Cyberpunk 2077 delayed until November 19

Rorie sure wasn't wrong with his "the beginning of delay announcements" or so comment during the latest Bombcast.

I'm not that fussed, because I never had this burning need for the game...and hey, maybe now I'll actually give the FF7 Remake a go on it's new release day, since 2077 won't be coming out immediately afterwards. How about you, bummed or non-phased over this not-that-surprising bit of news?

Holy shit what!? Well this is disappointing for sure. I was definitely looking forward to April. Man this isn't just some small delay. Well hopefully it doesn't get delayed again and misses 2020. Now I'm wondering if this is due to next gen systems. At least Doom Eternal is coming out in a few months.

That’s a bummer for me, but also good on them for taking the time. Looks like spring/summer will be a good time to catch up on my backlog, considering Cyberpunk was (at lest I think so) the only game this spring I was really looking forward to.

Good, this spring had too much coming out already.

This might actually be good depending on what they're doing with it. More time for polish is almost always a good thing.

I see the announcement mentions the "crowning achievement of this generation," but I also wonder if this presages a cross-generational version? I was torn about getting a game coming out in April with the new consoles coming out sometime in the holiday season, particularly when the game seems likely to push current-gen stuff to/past the breaking point. Getting a version on the new boxes where they can really uncork things would be ideal.

Plenty of games to play, not enough time to dedicate to them.

Take your time. Make it awesome. I’ll be here.

Not too bothered by it. Plenty of other games to play around that time, and CDPR is one of those devs that has earned the privilege of being able to release a game whenever they think it's ready.

Just make it good, my preference would be to release it when its ready, not due to what the spreadsheet says.

Don't be EA...

Great, now everyone can stop pretending like it was coming out in April.

Also, when did 5 month become a long delay?

This gives me time to save for better PC components that will actually run this game well, so I'm viewing the delay in a positive light. My 1070 and 6700k are really struggling at 1440p on high settings with newer games. A 3070 + mid-range Zen 3 should be out before September, and Cyberpunk was the game that made me consider upgrading in the first place. Edit: Hmm, just read Zen 3 is more likely releasing in 2021. I'll consider a 3700X, then.

It also means the game will be better, of course, so it's only good news, but I still understand why some are disappointed.

On one hand, I'll be more productive during my last semester. But on the other hand, the fuck am I gonna play?

Rhetorical question. Don't @ me.

All good to me, I'm excited to play it when it's ready.

I feel like this gives me plenty of time to budget for a new TV and a PS5 while expecting several games I was excited to play this year will be launch titles for that system as well.

It's getting to the point we're really going to need solid details about if/how/when back-compat is gonna work for this upcoming set of systems, though. It was a pipedream that games you owned on PS3 digitally would be retroactively honored on PS4 for a variety of reasons, but the economy of video games feels very different all these years later.

I'm glad they're taking their time, but it sucks for the rank and file who are likely going to be worked to the bone for another six months.

Oh shit that's right. The RTX 30XX cards might be out by then. Now I feel better about this.

Thats a pretty long delay. I thought it was going to be like a month but thats a proper Doom Eternal "christmas is ruined" type of delay.

Definitely will wait to purchase a ps5 before I get it now. But CDPR has earned any delay they need and then some.

April release never felt like a real thing anyway

Not at all, was expecting this. Hopefully the dev crew won't get worked to the bone.

@meierthered: according to the Waypoint article, the studio has stated both that there will be crunch for the staff, yet they don't need any additional staff to finish the project. Seems contradictory to me, but what do I know.

@redwing42:

Very contradictory. Seems like more stories are forming now about the developers.

I am actually pleased about how this times out with the RTX 30XX cards. More time to put money aside for it.

@hayt said:

Yeah, I'm aiming for a new build before this game comes out - so gives me more time.

I'm sad to hear there's still going to be massive crunch even with the delay. The problem with new consoles coming out for holiday 2020 is CDPR likely sees it as a mandate that the game cannot be released any later than Sept. and will absolutely grind their staff for the next ~8 months.

I worry this (purely speculative and unsubstantiated) hard deadline is going to leave the game as slightly unfinished/patch heavy despite the delay – in which case I'm likely better to just get it for PC vs console anyway.

To be honest, I’m used to delays in the game industry. Everything will be fine as long as the game is good.

A lot of triple A delays this year which I think is a good sign that some of the blunders of the previous year have been noticed across the board. Truth is making games is not easy and a big part of the reason many big budget games is iterative is simply due to the "finding the fun" issue.

Delaying Cyberpunk is a good sign.

Nice, I really hope they live up to the potential they have in all the stuff they've showed so far. I'm a firm "when it's ready" type of person.

Aaaand delayed again until November 19th. At this point CDPR should just stop announcing release dates until they're going gold, jfc. Their track record is fucking awful with delays.

There's been two including this one. Relax.

Also maybe things have been a little complicated lately.

folks the Keanu pointing thing is more than capable of modification, any date any time

@fugoy: And two delays for Witcher 3, and a delay for Witcher 2, so shush. These aren't short delays either, especially since the game has been playable from start to finish since January.

CDPRs planning is just unequivocally shit.

Gives me more time to finish my Witcher playthrough.

do people actually still get upset about delays because I thought we were past that

If two delays is what makes you think their planning is shit I don't know what to tell you. It's not like this is Persona or Metroid or some thing that takes years. Hell Last of Us 2 got delayed twice and no one was screaming at them. Making games is hard.

Something tells me if the game came out as they announced and was somehow broken you are the type of person yelling at the top of their lungs on how shit CDPR are ;) ... Yelling about delays just shows you have no idea how complicated this stuff is. I work in development and even I can only imagine how much work has to go in a game of this type especially when they are probably working at 60-70% capacity due to pandemic home-office. But yeah, let's yell at them because they didn't meet a deadline.

I have no problem with them pushing this back to November, but it sucks for the people working on the game who will likely have to endure another two months of crunch. It's much easier to support delays when the developers don't have a history of abusing their employees.

lol you can't just add them up from all their games like that's how it works. Stay mad fam.

@fugoy: True, learning from past mistakes is impossible.

Going to ignore the weird troll claiming to use delays as a metric for a company they have no knowledge of planning.

I'm almost happy there's a delay. I already have a bunch of games to play. Cyberpunk 2077 and AC Valhalla will probably have a bit of a release overlap causing me to choose. Won't matter because I'll just play one after another. Games don't magically disappear into the ether.

@vectortheangel: Then you should probably actually ignore me and not make passive aggressive remarks. But since you're up for a discussion:

In your mind, what is crunch, a reportedly rocky development and repeatedly missing release dates (and still releasing broken games) indicative of, if not bad planning?

Are you also going to hand wave the repeated issues a veteran developer is having with: "making games is hard", even after employees of the company have come out to criticize them for bad planning and the treatment of their employees?

CDPR's shortcomings are already well documented and criticized.

Back in April, CDPR came out to declare that they're confident in releasing the game in September and that the only issue "on their radar" was getting VO recorded in time due to COVID, and now they're out here saying that the game is so broken they can't make it in time.

I held my tongue in January when the first delay happened and instead of anyone pointing to CDPR having a history of this, everyone threw out their favourite outdated Miyamoto quote for the billionth time.

So maybe folks should stop acting flabbergasted and outraged when reports of crunch and mental breakdowns come out of these studios. You're watching (some of) the circumstances that facilitate it happen and instead of calling it out now, you're riding over in defence of them.

To wrap this around to my point: why announce a release date this soon once again? If you've already botched this badly, wait and give a date when you know you'll hit it.

I wonder how fucked their internal deadlines are.

If you want my selfish thoughts about the delay: this works out great for me, now there's time for the 3000 series to come out and I can do a complete PC overhaul before the game comes out.

Yeah, I feel like I'm reading different responses by @briarpack here than people seemingly accusing him of just being another person "mad that the game that they want got delayed"...I agree that a better solution here would be to either have enough manpower to ensure you don't have to crunch your employees to death, or just not announce a release date so that there are no pressures to release the game and thus give reasons for crunch. CDPR does have a history of not being able to hit self-imposed deadlines and a history of bad crunch...I can't imagine these two things aren't connected given how often poor planning and crunch are basically hand-in-hand.

Why not? Anyone looking forward to the game will not doubt be disappointed but delaying doesn't do any real harm.

Crunch should be viewed as a failure of management, not a celebration of it.

If this is to facilitate LESS crunch: more power to them, and I'd love to see more devs take this tack. If not: they need to get their shit together. Being pro-consumer doesn't mean you get a pass on being anti-worker.

I'm bummed about it because it means another X months of devs being ground into a pulp working on a project. CDPR crunches and they crunch hard, they've been crunching to make this date, and now they're going to crunch to make the new date. I don't care about the game, I just don't want these people to be overworked.

I thought that in most cases from what people in the industry have said, delays generally mean *more* crunch, not less? Because in most cases, unless a dev specifically says so, the delays are a product of not hitting goals, which just means they realized now that September is impossible...if they were already crunching to hit September, moving it to November doesn't mean they won't just be crunching for longer unless they outright say "We realize how crunch is bad, so we are extending our release date to ensure that our employees can work normal hours, and this means that the game will be delayed."

My understanding is that last part happening is very rare. I would doubt it would happen within CDPR either, given their track record.

I don't think that was his overall point though. The reason new release dates after delays can do harm is because, if we logically assume that while crunching to hit September they realized that wasn't going to be possible, delaying it with ANOTHER date just likely means more crunch. If you switch to a "we'll tell you when it's done" mentality, you might still have more crunch, but at least you aren't setting up public goal posts that will almost DEFINITELY increase the likelihood, and maybe even the amount, of crunch.

@sethmode: Nailed it on both accounts!

I think something kinda messed up happened in recent-ish years when some devs pushed unfinished games out the door and we started applauding delays.

Yes, a delay means we as consumers will probably get a better product in the end, but a delay also means that something went avry and a lot of people are probably going to get fucked over for at least a couple more months.

Not to say that people should send death threats over delays, but I really don't think these companies deserve pats on the back because of delays either.