The beleaguered Cyberpunk 2077 has sold 13 million copies, but founders of developer CD Projekt Red has lost $1 billion USD.
Bloomberg reports that (as of December 15th- five days after the game’s launch) CD Projekt Red’s founders have lost an estimated $1 billion USD. The developer was founded by Marcin Iwiński, and Michał Kiciński. Kiciński left the company in 2013, and Iwiński is the company’s joint CEO with Adam Kiciński (who is also the company’s president).
We previously reported how a mere three days after the game’s launch, CD Projekt Red’s stock value dropped by 29%. Bloomberg reported that total shares had dropped by a third.
According to Business Insider, shares closed at €98.80 EUR a share on December 4th, and closed €60.72 EUR on December 30th- the first time the stock value has begun to rise again since the fall. The company shares had previously fallen to €73.80 EUR a share on October 30th (shortly after they announced the final delay for the game), and €50.00 EUR a share on March 12th.
Bloomberg also reported that analyst estimations for Cyberpunk 2077‘s sales over 12 months fell from 30 million to 25.6 million after the game launched. However, CD Projekt have revealed that as of December 20th the game sold over 13 million copies. This figure is after considering refund requests via e-mail directly to the developer.
CD Projekt Red had previously announced the game had sold 8 million copies through pre-orders; made up of 59% PC and 41% consoles, with 74% digitally and 26% physically.
As previously reported, the game’s numerous delays and leaked footage were not the end of the woes for CD Projekt Red. One reviewer suffered a major epileptic seizure, and accused the developer on basing the Braindance headset off a medical device designed to intentionally induce seizures.
Despite high praise from initial reviews, the Metacritic user score was far less. Currently the Metascore for the PC version of the game is 86, with a user score of 7.2 (out of 10). Meanwhile, the game’s PlayStation 4 and Xbox One user scores are 3.4 and 4.7 respectively (with Metascores of 54 and 61 respectively).
It should be noted that those who have not played the game may also be submitting user reviews, as Metacritic does not verify if a user has completed or played a game. In February for example a user of Reset Era orchestrated the review bombing of AI: The Somnium Files.
Metacritic placed a 36 hour grace period on user reviews for video games in July of this year. Metacritic would later insist this decision was not motivated by reactions to any particular game. That year also say low user review scores for Warcraft III: Reforged, and The Last of Us Part II.
Users complained of Cyberpunk 2077‘s numerous glitches and bugs, along with poor optimization, and the console version having inferior graphics. CD Projekt Red had to recommend fans to complete the game quickly and avoid crafting too many items to prevent save file corruption, which was later patched. Even critic reviews that praised the game also discussed those issues.
CD Projekt Red apologized for the game’s advertising and launch, and offered full refunds. However, two lawsuits have been launched by investors- one in Poland also being an attorney.
A Q&A investor call reportedly had CD Projekt Red denying they had any special agreements for refunds for Cyberpunk 2077 on consoles, and that they were working on the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of the game “until the very last minute.”
Both Sony and Microsoft stated they would offer full refunds for the game. Sony would remove the game from the PlayStation Store, but there were “no talks” of Microsoft removing it from theirs.
While it was stated in the aforementioned Q&A investor call that the team were focused on fixing the game before any discussion of the game’s multiplayer or free DLC, a webpage was recently discovered- stating the first free DLC would launch in Early 2021.
Cyberpunk 2077 is available on Windows PC (via Epic Games, GOG, and Steam), PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Google Stadia. The game is also coming to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S in 2021, and players on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One respectively will be able to upgrade to the next-gen for free.
In case you missed it, you can find our review here.
Image: Previously released press release.
