by CD Projekt Red and published by CD Projekt, and based on Mike Pondsmith's Cyberpunk tabletop game series. The plot is set in the fictional metropolis of Night City, California, within the dystopian Cyberpunk universe. The player assumes the role of V (voiced by Gavin Drea/Cherami Leigh), a mercenary who accidentally gets imbued with a cybernetic "bio-chip" containing an engram of legendary rockstar and terrorist Johnny Silverhand (voiced by Keanu Reeves). As Johnny's consciousness begins overwriting V's own, the two must work together to separate and save V's life.

Cyberpunk 2077
A CGI rendering of a man holding a gun
Developer(s)CD Projekt Red
Publisher(s)CD Projekt
Director(s)
  • Adam Badowski
  • Konrad Tomaszkiewicz
  • Gabriel Amatangelo
Producer(s)
  • Konrad Tomaszkiewicz
  • Jędrzej Mróz
  • Przemysław Wójcik
  • Michał Stec
Designer(s)
  • Grzegorz Mocarski
  • Mateusz Kanik
  • Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz
  • Paweł Sasko
Programmer(s)
  • Piotr Tomsiński
  • Kacper Kościeński
Writer(s)
  • Marcin Blacha
  • Tomasz Marchewka
Composer(s)
SeriesCyberpunk
EngineREDengine 4
Platform(s)
Release
  • Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Stadia
  • 10 December 2020
  • PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S
  • 15 February 2022
Genre(s)Action role-playing
Mode(s)Single-player

The game's development began following the release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Blood and Wine (2016). The game was developed by a team of around 500 people using the REDengine 4 game engine. CD Projekt launched a new division in Wrocław, Poland, and partnered with Digital Scapes, Nvidia, QLOC, and Jali Research to aid the production. Cyberpunk creator Mike Pondsmith was a consultant, and actor Keanu Reeves had a starring role. The original score was led by Marcin Przybyłowicz, and featured the contributions of several licensed artists. After years of anticipation, CD Projekt released Cyberpunk 2077 for PlayStation 4, Stadia, Windows, and Xbox One on 10 December 2020, followed by PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S on 15 February 2022.

Cyberpunk 2077 received praise from critics for its narrative, setting, and graphics. However, some of its gameplay elements received mixed responses while its themes and representation of transgender characters received some criticism. It was also widely criticized for bugs, particularly in the console versions which suffered from performance problems. Sony removed it from the PlayStation Store from December 2020 to June 2021 while CD Projekt rectified some of the problems. CD Projekt became subject to investigations and class-action lawsuits for their perceived attempts at downplaying the severity of the technical problems before release; these were ultimately cleared with a settlement of US$1.85 million. By October 2023, the game had sold over 25 million units. An expansion, Phantom Liberty, released for PlayStation 5, Windows, and Xbox Series X/S on 26 September 2023, which sold 5 million units in 2023.[1] Its total cost to develop and market (including updates and DLC) is reportedly over $436 million, making it one of the most expensive video games to develop. A sequel, codenamed "Project Orion", was announced in October 2022.

Gameplay edit

 
Gameplay screenshot of the player-character completing a mission

Cyberpunk 2077 is an action role-playing game[2] played from a first-person perspective as V,[3] a mercenary whose voice,[4] face, hairstyle, body type and modifications, background, and clothing are customisable. There are also five attributes (Body, Intelligence, Reflexes, Technical, and Cool) that can be customized to suit the player's gameplay style.

The gameplay is flexible: the three primary play styles are Netrunner (hacking), Techie (machinery), and Solo (combat). V has a number of maneuvers to reposition in combat, including sprinting, taking cover, double-jumping, and sliding;[5][6] many of these abilities can be unlocked or upgraded through cyberware implants installed by a "ripperdoc".[7] Weapon use increases accuracy and reloading speed, which are reflected in character animations.[8] Equipment, such as weapons and armor, is governed by a coloured tier system[9] and is split into melee and ranged options. Melee strikes can be dealt with close-combat weapons.[10][11] There are three types of ranged weapons, all of which can be customised and modified—Power (with ricocheting bullets), Tech (which penetrates walls and enemies), and Smart (with homing bullets).[12][13] The game has four types of damage that can be inflicted and resisted—Physical, Thermal, Electric, and Chemical.[14][15][16] The game can be completed without killing anyone,[17] with non-lethal options for weapons and cyberware.[18]

The open world metropolis of Night City consists of six regions: the corporate City Centre, immigrant-inhabited Watson, luxurious Westbrook, suburban Heywood, gang-infested Pacifica, and industrial Santo Domingo. Its surrounding area, the Badlands, can also be explored. V navigates these locations on foot (in first-person view) and in vehicles (in either a third- or first-person view).[7] V owns an apartment and a garage, and can purchase additional apartments throughout the city.[10] There is a full day-night cycle and dynamic weather, which affects the way non-player characters (NPCs) behave.[12][19] Depending on the location, law enforcement may be alerted if V commits a crime.[20] Pedestrians are vulnerable to vehicular collisions.[13] [21] Radio stations are available to listen to.[22] [23] Night City features many non-English-speaking characters, whose languages can be translated with special implants.[24] V also periodically uses a "Braindance," a device that allows one to undergo other people's experiences.[25][26]

Branching dialogues enable interaction with NPCs and actions in quests[27] and the player's in-game choices can lead to different endings.[26] Experience points are obtained from main quests and used to upgrade stats; side quests yield "street cred", unlocking skills, vendors, places, and additional quests.[9][12][13][28] Quests are acquired from characters known as Fixers.[13] Throughout the game, V is aided by various companions.[10] Consumables, such as food, drinks, and drugs, are used for healing and temporary enhancements, and objects can be inspected in V's inventory.[6] Minigames include hacking, boxing, auto racing,[29] martial arts, and shooting ranges.[30]

Synopsis edit

Characters and setting edit

Cyberpunk 2077 takes place in Night City, an American megacity in the Free State of North California, controlled by corporations and unassailed by the laws of both country and state. It sees conflict from rampant gang wars and its ruling entities contending for dominance. The city relies on robotics for everyday aspects like waste collection, maintenance, and public transportation.[31][32] Its visual identity is derived from the four eras it underwent—austere Entropism, colourful Kitsch, imposing Neo-Militarism, and opulent Neo-Kitsch.[33] Homelessness abounds but does not preclude cybernetic modification for the poor, giving rise to cosmetic addiction, and consequent violence. Those whose addictions and heavy cyberization have rendered them mentally unstable, often referred to as cyberpsychos, are dealt with by the armed force known as MaxTac.[34][35] Trauma Team can be employed for rapid medical services.[36] Because of the constant threat of physical harm, all citizens are allowed to carry firearms in public openly.[37]

The primary protagonist of Cyberpunk 2077 is V (Gavin Drea or Cherami Leigh), a freelance mercenary whose background can be influenced by the player's choices. V is accompanied by Johnny Silverhand (Keanu Reeves), a legendary rock star and former terrorist who now exists as a digitized engram; Johnny is also briefly playable during some segments of the game. Throughout the main story, V and Johnny come into contact with several major allies and enemies, including the following: Jackie Welles (Jason Hightower), V's best friend and fellow mercenary; T-Bug (Cynthia McWilliams), a netrunner who provides tactical support to V and Jackie; Viktor Vector (Michael Gregory), a ripperdoc who maintains a close friendship with V; Misty Olzewski (Erica Lindbeck), Jackie's girlfriend who often provides spiritual guidance to V; Dexter "Dex" DeShawn (Michael-Leon Wooley), a local fixer in Night City; Evelyn Parker (Kari Wahlgren), a sex worker who partners with Dex and V's crew to organize a heist on Arasaka; Judy Álvarez (Carla Tassara), Evelyn's friend and a braindance editor who helps V in their investigation; Saburo Arasaka (Masane Tsukayama), the founder of the Arasaka Corporation; Yorinobu Arasaka (Hideo Kimura), Saburo's youngest son; Hanako Arasaka (Alpha Takahashi), Yorinobu's sister and Saburo's only daughter; Goro Takemura (Rome Kanda), Saburo's personal bodyguard; Rogue Amendiares (Jane Perry), the owner of the Afterlife nightclub and one of Johnny's former partners; Panam Palmer (Emily Woo Zeller), a nomad of the Aldecaldos clan; Saul Bright (Diarmaid Murtagh), the leader of the Aldecaldos; Alt Cunningham (Alix Wilton Regan), a netrunner and Johnny's former girlfriend who became an artificial intelligence wandering beyond the Blackwall; and Adam Smasher (Alec Newman), a notoriously ruthless cyborg who works for Yorinobu as Arasaka's head of security.

Plot edit

The game begins with the selection of one of three lifepaths for the player character V: Nomad, Streetkid, or Corpo. All three lifepaths involve V starting a new life in Night City with local thug Jackie Welles and working together as mercenaries with a netrunner, T-Bug.

In 2077, local fixer Dexter "Dex" DeShawn hires V and Jackie to steal a biochip known as "the Relic" from Arasaka Corporation. They acquire the Relic, but the plan goes awry when they witness the murder of the megacorp's leader Saburo Arasaka at the hands of his treacherous son Yorinobu. Yorinobu covers up the murder as poisoning and triggers a security sweep in which Arasaka's netrunners kill T-Bug. V and Jackie escape, but Jackie is fatally wounded in the process, and the Relic's protective case is damaged, forcing V to insert the biochip into the cyberware in their head.

Furious at the unwanted police attention, Dex shoots V in the head and leaves them for dead in a landfill. Upon awakening, V is haunted by the digital ghost of war veteran turned iconic rock star and terrorist Johnny Silverhand, believed to have died in 2023 during his own thermonuclear attack on Arasaka Tower. After being rescued by Saburo's bodyguard Takemura, who kills Dex, V learns from their ripperdoc Viktor Vector that Dex's bullet triggered resurrection nanotech on the biochip, repairing the damage to V's brain but starting an irreversible process that would overwrite V's memories with those of Johnny, whose memory engram is stored on the chip, leaving V only a few weeks before the process completes. The biochip cannot be removed without instantly killing V, so V must find a way to remove Johnny and survive.

Through reliving Johnny's memories, V learns that in 2013, Johnny's then-girlfriend Alt Cunningham had created Soulkiller, an artificial intelligence able to copy netrunners' minds through their neural links. However, the process destroyed the target's brain. Arasaka kidnapped Alt and forced her to create their own version of Soulkiller, which would store the minds of its targets in Arasaka's digital fortress, Mikoshi. Johnny led a rescue effort to save Alt, but failed to find her before Arasaka used Soulkiller on her; Johnny's later thermonuclear attack was a cover to free Alt's consciousness from Arasaka's subnet, but Arasaka's head of security Adam Smasher captured him and used Soulkiller on him as well.

By 2077, Arasaka was advertising a "Secure Your Soul" program and conducting secret research into writing a digital copy of a mind into a living human brain, from which the Relic arose. Eventually, V must decide whether to mount an attack on Arasaka Tower to gain physical access to Mikoshi and use Soulkiller to remove Johnny from their body, or to make a deal with Yorinobu's sister, Hanako Arasaka, to extract the Relic.

If V chooses to attack Arasaka Tower, depending upon player actions throughout the game, V can choose different options to conduct the attack. V can allow Johnny to take over and stage the attack with his former crew, suppress Johnny and mount the attack with their nomad allies from the Aldecaldos clan, mount the attack solo, or simply commit suicide. If V chooses to make a deal with Hanako instead, they convince the Arasaka board that Yorinobu killed Saburo, and oust Yorinobu as CEO. Hanako honors her deal with V and has Arasaka doctors extract the Relic from V. In all cases, it is revealed that the damage to V's body is irreversible. Depending on player choice, V either requests Arasaka upload them into Mikoshi until a suitable host body is found, remains in their body with an uncertain life expectancy, or allows Johnny to take over permanently. If V assaults Arasaka and chooses to remain in their body, they either become a Night City legend, or leave Night City with the Aldecaldos clan hoping to find a way to prolong their lifespan. If V surrenders their body to Johnny, the latter pays his respects to his friends and leaves Night City to start a new life.

Development edit

 
Mike Pondsmith was consulted by CD Projekt Red on the development of Cyberpunk 2077's story.

Preliminary work on Cyberpunk 2077 began following the release of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings Enhanced Edition (2012). CD Projekt Red—CD Projekt's internal development studio—approached Mike Pondsmith, the writer of Cyberpunk and founder of R. Talsorian Games, in early 2012, sending him a copy of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (2011). Impressed with the studio's unparalleled knowledge of the Cyberpunk universe at the time, Pondsmith and CD Projekt Red reached an agreement to license Cyberpunk's story from the year 2077 onward to CD Projekt Red, while Pondsmith retained the rights for media in the Cyberpunk universe set up until the year 2077. To ensure Cyberpunk's story remained cohesive during development, Pondsmith served as a consultant on Cyberpunk 2077. Pondsmith's experience at Microsoft developing games such as Crimson Skies (2000) and Blood Wake (2001), and at Monolith Productions developing The Matrix Online (2005), provided valuable wisdom to CD Projekt Red, in comparison to Polish writer Andrzej Sapkowski's indifference towards the studio during the development of The Witcher (2007) and The Witcher 2.[38]

Concept edit

The concept of Cyberpunk 2077 was adapted from Pondsmith's Cyberpunk series. Antithetical to the stereotypical cyberpunk genre, the concepts explored in Cyberpunk evoke a sense of rebellion and whimsy while retaining the genre's grim tone. The protagonist of Cyberpunk—in comparison to the typical archetype of a hero attempting to save the world—attempts to save himself, from a downtrodden and lowly perspective.[38] Lead gameplay designer Marcin Janiszewski sought to remind players of its connection to the Cyberpunk universe, writing, "We want to assure fans of the pen-and-paper game that this is still the same Cyberpunk you know". In comparison to CD Projekt Red's development on The Witcher series, the time difference between the events of Cyberpunk and Cyberpunk 2077 allotted the studio more freedom towards adapting the series, although they attempted to stay true to Pondsmith's original works.[39]

Cyberpunk 2077, by extension, presents an alternate history, in which the United States became mired in wars in Central America in the 1980s deeply undermining its power and economy, the Soviet Union failed to dissolve and Japan became a superpower, diffusing its culture as far as California. The events of Cyberpunk 2077 take place in the fictitious Night City, a megalopolis immersed in Japanese culture that lies between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Stereotypical cyberpunk motifs, such as sadism, commercialization, cruelty, and satisfaction, remain as mainstays in the political landscape of Night City.[40] A hedonistic wonderland, Night City is divided into two distinct classes: the downtrodden, who use psychedelic substances and physically augmented sex workers as a form of escapism, while the elite corporate class (known as "corpos") dominate society and are afforded great financial success.[41]

The script was first written in Polish and translated into English, a standard practice for CD Projekt Red's games, according to quest director Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz.[42]

Game design edit

CD Projekt Red used a first-person perspective to immerse the player further in the world and hone in on the megacorporation motif.[43] To seamlessly blend cutscenes with gameplay, CD Projekt Red decided to frame cutscenes in first-person, including the sex scenes, with limited exceptions. Players can, however, drive in third-person, and the player's character is visible in areas such as mirrors and security cameras.[44] The decision by game director Adam Badowski to include nudity was tactfully planned, with Badowski stating, "Nudity is important for us because of one reason. This is cyberpunk, so people augment their body. So the body is no longer [sacred]; it’s [profane]", expanding upon transhumanist beliefs.[45]

The quest team took several changes in comparison to the quest system in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (2015). Game logic was implemented to allow for players to undertake quests in seemingly random orders while remaining coherent, while doubling down on The Witcher 3' philosophy of a "quest twist".[46] To reuse the stories written during the game's development, unused parts from the main story were turned into side quests.[47]

Technology edit

Cyberpunk 2077 was developed using REDengine 4, the fourth iteration of CD Projekt Red's internal game engine.[48] REDengine 3, REDengine 4's predecessor, implemented improvements to terrain and vegetation rendering. To achieve this, regions are streamed from a clipped mipmap (through a method known as clipmapping) in memory. Six clipmaps are created in total; the elevation, control map, and colour clipmaps are streamed, while the vertical error, normal, and terrain shadow clipmaps are generated at runtime. In addition, a technique known as tessellation is used, where polygons are divided. In particular, polygon triangulation is used, where data is tessellated into triangles. The error maps are downsampled prior to hardware tessellation. This avoids costly computation, as large areas with high levels of tessellation aren't rendered. Furthermore, REDengine3 employs a radical approach to texturing; textures are painted using two textures: a background texture and an overlay texture. For slopes, the slope angle is computed and compared against a threshold value. Creating a thick cover on slopes was made possible through boosting the overlay texture when the vertex normal looked up; however, this presented complications in ground features, such as cobblestones, where improper distribution was applied. To address this, damping was added, along with blend sharpening. These measures created an ultimately low memory footprint.[49] Other advancements made by REDengine 3 include refined animations, volumetric effects allowing for advanced rendering of particle effects, such as clouds, dynamic physics, and an advanced dialogue mimic system. These improvements allowed The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt to have a more immersive open-world.[50]

Although Cyberpunk 2077 was initially developed using REDengine 3 as far back as 2013,[51] CD Projekt Red developed REDengine 4 after facing difficulty developing the game, which used a first-person perspective, a departure from the third-person perspective CD Projekt had developed in for earlier iterations of REDengine. REDengine 4 was developed using a US$7 million grant from the Polish government.[50] Nearly every aspect of REDengine was changed as a result, including the particle effects editor.[52] CD Projekt Red continued to work on REDengine throughout Cyberpunk 2077's development cycle, and as late as 2017.[53] Cyberpunk 2077 is the final game to use REDengine, as future games from CD Projekt Red will instead be developed using Unreal Engine 5.[48]

REDengine 4 implemented various lighting adjustments to create a more realistic world, including hardware-accelerated ray tracing through DirectX, global illumination, diffuse illumination, and ambient occlusion. These features are not present on the console versions of the game. Other features include physically based rendering—an improvement over REDengine 3, screen space reflections, and pin sharp reflections, although the player's character is omitted from the bounding volume hierarchy structure generated ray-traced reflections. The player's character does appear, however, in render to texture objects, such as mirrors. Improvements to shadows include cascaded shadow maps, screen space shadows, and ray-traced shadows with contact hardening, while improvements to character rendering include subsurface scattering and realistic skin shading. These features introduced computational complexity, testing older consoles, such as the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.[54] Cyberpunk 2077 uses vertical asset streaming, or culling, a rendering technique that omits objects below and above the player's field of view. This technique saves memory.[55]

During the development of Cyberpunk 2077, CD Projekt Red partnered with several companies. These companies include Vancouver-based studio Digital Scapes to create additional tools,[56] multinational technology company Nvidia to implement real-time ray tracing,[57] and developer QLOC for quality assurance.[58] In addition, artificial intelligence company Jali Research helped CD Projekt Red implement lip syncing for all ten localizations through procedural generation.[59]

Art edit

 
 
The work of Dieter Rams (left) and Syd Mead (right) served as inspiration for Night City.

When designing Night City, the art design team at CD Projekt Red took multiple sources of inspiration. German industrial designer Dieter Rams and American neo-futurist concept artist Syd Mead inspired the team, who used Rams' elegance to juxtapose the low-class neighborhoods in Night City and Mead's vibrant colours and materialism to create the demeanor of Night City, in what the team called "kitsch". Building these environments took the team eight years.[60] To create a cyberpunk look for Night City, the team incorporated retro and futuristic elements. To accomplish this, the team looked at dilapidated or old-fashioned buildings—aspects of a familiar reality—with futurism. "For example, you could have a run down building with an old wooden door, but an LED light might be attached to that door, which could be a part of a high-tech security system," Hiroshi Sakakibara, Environment City Coordinator at CD Projekt Red, said during a Cyberpunk 2077 livestream at Tokyo Game Show 2020. A key source of inspiration for the team was Blade Runner (1982), which Sakakibara referred to as the "Bible of all cyberpunk".[61] Other sources of inspiration for the team include the manga and anime series Ghost in the Shell, and other video games such as System Shock (1994) and the first part of Deus Ex (2000).[62] To design the buildings in Night City, the team consulted with urban planners and drew upon the themes of Brutalist architecture.[63][61] The game's yellow-themed design serves as the antithesis to typical neon art.[64] The designs of Marcello Gandini helped shape the appearance of many of the cars in the game.[65] A motorbike akin to the one in the Akira manga and anime film appears in the game, as well as a car inspired by Mad Max: Fury Road (2015).[66][67]

To develop the world building in Night City, the team used four distinct visual styles—austere Entropism, colourful Kitsch, imposing Neomilitarism, and opulent Neokitsch—to explain what happened to the world prior to the events of the game. Bulky cars and unappealing buildings represent Entropism, an architectural style that came about through necessity. In Entropism, practicality is valued more than aesthetics. As the economy recovered, the vibrant style of Kitsch gained traction. The style of Kitsch was countered with Neomilitarism, an ascetic movement where the rise of corporations undid many of the stylistic decisions made in Entropism. Finally, Neokitsch incorporated the classist systems in Neomilitarism with the vibrance of Entropism. In Neokitsch, the rich use scarce materials, such as wood and marble, to construct their buildings, and wear clothes from animals.[68] Night City features six districts, each with a unique gusto. Pacifica, for instance, was a prosperous vacation destination until an economic crisis hit, leaving the Haitian community to form a civilization around the buildings.[69]

The team used the digital compositing software Nuke to design Night City. A challenge for the team was creating a global illumination system that would cast a variety of light sources on narrow streets. Nuke was used to analytically reference the lighting in REDengine with Nuke. In contrast to most other video games, which use tone-mapping, Cyberpunk 2077 uses a classic film LUT. In addition, Nuke was used to design the game's user interface and splash screen.[70]

Audio edit

V is voiced by Gavin Drea and Cherami Leigh for the male and female versions of V, respectively.[71] CD Projekt Red sought a suitable voice actor for the role of Johnny Silverhand. Keanu Reeves was approached in July 2018 for the role, and noted for his work as Neo in The Matrix franchise. Reeves' performance was recorded using motion capture technology, a process he had previously used for his performance as Neo in The Matrix (1999). Although a newcomer to the video game format, Reeves enjoyed the script.[72] Silverhand is featured prominently in the game, with CD Projekt co-founder Marcin Iwiński recalling in an interview with Bloomberg News that Silverhand's dialogue count is second only to V.[73]

Multiple licensed artists contributed to Cyberpunk 2077' soundtrack. Hip hop duo Run the Jewels, composed of rappers El-P and Killer Mike, wrote "No Save Point" for the game's soundtrack—a track that vividly critiques the socioeconomic state of Night City.[74] The song is featured in the game and performed by El-P and Killer Mike as "Yankee and the Brave",[75] a reference to the duo's fourth studio album, RTJ4 (2020).[76] Other contributors include Canadian musician Grimes (as Lizzy Wizzy), Swedish band Refused (as Samurai), American rapper ASAP Rocky, English musician Gazelle Twin (as Trash Generation), and American musician Ilan Rubin, among others.[77][75]

"I Really Want to Stay at Your House" is a song by British singer Rosa Walton written for the game.[a] Featured in the fictional radio station 98.7 Body Heat Radio, the song was included by Lakeshore Records on the soundtrack album Cyberpunk 2077: Radio, Vol. 2 (Original Soundtrack), which was released on 18 December 2020.[78][79] The song would later on go viral in 2022 after being utilised heavily in Cyberpunk: Edgerunners and chart in the United Kingdom at number 68.[80][81]

Marketing and release edit

Cyberpunk 2077 was announced in May 2012.[82] Trailers for the game were released in January 2013,[83] at E3 2018,[84] and at E3 2019.[85] The game was initially confirmed for Windows,[86] with PlayStation 4 and Xbox One announced at E3 2018.[84] Stadia was announced in August 2019.[87]

At E3 2019, an initial release date of 16 April 2020 was announced.[85] This was delayed to 17 September,[88] then 19 November,[89] and finally 10 December.[90] The developers received death threats over the last delay.[91] The final delay was decided suddenly, with discussions commencing a day before the initial announcement. Due to Polish law, CD Projekt was not allowed to inform every member of the development team due to its large size; around ninety percent were not informed until the last minute.[92] Rockfish Game's Everspace 2's early access release and an expansion to Grinding Gear Games's Path of Exile, scheduled to be released in December 2020, were delayed until the following month in order to avoid competing with Cyberpunk 2077's release.[93][94]

Funko Pops were obtainable starting 16 April 2020.[95] CD Projekt Red held a cosplay competition from June 2019 to October 2020.[96][97] McFarlane Toys signed a three-year agreement to manufacture action figures.[98] The Cyberpunk 2077-themed Xbox One X, which includes a digital copy and downloadable content,[99] became the final limited edition of that console.[100] Designed with the same aesthetic were video cards,[101] gaming chairs,[102] energy drinks,[103] sneakers,[104] smartphones exclusive to China,[105] and peripherals.[106][107] From May 2020, advertising company Agora Group had newspapers, online services, and radio channels doing promotion in Poland. Their subsidiaries carried out publicity outdoors and in movie theatres, using established brands to disseminate information about the game.[108]

With E3 2020 cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic, CD Projekt's online event Night City Wire showed additional trailers, more gameplay,[109][110][111] and making-of footage.[112] Next-generation ports for Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5 were initially scheduled for release in 2021,[113] but were delayed in October 2021,[114] before eventually releasing on 15 February 2022.[115][116][117] Owners of the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions were able to freely download the game on their respective next-generation models.[118][119] The delayed standalone multiplayer was announced to launch after 2021.[120][121]

As with The Witcher 2 and The Witcher 3, both Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment[122] and Bandai Namco Entertainment served as physical distributors in North America and Central Europe,[123] Australia, and New Zealand[124] respectively. Spike Chunsoft published the physical PlayStation 4 copies in Japan.[125]

The versions of Cyberpunk 2077 released in Japan and China were subject to a reduction in the amount of nudity and gore portrayed in order to meet rating agency requirements and censorship laws.[126][127] A datamine of the game's source code by hackers in February 2021 revealed that content flagged for censorship in China was tagged under "Winnie the Pooh", a reference to an internet meme in which Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping was compared to the titular character.[128][129][130][131]

Retail editions edit

A "Collector's Edition" consisting of a custom box, steelbook case, figurine depicting a male V, hardcover artbook, metal pin set and keychain, A Visitor's Guide to Night City, embroidered patches, world compendium, Night City postcards and map, and stickers was released along with the game. The standard edition also contains the compendium, postcards, map, and stickers.[132] Digital items that come with every copy are the soundtrack, art booklet, Cyberpunk 2020 sourcebook, wallpapers, and Cyberpunk 2077: Your Voice comic.[133] Purchases through CD Projekt's subsidiary GOG.com include the digital comic Cyberpunk 2077: Big City Dreams.[134]

A physical release of the game for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X, which includes Phantom Liberty, was announced on 21 November 2023. Players on PC could purchase this version digitally, and PlayStation 5 releases come with a digital code instead of a disc.[135] This release, titled the "Ultimate Edition", was released on 5 December 2023.[136]

Downloadable content edit

Prior to the announcement of the game's only planned expansion, Phantom Liberty, CD Projekt Red released 18 different DLCs for the game which added cosmetics and additional gameplay content. One of the DLCs released included content from the Cyberpunk: Edgerunners anime.[137] The expansion, which stars Idris Elba, was released in September 2023.[138]

Along with the release of the "Ultimate Edition" on 5 December 2023, CD Projekt released Update 2.1, which they characterized as "the last major update," which introduces a functioning Metro system, additional scenes with V's romantic interest, and other quality improvements.[139][140]

Related media edit

The World of Cyberpunk 2077, a 192-page art book,[141] was published by Dark Horse Books on 29 July 2020.[142]

On 9 September, Dark Horse Comics brought out the first issue of a comic book series called Cyberpunk 2077: Trauma Team with writer Cullen Bunn and illustrator Miguel Valderrama.[143] A number of other comic series in the world of Cyberpunk 2077 have also been published by Dark Horse Comics, including Cyberpunk 2077: Big City Dreams (2022), and Cyberpunk 2077: Blackout (2022).

Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, an anime spin-off collaboration co-produced by CD Projekt Red and Trigger, premiered on 13 September 2022 on Netflix.[144]

A card game created alongside publisher CMON Limited, Cyberpunk 2077 – Afterlife: The Card Game, was slated for 2020 but has yet to be released; no updating announcements have been made and the card game's future remains uncertain.[145]

Reception edit

Pre-release edit

The game was highly anticipated before its release.[146] It won over one hundred awards at E3 2018,[147] including Best Game, Best Xbox One Game, Best PC Game,[148] Best RPG,[149] and People's Choice at IGN,[150] Best Role-Playing Game and Game of the Show at Game Informer,[151] Best of E3 at PC Gamer,[152] and Game of the Show at GamesRadar+.[153] The second trailer was considered one of the best at the expo,[154][155][156][157] although writer William Gibson, credited with pioneering the cyberpunk subgenre, described it as "GTA skinned-over with a generic 80s retro-future".[158] Gibson later responded more positively to the first gameplay demo.[159] The first-person perspective, in contrast with The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt's third-person, was subject to criticism.[160][161] Cyberpunk 2077 was the most widely discussed game of E3 2019,[162] where it was presented awards for Best of E3 at GamesRadar+, PC Gamer, Rock, Paper, Shotgun, and Ars Technica,[163][164][165][166] and Best Game, People's Choice, Best PS4 Game, Best Xbox One Game, Best PC Game, and Best RPG at IGN.[167] The third trailer was lauded with emphasis on Reeves' reveal.[168][169]

Liana Ruppert, a journalist for Game Informer who has photosensitive epilepsy, experienced a grand mal seizure while reviewing the game days before its release. The seizure was triggered by the game's "braindance" sequence, which contains red and white flashing lights that reportedly resemble the patterns produced by medical devices used to intentionally trigger seizures.[170] In response, CD Projekt Red made a public statement and reached out to Ruppert.[171][172] The company then released a patch to add a warning, and issued a later patch on 11 December to reduce the risk of inducing epileptic symptoms.[173]

Prior to the release of the game, CD Projekt Red provided review copies of Cyberpunk to several major outlets. CD Projekt Red issued strict review embargo terms on these review copies, requiring reviewers to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDA) and only allowing for footage provided by the company to be shown in reviews; according to Wired Magazine (which did not receive a reviewer copy), violating the NDA could cost around $27,000 per violation.[174] Concern also arose over the fact review copies were issued for the PC version of the game, ensuring that all pre-release reviews related to the PC version of the game, excluding consoles. As a result, this eroded trust from some consumers.[175]

Post-release edit

The PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series releases of Cyberpunk 2077 received "generally favorable" reviews from critics, according to review aggregator website Metacritic.[176][178][180] The PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of the game received "mixed or average" reviews.[177][179]

Critics praised the quality of the story as well as the depth and expansiveness of side quests,[185] immersive atmosphere of the world,[184] visual quality,[189] and freshness of the cyberpunk setting.[190] The game's systems such as crafting, driving mechanics, and combat received a mixed response.[183] Some critics, while acknowledging the game's many strengths, nonetheless criticised its shallow portrayal of the cyberpunk genre, and also described its portrayal of related themes such as anti-capitalism and anarchism as ironic.[191][192] Others took issue with the portrayal of transgender people, who they felt were fetishized by in-game material but were not given any meaningful role in the narrative.[183][193][194]

On launch day, the game exceeded 1 million concurrent viewers on Twitch.[195]

Along with several post-release patches, following the release of the anime series Cyberpunk: Edgerunners on Netflix in September 2022, the game's player count on PC boosted to levels last seen with the game's initial release.[196] The million-plus daily player count continued for at least four weeks following the release of Edgerunners.[197]

Technical issues edit

The release of Cyberpunk 2077 was a high-profile event and was considered a disastrous launch[198][199] as a result of the game suffering from numerous bugs and performance issues, particularly on the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions.[b] The Guardian called the release "a shambles",[204] while The New York Times said it was among the most conspicuous disasters in the industry's history, with CD Projekt Red prominently failing to meet expectations for what was anticipated to be the biggest game release of the year.[198] Other gaming industry commentators have described the post-launch reception of Cyberpunk 2077 as a fall from grace for CD Projekt Red, who had previously enjoyed a fiercely pro-consumer reputation.[205][206]

Some of the initial reviews that had been based only on the PC version of the game were later updated to add a caveat about the notable difference in performance between this version and its console releases.[183][185] Because of the game's performance on consoles, CD Projekt issued an apology, particularly for their pre-release secrecy regarding these versions, concluding that unsatisfied consumers could opt for refunds.[207][208] This was initially followed by multiple reports of players unable to get said refund. CD Projekt Red later stated that they had no specific deals in place with either Microsoft or Sony to facilitate such an action; refunds are dealt with according to standard refund policies.[209] On 17 December 2020, Sony announced that it would offer refunds to customers who had purchased Cyberpunk 2077 through the PlayStation Store and removed it from the store "until further notice";[210] once returned to the store in June 2021, the PlayStation Store warned users that "Users continue to experience performance issues with this game. Purchase for use on PS4 systems is not recommended."[211] The Xbox One version of the game remained available for purchase from the online Microsoft store, albeit with a warning about the game's performance issues. Players who bought the game through the Microsoft store were also offered refunds.[212][213] In the US, GameStop accepted returns of boxed versions of the game even if the box was opened, an exception to the store's usual refund policy.[214]

Although the game's reviews were largely positive, its aggregate score was thought to be disappointing by analysts. CD Projekt SA stock fell by up to 9.4% after the publication of Metacritic's reviews.[215] The reviews aggregation OpenCritic criticised CD Projekt Red for deliberately attempting to misrepresent the game, and not delivering review copies for Xbox One and PlayStation 4, knowing it would receive negative reviews.[216] A class-action lawsuit representing those making investments in CD Projekt during 2020 was filed on 24 December 2020 in California, asserting that the company made fraudulent claims to the state of Cyberpunk 2077 as to mislead those investors;[217] a second similar class-action suit had also been filed by January 2021.[218] By May 2021, four separate lawsuits against CD Projekt had been filed over Cyberpunk 2077, and had been subsequently merged into one common action.[219] CD Projekt proposed a settlement with the investors in December 2021, providing US$1.85 million to the group as part of the terms[220] which was approved by a judge in January 2023.[221] Poland's Office of Competition and Consumer Protection began an investigation of the game in January 2021, asking CD Projekt for an "explanation regarding problems with the game and actions taken by them".[222] Having previously asked its employees to work 6-day weeks for several final months of the development of the game, the company ditched plans to tie developers' bonuses to review scores, choosing instead to pay out the full bonus regardless.[223]

Jason Schreier of Bloomberg News said that, based on discussions with CD Projekt developers, a major reason for the poor performance of Cyberpunk 2077 on release was underestimating the effort that would be needed. While more than twice as many developers were brought on board to help with the game compared to The Witcher 3, CD Projekt had only expected the same amount of time to complete the game, so that the bulk of development towards the game only began in late 2016. The expanded scope of Cyberpunk 2077 including the game's new engine had created difficulties, and while there were more developers, there was less organization of their various functions that further hampered the development, according to Schreier's report. Many developers urged management to hold off on the game's release.[224] Co-CEO Marcin Iwiński issued an open message to players on 13 January 2021, apologizing for the state of the game and the company's plans to correct it. Iwiński stated that the company "underestimated the risk" in bringing a game optimized to run on personal computers over to consoles, particularly the older Xbox One and PlayStation 4 consoles.[225] He specifically faulted the in-game streaming engine that was used to load in assets from storage on the fly as the player moved through the game, which was scaled back to work on the older consoles.[226] While they had tested these versions as they approached release, they had not seen the same issues that players had reported in the released version. He affirmed that the developers were not responsible for the release state of the game, but instead this was a choice made by himself and the other management of the company.[225] Besides working to issue refunds and bring the game to a state to return it to the PlayStation Store, Iwiński outlined a year-long path that will involve multiple patches to bring the older consoles' versions to better performance and then looking to optimizing the game for newer consoles, prior to any further additional content development.[225]

Edgerunners release edit

Despite the rampant technical issues that were prevalent during its initial release that affected the game's sales, Cyberpunk 2077 saw an increase in the number of units sold during the year 2022 of up to 18%, with 94% of the sales being digital.[227][228] This increase was partially attributed to the release of the Netflix anime series Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, which garnered positive reviews from both critics and fans,[229][230] and the concurrent release of a game update which added material from the series in the form of multiple items. CD Projekt Red recognized the success of Edgerunners having driven sales of Cyberpunk 2077 by stating that "a significant increase in the amount of the Group’s Sales in the third quarter of 2022 in relation to the reference period was mainly due to a good reception of the Cyberpunk Edgerunner update 1.6 which preceded the release on Netflix of the Cyberpunk: Edgerunners anime series."[231] The series would again be referenced in the Cyberpunk 2.0 update that came alongside the Phantom Liberty downloadable content.[232]

Financials edit

Cyberpunk 2077 received eight million pre-orders on all platforms, of which 74% were digital,[233] and it received more pre-orders than The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt;[234] one third of PC sales were through GOG.com.[235] It was a best-seller on Steam in China.[236] CD Projekt Red has stated that digital preorders for the title alone recouped the game's production cost as well as the game's 2020 marketing cost.[237] According to a CD Projekt investors call, sales saw a drastic decline four days after release owing to the technical issues present.[238] After the launch, analyst estimations for sales over 12 months fell from 30 million to 25.6 million.[239]

Within twelve hours after its release, the game had over one million concurrent players on Steam.[240] In Japan, the PlayStation 4 version of Cyberpunk 2077 sold an estimated 104,600 physical units during its debut week, making it the second best-selling retail game of the week in the country.[241] The game passed 13 million units sold in December 2020.[242][243] It had the biggest digital game launch of all time, selling 10.2 million digital units[244] and grossed $609 million in digital sales by 31 December 2020.[245] By September 2022, the game had sold over 20 million units.[246] As of October 2023, it has sold over 25 million units.[247]

In October 2023, CD Projekt Red revealed that they have spent over $120 million on "Cyberpunk 2077" since launch, accounting for updates and bug fixes. According to a report from Kotaku, the base game cost $174 million to develop and $142 million to market. The development / marketing of "Phantom Liberty" cost ~$84 million alone.

The total cost of the game is now reportedly over $436 million, making it the second-most expensive video game to develop behind Star Citizen.[248]

Awards edit

Award nominations for Cyberpunk 2077
Year Award Category Result
2013 Golden Trailer Awards[249] Best Video Game Trailer Nominated
2018 Game Critics Awards[250] Special Commendation for Graphics Won
Special Commendation for Innovation Won
2018 Golden Joystick Awards[251] Most Wanted Game Won
Gamers' Choice Awards[252] Most Anticipated Game Nominated
2019 Game Critics Awards[253] Special Commendation for Graphics Won
2019 Golden Joystick Awards[254] Most Wanted Game Won
2020 18th Visual Effects Society Awards[255][256] Outstanding Animated Character in a Commercial (Dex) Won
Gamescom Award 2020[257] Best PC Game Won
Best Role-Playing Game Won
Best of Gamescom Won
Gamescom "Most Wanted" Consumer Award Won
Best Sony PlayStation Game Won
2021 New York Game Awards[258] Statue of Liberty Award for Best World Nominated
Herman Melville Award for Best Writing Nominated
Great White Way Award for Best Acting in a Game (Keanu Reeves) Nominated
19th Visual Effects Society Awards[259][260] Outstanding Created Environment in an Episode, Commercial, or Real-Time Project Nominated
Outstanding Visual Effects in a Real-Time Project Nominated
17th British Academy Games Awards[261][262] Artistic Achievement Nominated
Narrative Nominated
Performer in a Leading Role (Cherami Leigh) Nominated
Performer in a Supporting Role (Carla Tassara) Nominated
24th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards[263] Role-Playing Game of the Year Nominated
Golden Trailer Awards[264] Best Video Game Trailer Nominated
Best Video Game TV Spot Nominated
The Game Awards 2021[265][266] Best Score and Music Nominated
Best Role Playing Game Nominated
The Steam Awards[267] Game of the Year Nominated
Outstanding Story-Rich Game Won
2022 The Steam Awards[268] Labor of Love Won
2023 The Game Awards 2023[269] Best Ongoing Game Won
Best Community Support Nominated
Players' Voice Nominated

Sequel edit

A sequel, codenamed "Project Orion", was announced in October 2022. It will be developed by CD Projekt North America, which has studios in both Vancouver and Boston. Several core team members working on Cyberpunk 2077 will be relocated to Boston to work on the game. The game's development will begin following the release of Phantom Liberty. [270][271][272] The game will be directed by Gabe Amatangelo, who previously directed the Phantom Liberty expansion. The game is set to be developed with Unreal Engine 5.[273] By February 2024 the game was in early development, with key members of the development team being moved to Boston. [274]

Notes edit

  1. ^ Walton is credited alongside Hallie Coggins, her fictional in-universe persona created for Cyberpunk 2077.
  2. ^ Attributed to multiple sources: [200][201][202][203]

References edit

  1. ^ Square, Push (4 January 2024). "Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty Smashed 5 Million Sales in 2023". Push Square. Retrieved 4 January 2024.
  2. ^ Holt, Kris (18 September 2020). "'Cyberpunk 2077' won't require a high-end gaming rig". Engadget. Archived from the original on 19 September 2020.
  3. ^ Martin, Matt (12 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077: Banging, C-bombs and bullet-time – everything we know from 50 minutes of gameplay". VG247. Archived from the original on 12 June 2018.
  4. ^ Robinson, Andy (28 August 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 interview: 'There are many surprises left'". Video Games Chronicle. Archived from the original on 29 August 2019.
  5. ^ Fenlon, Wes; Messner, Steven (12 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 is an FPS". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  6. ^ a b Messner, Steven (13 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077: Everything we learned from the jam-packed E3 demo". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  7. ^ a b CD Projekt Red (10 December 2020). Cyberpunk 2077 (PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Stadia, Windows, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S). CD Projekt.
  8. ^ @CyberpunkGame (5 July 2019). "Listen up, Choombas! Miles Tost, level designer on #Cyberpunk2077, has got some cool beans to spill regarding the game's character progression system. You in?" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  9. ^ a b Schreier, Jason (13 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 Is A Violent, Impressive Blend Of Deus Ex And The Witcher 3". Kotaku. Archived from the original on 14 June 2018.
  10. ^ a b c Yin-Poole, Wesley (13 June 2018). "We watched 50 minutes of uncut Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay and interviewed CD Projekt about it". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  11. ^ Conditt, Jessica (14 June 2018). "In 'Cyberpunk 2077' you control your own dark, intoxicating future". Engadget. Archived from the original on 14 June 2018.
  12. ^ a b c Faller, Patrick (12 June 2018). "E3 2018: Cyberpunk 2077 Is A First-Person RPG With Shooter Elements". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  13. ^ a b c d Tapsell, Chris (13 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay details, E3 trailer, easter eggs, secret website password and everything we know". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  14. ^ Makedonski, Brett (12 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077's E3 demo was incredible and massive, here's everything we learned". Destructoid. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  15. ^ Hall, Charlie (30 August 2019). "New Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay gives us our first good look at character creation, hacking". Polygon. Archived from the original on 30 August 2019.
  16. ^ Marks, Tom (12 June 2018). "E3 2018: Cyberpunk 2077 Doesn't Look Like The Witcher, But It Does Look Incredible". IGN. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  17. ^ Tapsell, Chris (12 June 2019). "We've seen another 50 minutes of Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay – is it cyberpunk yet?". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 12 June 2019.
  18. ^ Savage, Phil (12 June 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077's lead quest designer explains why using cyberspace requires a bathtub". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 13 June 2019.
  19. ^ Webster, Andrew (13 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 is part RPG, part shooter, part GTA-style mayhem". The Verge. Archived from the original on 14 June 2018.
  20. ^ White, Sam (27 November 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077: all new details including side quests, crime system and more". VG247. Archived from the original on 28 November 2019.
  21. ^ Cryer, Hirun (21 August 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 Producer Details Law Enforcement and the Rich Areas of Night City". USgamer. Archived from the original on 12 May 2020.
  22. ^ I Ask CD Projekt Red Your Most Requested Cyberpunk 2077 Questions in E3 2019 Interview. YouTube. YongYea. 13 June 2019. Archived from the original on 15 June 2019. Retrieved 15 June 2019.
  23. ^ @CyberpunkGame (11 July 2019). "Lead Quest Designer for #Cyberpunk2077, @PaweSasko, would like to talk to you about cars and motorcycles. And if there's cars, there has to be radio, right?" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  24. ^ Sarkar, Samit (1 March 2013). "Cyberpunk 2077 characters may speak in multiple languages". Polygon. Archived from the original on 22 August 2013.
  25. ^ Cook, Adam (17 February 2016). "What do we know about Cyberpunk 2077 so far?". Red Bull Games. Archived from the original on 27 February 2017.
  26. ^ a b Farrelly, Stephen (13 April 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 – Everything CD Projekt Red's new game needs". Red Bull Games. Archived from the original on 15 April 2018.
  27. ^ Futter, Michael (12 June 2018). "'Cyberpunk 2077' Is More 'Deus Ex' Than 'Witcher 3'". Variety. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018.
  28. ^ Fillari, Alessandro (13 June 2018). "E3 2018: CD Projekt Red's Cyberpunk 2077 Is Even More Ambitious Than You Think It Is". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 14 June 2018.
  29. ^ Wilson, Tony (25 June 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 Has Romance, Minigames, And Self-Driving Cars – GS News Update". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 26 June 2019.
  30. ^ Weber, Rachel (25 June 2019). "Life in Cyberpunk 2077: Romance, cyberspace, and silly side quests". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 26 June 2019.
  31. ^ Donnelly, Joe (26 June 2018). "CD Projekt Red breaks down Cyberpunk 2077 trailer frame by frame in new series". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 27 June 2018.
  32. ^ Cyberpunk 2077 Gameplay Reveal — 48-minute walkthrough. YouTube. Cyberpunk 2077. 27 August 2018. Archived from the original on 27 August 2018. Retrieved 29 June 2020.
  33. ^ Billcliffe, James (27 August 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077's Night City: inside the design eras, the communities, and how they affect the player". VG247. Archived from the original on 28 August 2019.
  34. ^ Hernandez, Patricia (10 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 looks incredible". The Verge. Archived from the original on 11 June 2018.
  35. ^ Donnelly, Joe (29 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 frame by frame trailer series explores political side of Night City". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 29 June 2018.
  36. ^ Kelly, Andy (29 August 2019). "Mike Pondsmith wants Cyberpunk 2077 to feel real, not just look cool". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 30 August 2019.
  37. ^ Donnelly, Joe (20 July 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 frame by frame trailer series talks gun laws in Night City". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 27 August 2018.
  38. ^ a b Purchese, Robert (13 July 2017). "Making Cyberpunk: when Mike Pondsmith met CD Projekt Red". Eurogamer. Retrieved 26 December 2022.
  39. ^ Webster, Andrew (25 January 2013). "Braindancing in Night City: inside the dark new world of 'Cyberpunk 2077'". The Verge. Retrieved 28 December 2022.
  40. ^ Robertson, Adi (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 is huge, ambitious, and safe". The Verge. Retrieved 28 December 2022.
  41. ^ Rosenberg, Adam (9 December 2020). "'Cyberpunk 2077' is a wondrous creation trailed by a mile-long line of asterisks". Mashable. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
  42. ^ Pawlikowski, Matthias (5 July 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 First Written in Polish". Gamepressure. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  43. ^ Faller, Patrick (13 June 2018). "E3 2018: CD Projekt Red's Cyberpunk 2077 Is A First-Person RPG With Shooter Elements". GameSpot. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  44. ^ Macgregor, Jody (1 September 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077's cutscenes will apparently be first-person". PC Gamer. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  45. ^ Hall, Charlie (22 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 will include full nudity for a very important reason". Polygon. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  46. ^ Francis, Bryant (20 June 2018). "'It can never be that simple': Designing the quests of Cyberpunk 2077". Gamasutra. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  47. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 CD Projekt interview – 'What I'm not willing to say is what we're saying'". Metro. 5 September 2018. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  48. ^ a b Zollner, Amelia (16 May 2022). "Cyberpunk 2077 In Unreal Engine 5 Offers a Glimpse Of What CD Projekt Red Was Trying To Pull Off". IGN. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  49. ^ Gollent, Marcin. "Landscape creation and rendering in REDengine 3" (PDF). Game Developers Conference. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  50. ^ a b Alexandrou, Alexandros (15 September 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077: An Intellectual Property Analysis of a Multifaceted Product" (PDF). World Intellectual Property Organization. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  51. ^ Hinkle, David (1 February 2013). "CD Projekt Red introduces REDengine 3, latest iteration of in-house tech". Engadget. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  52. ^ Grayson, Nathan (10 May 2016). "The People Making Cyberpunk 2077 Would Like To Correct A Misconception About Game Development". Kotaku. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  53. ^ "Management Board Report on CD Projekt Capital Group and CD Projekt S.A. Activities in 2017" (PDF). CD Projekt. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  54. ^ Linneman, John (10 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 PC tech analysis: a closer look at the ultra high-end experience". Eurogamer. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  55. ^ Cryer, Hirun (27 August 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 is Adding a New Dimension to Asset Streaming". USgamer. Archived from the original on 29 August 2019. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  56. ^ Valentine, Rebekah (8 October 2018). "CD Projekt Red partners with Digital Scapes on Cyberpunk 2077". GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  57. ^ Burnes, Andrew (11 June 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077: NVIDIA Partnership Brings Ray Tracing To Hugely-Anticipated Game". Nvidia. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  58. ^ Birch, Nathan (24 January 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Team Joined by a Studio That's Worked With Capcom, Namco Bandai, More". WCCFTech. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  59. ^ Holt, Kris (20 October 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077's dialogue was lip-synced by AI". Engadget. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  60. ^ Rivera, Joshua (14 December 2020). "Inside the Design of Cyberpunk 2077's Urban Dystopia". Architectural Digest. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  61. ^ a b Krabbe, Esra (26 September 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Environment Designer Explains How His Team Built Night City". IGN. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  62. ^ Conditt, Jessica (1 August 2012). "CD Projekt Red's 'Cyberpunk' inspired by System Shock, Blade Runner". Engadget. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  63. ^ Schilling, Chris (September 2020). "Inside Cyberpunk 2077, and the most elaborately detailed future city we've ever seen in a videogame". Edge. No. 348. p. 65.
  64. ^ Kuznetsova, Oxana (14 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Art: Retrofuturism in Beams of Neon Light". The Designist. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  65. ^ Taylor-Kent, Oscar (October 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077's art team talk to Oscar Taylor-Kent about creating the hot looks, fast rides, big guns, and slick cyberware that defines Night City". PlayStation Official Magazine – UK. No. 179. pp. 50–58.
  66. ^ Benson, Julian (12 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 devs "will be significantly more open"". PCGamesN. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  67. ^ Chalk, Andy (15 May 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 car pays tribute to Mad Max: Fury Road". PC Gamer. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  68. ^ Batchelor, James (18 September 2019). "The 57 years of unseen work that built Cyberpunk 2077's Night City". GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  69. ^ Billcliffe, James (27 August 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077's Night City: inside the design eras, the communities, and how they affect the player". VG247. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  70. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077: building Night City with Nuke". The Foundry. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  71. ^ Amaro, Miguel (27 December 2020). "In-Game vs Reality: What Cyberpunk 2077 Characters Look Like In Real Life". The Gamer. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
  72. ^ Lewis, Evan (12 June 2019). "Keanu Reeves on Cyberpunk 2077, getting into gaming, John Wick, and more". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
  73. ^ "CD Projekt's Iwiński on Cyberpunk 2077, Keanu Reeves and China". Bloomberg News. 11 June 2019. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
  74. ^ Pareles, Jon; Caramanica, Jon; Russonello, Giovanni; Zoladz, Lindsay (13 November 2020). "Billie Eilish's Kiss-Off, and 14 More New Songs". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  75. ^ a b James, Sarah (11 December 2020). "Everything you need to know about Cyberpunk 2077's radio stations". PC Gamer. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  76. ^ Manno, Lizzie (4 June 2020). "The 8 Most Searing Lyrics on Run the Jewels' RTJ4". Paste. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  77. ^ Gartenberg, Chaim (13 December 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077's soundtrack features Grimes, Run the Jewels, and more". The Verge. Retrieved 28 December 2022.
  78. ^ D'Souza, Shaad (18 November 2020). "New music from SOPHIE, Grimes, Shygirl, more to feature on Cyberpunk 2077 soundtrack". The Fader. Archived from the original on 13 May 2022. Retrieved 4 October 2022.
  79. ^ "Preview Grimes' New Song "Delicate Weapon" From 'Cyberpunk 2077: Radio Vol. 2'". 18 December 2020.
  80. ^ Clark, Ryan (19 September 2022). "'Cyberpunk Edgerunners' review: Turning trash into treasure". The Daily Beacon. Archived from the original on 23 September 2022. Retrieved 4 October 2022.
  81. ^ Park, Gene (23 September 2022). "Fueled by Netflix and patches, 'Cyberpunk 2077' gets a 'second chance'". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 23 September 2022. Retrieved 4 October 2022.
  82. ^ Purchese, Robert (30 August 2016). "I was there when The Witcher 3 launched". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 21 August 2015.
  83. ^ Grubb, Jeff (10 January 2013). "CD Projekt Red reveals Cyberpunk 2077 teaser trailer". GamesBeat. Archived from the original on 5 April 2018.
  84. ^ a b Romano, Sal (10 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 coming to PS4, Xbox One, and PC; debut trailer". Gematsu. Archived from the original on 11 June 2018.
  85. ^ a b Robertson, Adi (9 June 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 will be released April 16th, 2020 and feature Keanu Reeves". The Verge. Archived from the original on 9 June 2019.
  86. ^ Makuch, Eddie (14 October 2013). "Cyberpunk 2077 "probably" coming to PS4, Xbox One". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 28 July 2017.
  87. ^ Gartenberg, Chaim (19 August 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 is coming to Google's Stadia cloud gaming service". The Verge. Archived from the original on 20 August 2019.
  88. ^ Ramée, Jordan (16 January 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Has Been Delayed". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 16 January 2020.
  89. ^ @CyberpunkGame (18 June 2020). "An important development update" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 18 June 2020 – via Twitter.
  90. ^ Chalk, Andy (27 October 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 has been delayed until December". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 27 October 2020. Retrieved 27 October 2020.
  91. ^ Clayton, Natalie (28 October 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 devs are getting death threats over the delay". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 5 June 2021. Retrieved 5 June 2021.
  92. ^ Ruppert, Liana. "Cyberpunk 2077 Devs Didn't Know About The Delay Until The Day Of, Here's Why". Game Informer. Archived from the original on 17 September 2021. Retrieved 21 September 2021.
  93. ^ Yin-Poole, Wesley (31 October 2020). "Another developer delays its December game to avoid getting crushed by Cyberpunk". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 30 August 2021. Retrieved 21 September 2021.
  94. ^ Livingston, Christopher (28 October 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 is now delaying other games, too". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 6 October 2021. Retrieved 21 September 2021.
  95. ^ Reiner, Andrew (20 January 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Funko Pops Are On The Way". Game Informer. Archived from the original on 21 January 2020.
  96. ^ "The official Cyberpunk 2077 Cosplay Contest is here!". CD Projekt Red. 27 June 2019. Archived from the original on 31 July 2019.
  97. ^ @CyberpunkGame (15 October 2020). "In less than 7 hours the winners of the official Cyberpunk 2077 Cosplay Contest will be revealed!" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 15 October 2020 – via Twitter.
  98. ^ Carpenter, Nicole (26 December 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 is blessing us with new Keanu Reeves action figures". Polygon. Archived from the original on 26 December 2019.
  99. ^ Skrebels, Joe (5 June 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Xbox One X Special Edition Comes With Free DLC Expansion". IGN. Archived from the original on 6 June 2020.
  100. ^ Sheridan, Connor (20 April 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Xbox One X will be "the final Xbox One X limited edition console to ever be released"". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 30 April 2020.
  101. ^ Wilde, Tyler (1 May 2020). "Here's a chance to win a GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Cyberpunk 2077 Edition". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 2 May 2020.
  102. ^ Petite, Steven (26 June 2020). "Secretlab's Cyberpunk 2077 Gaming Chair Is Striking And Available Now For A Limited Time". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 26 June 2020.
  103. ^ Zheng, Jenny (8 September 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Energy Drinks Will Come With Xbox Credit And Contest Entries For Cool Prizes". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 12 September 2020. Retrieved 12 September 2020.
  104. ^ Plunkett, Luke (24 September 2020). "Adidas Is Making Cyberpunk 2077 Sneakers". Kotaku. Archived from the original on 25 September 2020. Retrieved 25 September 2020.
  105. ^ Jones, Ali (15 October 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 is getting its own smartphone, exclusive to China". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 15 October 2020. Retrieved 15 October 2020.
  106. ^ Denzer, TJ (13 October 2020). "SteelSeries announces limited-edition Cyberpunk 2077 headsets & mousepads". Shacknews. Archived from the original on 21 October 2020. Retrieved 21 October 2020.
  107. ^ Powell, Kai (11 October 2020). "Razer Meets Night City With New Cyberpunk 2077-Themed Razer Viper Ultimate". Wccftech. Archived from the original on 21 October 2020. Retrieved 21 October 2020.
  108. ^ "Launch of Cyberpunk 2077 supported by advertising campaign involving Agora Group media and brands". CD Projekt. 29 May 2020. Archived from the original on 6 June 2020.
  109. ^ Chalk, Andy (5 May 2020). "CD Projekt teases Cyberpunk 2077 event in June". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 29 June 2020.
  110. ^ McWhertor, Michael (25 June 2020). "Watch the Cyberpunk 2077 Night City Wire livestream here". Polygon. Archived from the original on 25 June 2020.
  111. ^ Chalk, Andy (15 October 2020). "Watch Cyberpunk 2077's next Night City Wire stream here". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 17 October 2020. Retrieved 16 October 2020.
  112. ^ Kim, Matt T.M. (10 August 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Night City Wire Episode 3 Coming Soon". IGN. Archived from the original on 12 August 2020. Retrieved 12 August 2020.
  113. ^ Ivan, Tom (19 June 2020). "Despite its latest delay, Cyberpunk 2077's 'full' next-gen version won't release until 2021". Video Games Chronicle. Archived from the original on 20 June 2020.
  114. ^ Campbell, Kyle (20 October 2021). "'Cyberpunk 2077' and 'The Witcher 3' next-gen versions delayed". USA Today. Archived from the original on 20 October 2021. Retrieved 21 October 2021.
  115. ^ Makuch, Eddie (16 February 2022). "Cyberpunk 2077 PS5 And Xbox Series X/S Update Is Out Now With Ray Tracing, 4K, Faster Load Times". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 19 February 2022. Retrieved 19 February 2022.
  116. ^ Notis, Ari (15 February 2022). "Cyberpunk 2077's Return To Consoles Is Practically A Checklist Of What Everyone Mocked". Kotaku. Archived from the original on 18 February 2022. Retrieved 19 February 2022.
  117. ^ Warren, Tom; Peters, Jay (15 February 2022). "Cyberpunk 2077's next-gen update now available for PS5 and Xbox Series X / S". The Verge. Archived from the original on 17 February 2022. Retrieved 19 February 2022.
  118. ^ Barbosa, Alessandro (24 February 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Upgrades For Xbox Series X Will Be Free". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 24 February 2020.
  119. ^ Phillips, Tom (19 June 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 PS4 will get a free upgrade for PlayStation 5". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 19 June 2020.
  120. ^ Sheridan, Connor (16 January 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 multiplayer is its own AAA project and probably won't be out until 2022". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 6 December 2020. Retrieved 6 December 2020.
  121. ^ Hall, Charlie (16 January 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 developer says multiplayer won't be available until after 2021". Polygon. Archived from the original on 17 January 2020.
  122. ^ "Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment To Distribute Cyberpunk 2077 in North America". CD Projekt. 3 October 2018. Archived from the original on 4 October 2018.
  123. ^ "BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment Europe to distribute Cyberpunk 2077 in selected European markets". CD Projekt. 16 October 2018. Archived from the original on 7 December 2020. Retrieved 7 December 2020.
  124. ^ Wright, Steve (30 April 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 Australian distribution handled by Bandai Namco". Stevivor. Archived from the original on 4 May 2019.
  125. ^ Chapman, Paul (11 September 2019). "Night City Beckons in Japanese Trailer for Cyberpunk 2077". Crunchyroll. Archived from the original on 25 July 2020.
  126. ^ Prescott, Shaun (1 July 2020). "CD Projekt Red confirms Cyberpunk 2077 will be censored in Japan". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 28 July 2021. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  127. ^ Frayna, Marion (30 June 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Deemed Too Risque In Japan, Will Receive Heavy Censorship". Geek Culture. Archived from the original on 28 July 2021. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  128. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 Reportedly Refers To China Censorship As Winnie the Pooh". Screen Rant. 8 June 2021. Archived from the original on 28 July 2021.
  129. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 had a China censor flag called Winnie the Pooh, according to leaked data". VG247. 8 June 2021. Archived from the original on 28 July 2021. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  130. ^ "CDPR Used "Winnie The Pooh" To Mark Censorship Flags For China In Cyberpunk 2077". TheGamer. 7 June 2021. Archived from the original on 28 July 2021. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  131. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 Source Code Reportedly Tags Chinese Censorship as 'Winnie the Pooh'". TechRaptor. 7 June 2021. Archived from the original on 28 July 2021. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  132. ^ Reed, Chris (10 June 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077: Complete Guide to Collector's Edition and Preorder Bonuses – Xbox One and PS4". IGN. Archived from the original on 10 June 2019.
  133. ^ @CyberpunkGame (30 June 2020). "Did you know that... each copy of #Cyberpunk2077 comes with digital content?" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 30 June 2020 – via Twitter.
  134. ^ @GOGcom (16 October 2020). "We're excited to reveal the exclusive digital comic, #Cyberpunk2077: Big City Dreams, available for everyone who buys the game on GOG.COM!" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 16 October 2020 – via Twitter.
  135. ^ Ramsey, Robert (21 November 2023). "Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition Announced, Launches Physically and Digitally in December". Retrieved 23 November 2023.
  136. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition Premieres This Year". 21 November 2023. Retrieved 23 November 2023.
  137. ^ "EDGERUNNERS UPDATE (PATCH 1.6) — LIST OF CHANGES". 6 September 2022. Archived from the original on 16 November 2022. Retrieved 16 November 2022.
  138. ^ Egan, Toussaint (7 September 2022). "Phantom Liberty is the 'only planned expansion' for Cyberpunk 2077". Polygon. Archived from the original on 7 September 2022. Retrieved 7 September 2022.
  139. ^ Sawyer, Will (9 December 2023). "Everything new in Cyberpunk 2077 update 2.1". GamesRadar. Retrieved 9 December 2023.
  140. ^ Welsh, Oli (4 December 2023). "After a turbulent 3 years, CD Projekt is done making Cyberpunk 2077". Polygon. Retrieved 4 March 2024.
  141. ^ Dahlgren, Lisa (19 March 2020). "The World of Cyberpunk 2077 to release in June". Gamereactor. Archived from the original on 20 March 2020.
  142. ^ "The World of Cyberpunk 2077 HC". Dark Horse Comics. Archived from the original on 9 July 2020.
  143. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077: Trauma Team #1". Dark Horse Comics. Archived from the original on 21 June 2020.
  144. ^ Petski, Denise (8 June 2022). "'Cyberpunk: Edgerunners' Teaser Trailer: First Look At Netflix Anime Series Based On Video Game; Premiere Date". Deadline Hollywood. Archived from the original on 8 June 2022. Retrieved 8 June 2022.
  145. ^ Nunneley, Stephany (1 August 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077 – Afterlife: The Card Game is a standalone physical card game coming next year". VG247. Archived from the original on 1 August 2019.
  146. ^ Fahey, Rob (11 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 launches with some real dystopia in tow". Gameindustry.biz. Archived from the original on 10 January 2021. Retrieved 17 December 2020.
  147. ^ Burnes, Andrew (11 June 2019). "Cyberpunk 2077: NVIDIA Partnership Brings Ray Tracing To Hugely-Anticipated Game". Nvidia. Archived from the original on 11 June 2019.
  148. ^ Staff (15 June 2018). "Best of E3 2018 Awards". IGN. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  149. ^ Staff (15 June 2018). "Best of E3 2018 Awards". IGN. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  150. ^ Staff (15 June 2018). "Best of E3 2018 Awards". IGN. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  151. ^ Staff (20 June 2018). "Game Informer's Best Of E3 2018 Awards". Game Informer. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  152. ^ "The PC Gamer Best of E3 2018 awards". PC Gamer. 19 June 2018. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  153. ^ Staff (16 June 2018). "GamesRadar+ E3 2018 awards – the best, most exciting games at E3 2018". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  154. ^ Lee, Julia (12 June 2018). "E3 2018: The best game trailers". Polygon. Archived from the original on 14 June 2018.
  155. ^ Ramée, Jordan (14 June 2018). "The Best Trailers From E3 2018". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  156. ^ Gerardi, Matt (19 June 2018). "The 15 best video game trailers of E3 2018". The A.V. Club. Archived from the original on 23 June 2018.
  157. ^ Gartenberg, Chaim (12 June 2018). "The 25 best game trailers from E3 2018". The Verge. Archived from the original on 17 June 2018.
  158. ^ Wilde, Tyler (11 June 2018). "William Gibson doesn't think Cyberpunk 2077 is cyberpunk enough". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 11 June 2018.
  159. ^ @GreatDismal (27 August 2018). "Looks *much* better to me than the earlier teaser. Has "dirt in the corners" texture" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 1 July 2020 – via Twitter.
  160. ^ Sheridan, Connor (13 June 2018). "Cyberpunk 2077 has a first-person perspective and its character customization will be more than visual". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  161. ^ Sliva, Marty (18 June 2018). "E3 2018: Cyberpunk 2077: CD Projekt Addresses First-Person Backlash". IGN. Archived from the original on 26 June 2018.
  162. ^ Bidaux, Thomas (17 June 2019). "Does Sony's absence mean game over for E3? Here's what the data says…". ICO Partners. Archived from the original on 18 June 2019.
  163. ^ Staff (18 June 2019). "Best games of E3 2019 – What came away with GamesRadar's Game of the Show?". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 18 June 2019.
  164. ^ "PC Gamer's Best of E3 2019 Awards". PC Gamer. 15 June 2019. Archived from the original on 18 June 2019.
  165. ^ "The best games of E3 2019". Rock Paper Shotgun. 14 June 2019. Archived from the original on 18 June 2019.
  166. ^ Machkovech, Sam; Orland, Kyle (14 June 2019). "The best games, demos, and tech of E3 2019". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on 14 June 2019.
  167. ^ Staff (14 June 2019). "Best of E3 2019 Awards". IGN. Archived from the original on 18 June 2019.
  168. ^ Alexander, Julia (11 June 2019). "E3 2019: 15 best trailers from the show". The Verge. Archived from the original on 19 June 2019.
  169. ^ Bedingfield, Will (14 June 2019). "The best games (and trailers) from E3 2019". Wired. Archived from the original on 19 June 2019.
  170. ^ Ruppert, Liana (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Epileptic PSA". Game Informer. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  171. ^ Lyles, Taylor (8 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 to add new epilepsy warning as devs work on a permanent fix". The Verge. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  172. ^ Lee, Jonathan (9 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 adding more warnings after reviewer suffered seizure". In The Know. Archived from the original on 16 December 2020. Retrieved 19 December 2020.
  173. ^ Peters, Jay (11 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077's 1.04 patch makes changes to reduce epilepsy risk". The Verge. Archived from the original on 13 December 2020. Retrieved 19 December 2020.
  174. ^ "How Cyberpunk 2077 Sold a Promise—and Rigged the System". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Archived from the original on 21 December 2020. Retrieved 21 December 2020.
  175. ^ Reeves, Brianna (9 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Reviewers Weren't Allowed To Use Their Own Gameplay Footage". ScreenRant. Archived from the original on 9 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  176. ^ a b "Cyberpunk 2077 (PC)". Metacritic. Fandom, Inc. Archived from the original on 7 December 2020. Retrieved 16 February 2021.
  177. ^ a b "Cyberpunk 2077 (PlayStation 4)". Metacritic. Fandom, Inc. Archived from the original on 14 December 2020. Retrieved 16 February 2021.
  178. ^ a b "Cyberpunk 2077 (PlayStation 5)". Metacritic. Fandom, Inc. Archived from the original on 17 March 2022. Retrieved 27 March 2022.
  179. ^ a b "Cyberpunk 2077 (Xbox One)". Metacritic. Fandom, Inc. Archived from the original on 14 December 2020. Retrieved 16 February 2021.
  180. ^ a b "Cyberpunk 2077 (Xbox Series X)". Metacritic. Fandom, Inc. Archived from the original on 9 March 2022. Retrieved 27 March 2022.
  181. ^ Reiner, Andrew (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Review – A Wild Time In Night City". Game Informer. Archived from the original on 7 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  182. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 review – could it ever live up to the hype?". the Guardian. 16 December 2020. Archived from the original on 3 June 2021. Retrieved 1 June 2021.
  183. ^ a b c d Plagge, Kallie (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Review". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 9 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  184. ^ a b Loveridge, Sam (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 review: "What it lacks in length, it makes up for with depth and soul"". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 8 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  185. ^ a b c Marks, Tom (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Review". IGN. Archived from the original on 7 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  186. ^ Davenport, James (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 review". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 7 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  187. ^ Scott-Jones, Richard (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 review – groundbreaking, but not like you think". PCGamesN. Archived from the original on 8 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  188. ^ Billcliffe, James (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Review: Complicated, Deep, Perception, Reality". VG247. Archived from the original on 8 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  189. ^ Gough, Owen (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 review – CD Projekt Red's next-gen game". Digital Spy. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  190. ^ Dammes, Mathias (9 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 im Test: Ein klasse RPG – Update mit Testvideo". PC GAMES (in German). Archived from the original on 8 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  191. ^ Sheehan, Jason (22 December 2020). "In 'Cyberpunk 2077,' The Only Truly Punk Move Is Not To Play". NPR. Archived from the original on 23 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020. It's like an Eat The Rich t-shirt with the Hot Topic price tag still on it; like Starbucks selling lattes in decorative All War Is Class War mugs.
  192. ^ Chick, Tom (15 December 2020). "Looking for the cyberpunk in Cyberpunk 2077". Quartertothree. Archived from the original on 16 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  193. ^ Robertson, Adi (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 is huge, ambitious, and safe". The Verge. Archived from the original on 22 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  194. ^ Henley, Stacey (4 December 2020). "It sucks that Cyberpunk 2077's edgelord marketing worked so well". Polygon. Retrieved 26 October 2023.
  195. ^ Gilbert, Ben. "'Cyberpunk 2077' amassed at least $480 million in sales before it even launched — and now it's topping sales and streaming charts". Business Insider. Archived from the original on 12 December 2020.
  196. ^ Bolding, Jonathan (18 September 2022). "Skyrocketing Cyberpunk 2077 player counts prove the Netflix boost is real". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 18 September 2022. Retrieved 18 September 2022.
  197. ^ Bonthuys, Darryn (19 October 2022). "A Month Later, A Million Chooms Are Still Logging into Cyberpunk 2077 Every Day". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 23 October 2022. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  198. ^ a b Isaac, Mike; Browning, Kellen (19 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Was Supposed to Be the Biggest Video Game of the Year. What Happened?". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on 19 December 2020. Retrieved 19 December 2020.
  199. ^ Carman, Ashley (25 December 2020). "Investor sues CD Projekt over bungled CyberPunk 2077 launch". The Verge. Archived from the original on 9 September 2021. Retrieved 26 December 2020. The anticipated CyberPunk 2077 launch wasn't just a disaster for gamers, but for the game's investors, too.
  200. ^ Zamora, Gabriel. "Cyberpunk 2077 (for PC) Review". PCMAG. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  201. ^ Corden, Jez (7 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 review: A strong contender for best game ever made". Windows Central. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  202. ^ Hernandez, Patricia (9 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 on PS4 and Xbox One seems to have major problems". Polygon. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  203. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 Is Looking Rough On PS4 And Xbox One At The Moment". Kotaku. 10 December 2020. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  204. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077: how 2020's biggest video game launch turned into a shambles". the Guardian. 18 December 2020. Archived from the original on 22 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  205. ^ December 2020, Demi Williams (15 December 2020). "The cost of fixing Cyberpunk 2077 is "irrelevant" compared to restoring company reputation, says CDPR". gamesradar. Archived from the original on 22 December 2020. Retrieved 21 December 2020.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  206. ^ Morics, Peter (17 December 2020). "CD Projekt Founders Lost $1 Billion Over Cyberpunk 2077's Disastrous Launch". Screen Rant. Archived from the original on 21 December 2020. Retrieved 21 December 2020.
  207. ^ Humphries, Matthew. "CD Projekt Red Offers Apology and Refunds for Cyberpunk 2077". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 15 December 2020. Retrieved 15 December 2020.
  208. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 devs offer refunds, promise to fix bugs and performance". GINX. 14 December 2020. Archived from the original on 16 February 2022. Retrieved 16 February 2022.
  209. ^ Porter, Jon (15 December 2020). "It's not as easy to get a Cyberpunk 2077 refund as CD Projekt Red suggested". The Verge. Archived from the original on 15 December 2020. Retrieved 15 December 2020.
  210. ^ Dornbush, Jonathon (17 December 2020). "Sony Removing Cyberpunk 2077 from PS Store, Will Offer Refunds to PlayStation Players Who Already Bought It". IGN. Archived from the original on 18 December 2020. Retrieved 17 December 2020.
  211. ^ Robinson, Andy (21 June 2021). "Cyberpunk is finally back on PlayStation, but Sony warns: 'PS4 is not recommended'". Video Games Chronicle. Archived from the original on 21 June 2021. Retrieved 21 June 2021.
  212. ^ Peters, Jay (18 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077's Microsoft store listing now has a warning for bugs". The Verge. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  213. ^ Hernandez, Patricia (18 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077's digital store removal: your questions, answered". Polygon. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  214. ^ Peters, Jay (22 December 2020). "GameStop will reportedly accept Cyberpunk 2077 returns, even if you've opened the game". The Verge. Archived from the original on 22 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  215. ^ "Cyberpunk Game Reviews Take Wind Out of CD Projekt's Sails". Bloomberg. 7 December 2020. Archived from the original on 11 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  216. ^ "They Knew It Was Wrong. CD Projekt Red Deceived Consumers Anyway". OpenCritic. 14 December 2020. Archived from the original on 15 December 2020. Retrieved 18 December 2020.
  217. ^ Carpenter, Nicole (24 December 2020). "CD Projekt facing class action lawsuit over Cyberpunk 2077 release". Polygon. Archived from the original on 24 December 2020. Retrieved 24 December 2020.
  218. ^ Ivan, Tom (18 January 2021). "CD Projekt responds to another Cyberpunk 2077 class action lawsuit". Video Games Chronicle. Archived from the original on 9 September 2021. Retrieved 18 January 2021.
  219. ^ Robinson, Andy (19 May 2021). "Four class action lawsuits over Cyberpunk's troubled launch are combining". Video Games Chronicle. Archived from the original on 19 May 2021. Retrieved 19 May 2021.
  220. ^ Phillips, Tom (16 December 2021). "Cyberpunk 2077 developer settles disgruntled investors for just $1.85m". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 16 December 2021. Retrieved 16 December 2021.
  221. ^ "Investors settle Cyberpunk 2077 lawsuit with developer for $1.85 million". Ars Technica. 5 January 2023. Archived from the original on 5 February 2023. Retrieved 5 January 2023.
  222. ^ Skrebels, Joe (11 January 2021). "Cyberpunk 2077's Launch and Ongoing Fixes Investigated By Consumer Protection Agency". IGN. Archived from the original on 9 September 2021. Retrieved 11 January 2021.
  223. ^ Peters, Jay (11 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077's long-struggling developers will see their bonuses after all". The Verge. Archived from the original on 13 December 2020. Retrieved 13 December 2020.
  224. ^ Schreier, Jason (16 January 2021). "Inside Cyberpunk 2077's Disastrous Rollout". Bloomberg News. Retrieved 16 January 2021.
  225. ^ a b c Good, Owen S. (13 January 2021). "CD Projekt: 'Don't fault devs' for Cyberpunk 2077's launch". Polygon. Archived from the original on 9 September 2021. Retrieved 13 January 2021.
  226. ^ Orland, Kyle (13 January 2021). "CDPR CEO blames "in-game streaming" for Cyberpunk's console problems". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on 9 September 2021. Retrieved 13 January 2021.
  227. ^ Valentine, Rebekah (30 March 2023). "Cyberpunk 2077's Turnaround Just Gave CD Projekt Its Second-Best Revenue Year Ever". IGN. Retrieved 24 August 2023.
  228. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 Crosses 20 Million Copies Sold As It Rides Edgerunners Wave". GameSpot. Retrieved 14 September 2023.
  229. ^ Wilson, Jonathon (13 September 2022). "Cyberpunk: Edgerunners season 1 review – a psychedelic anime bucks the trend for video game adaptations". Ready Steady Cut. Retrieved 16 September 2022.
  230. ^ Kim, Matt (14 September 2022). "Cyberpunk: Edgerunners Review". IGN. Retrieved 16 September 2022.
  231. ^ Chalk, Andy (29 November 2022). "Cyberpunk: Edgerunners helped push CD Projekt to 'the best third quarter in our entire history'". PC Gamer. Retrieved 24 August 2023.
  232. ^ Donovan, Imogen (22 September 2023). "'Cyberpunk 2077' update adds heartbreaking 'Edgerunners' reference". NME. Retrieved 6 October 2023.
  233. ^ Batchelor, James (10 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 racked up 8 m pre-orders, 74% were digital". gamesindustry.biz. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  234. ^ "CD Projekt's Iwiński on Cyberpunk 2077, Keanu Reeves and China". Bloomberg News. 12 June 2019. Archived from the original on 23 July 2019.
  235. ^ Jones, Ali (8 July 2019). "A third of Cyberpunk 2077 PC pre-orders have been purchased through GOG". PCGamesN. Archived from the original on 9 July 2019.
  236. ^ "Przedpremierowa sprzedaż Cyberpunk 2077 jest największa w... Chinach". Interia (in Polish). 29 June 2020. Archived from the original on 3 July 2020.
  237. ^ Hall, Charlie (11 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 has already recouped its development costs, CD Projekt says". Polygon. Archived from the original on 12 December 2020. Retrieved 13 December 2020.
  238. ^ Rupert, Lianna. "CDPR Conference Call Reveals Last-Gen Cyberpunk 2077 Neglect, No Refund Agreement In Place". Game Informer. Archived from the original on 15 December 2020. Retrieved 15 December 2020.
  239. ^ Krasuski, Konrad (15 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 debacle costs founders US$1 billion of wealth". BNN Bloomberg. Retrieved 21 March 2024.
  240. ^ Bayliss, Ben (10 December 2020). "Cyberpunk 2077 Hits Over 1 Million Concurrent Players on Steam in Less Than 12 Hours". DualShockers. Archived from the original on 10 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  241. ^ Romano, Sal (17 December 2020). "Famitsu Sales: 12/7/20 – 12/13/20". Gematsu. Archived from the original on 17 December 2020. Retrieved 17 December 2020.
  242. ^ "Disclosure of estimated sales of Cyberpunk 2077" (PDF). CD Projekt Red. 22 December 2020. Archived (PDF) from the original on 22 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  243. ^ Gilbert, Ben (22 December 2020). "'Cyberpunk 2077' sales have already topped 13 million despite the game being pulled from the PlayStation 4". Business Insider. Archived from the original on 23 December 2020. Retrieved 22 December 2020.
  244. ^ "Worldwide digital games market: December 2020". SuperData Research. Nielsen Company. 22 January 2021. Archived from the original on 22 January 2021. Retrieved 22 January 2021.
  245. ^ "Games and interactive media earnings rose 12% to $139.9B in 2020". SuperData Research. Nielsen Company. 6 January 2021. Archived from the original on 27 January 2021. Retrieved 6 January 2021.
  246. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 Crosses 20 Million Copies Sold As It Rides Edgerunners Wave". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 28 September 2022. Retrieved 3 October 2022.
  247. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 clears 25m sales and Phantom Liberty hits 3m in its first week". VGC. 5 October 2023. Retrieved 5 October 2023.
  248. ^ Writer, Sophie McEvoy Staff (6 October 2023). "CD Projekt spent over $120m to save Cyberpunk 2077". GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved 6 October 2023.
  249. ^ "Disney, Iron Man 3 Dominate 2013 Golden Trailer Awards". Deadline Hollywood. 5 May 2013. Archived from the original on 31 August 2014. Retrieved 1 November 2022.
  250. ^ Watts, Steve (5 July 2018). "Resident Evil 2 Wins Top Honor In E3 Game Critics Awards". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 9 January 2020.
  251. ^ Sheridan, Connor (16 November 2018). "Golden Joystick Awards 2018 winners: God of War wins big but Fortnite gets Victory Royale". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 16 November 2018.
  252. ^ Glyer, Mike (19 November 2018). "2018 Gamers' Choice Awards Nominees". File 770. Archived from the original on 9 January 2020.
  253. ^ Sheridan, Connor (27 June 2019). "Game Critics Awards Best of E3 2019 winners: Here are the victors and nominees for every category". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 28 June 2019.
  254. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 claims this year's Golden Joystick for Most Wanted Game". Gamasutra. 15 November 2019. Archived from the original on 16 November 2019.
  255. ^ Hipes, Patrick (7 January 2020). "VES Awards Nominations: The Lion King, Alita: Battle Angel, The Mandalorian & GoT Top List". Deadline Hollywood. Archived from the original on 16 February 2020. Retrieved 1 November 2022.
  256. ^ Huff, Lauren (29 January 2020). "The Lion King reigns at 2020 Visual Effects Society Awards". Entertainment Weekly. Archived from the original on 30 January 2020. Retrieved 1 November 2022.
  257. ^ "gamescom Award". www.gamescom.global. Archived from the original on 12 November 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  258. ^ Craddock, Ryan (6 January 2021). "Animal Crossing Nominated For New York Game Awards' GOTY, Will Be Co-Hosted By Reggie Fils-Aimé". Nintendo Life. Gamer Network. Archived from the original on 5 January 2021. Retrieved 3 May 2021.
  259. ^ Pedersen, Erik (2 March 2021). "VES Awards Nominations: Tenet, Midnight Sky, Extraction, Soul & Mandalorian Among Titles In Visual Effects Hunt". Deadline Hollywood. Archived from the original on 2 March 2021. Retrieved 2 March 2021.
  260. ^ Hipes, Patrick (6 April 2021). "VES Awards: The Midnight Sky, Pixar's Soul, The Mandalorian Take Marquee Honors – Full List Of Winners". Deadline Hollywood. Archived from the original on 7 April 2021. Retrieved 6 April 2021.
  261. ^ "2021 BAFTA Games Awards: The Nominations". www.bafta.org. 1 March 2021. Archived from the original on 29 April 2021. Retrieved 4 March 2021.
  262. ^ "2021 BAFTA Games Awards: The Winners". www.bafta.org. 1 March 2021. Archived from the original on 29 April 2021. Retrieved 27 March 2021.
  263. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 – 24th D.I.C.E. Awards". www.interactive.org. Archived from the original on 15 February 2022. Retrieved 15 February 2022.
  264. ^ Crist, Allison; Perez, Lexy (22 July 2021). "Golden Trailer Awards: A Quiet Place: Part II, Black Widow Among Winners". The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on 13 August 2021. Retrieved 1 November 2022.
  265. ^ Hafford, Hayden (7 December 2021). "The Game Awards 2021: Nominees, start times, and where to watch". Rock, Paper, Shotgun. Archived from the original on 10 December 2021. Retrieved 8 December 2021.
  266. ^ Backhurst, Adam (10 December 2021). "The Game Awards 2021 Winners: The Full List". IGN. Archived from the original on 10 December 2021. Retrieved 10 December 2021.
  267. ^ Adams, Robert N. (3 January 2022). "The Steam Awards 2021 Winners Announced". TechRaptor. Archived from the original on 1 January 2024. Retrieved 1 January 2024.
  268. ^ Fragen, Jordan (3 January 2023). "The Steam Awards 2022 announces winners". VentureBeat. Archived from the original on 1 January 2024. Retrieved 1 January 2024.
  269. ^ Eddie Makuch (7 December 2023). "All The Game Awards 2023 Winners Revealed". gamespot.com. Retrieved 9 December 2023.
  270. ^ Carpenter, Nicole (4 October 2022). "CD Projekt Red announces Cyberpunk 2077 sequel, Project Orion". Polygon. Archived from the original on 4 October 2022. Retrieved 4 October 2022.
  271. ^ Scullion, Chris (5 October 2022). "Core Cyberpunk 2077 team members 'are moving to the US' to lead sequel studio". Video Games Chronicle. Archived from the original on 5 October 2022. Retrieved 5 October 2022.
  272. ^ "New Witcher Saga Announced. CD PROJEKT RED Begins Development on Unreal Engine 5 as Part of a Strategic Partnership with Epic Games". CD Projekt. 21 March 2022. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  273. ^ Harradence, Michael (14 June 2023). "Gabe Amatangelo Plans To Direct The Cyberpunk 2077 Sequel, Confirms It Will Use Epic's Unreal Engine". PlayStation Universe. Retrieved 14 June 2023.
  274. ^ "Cyberpunk 2077 Follow-up, codenamed Project Orion, grows in strength at CD PROJEKT RED North America!". 6 February 2024. Retrieved 25 March 2024.

Further reading edit

  • Byrd, Christopher (10 December 2021). "The Strange, Unfinished Saga of Cyberpunk 2077". The New Yorker. Archived from the original on 23 December 2021. Retrieved 22 December 2021.

External links edit

  • Official website