We all know it very well, the gaming community was particularly in turmoil for the release of cyberpunk 2077, but already after a few hours from Day-One the bitter truth has been revealed in a much more problematic product than initially predicted, with an avalanche of bugs presented to the public. These do not undermine the gaming experience on PC and next gen consoles, but reflect the urgency with which the title was released (which is also a bit reflective, considering the various delays that have postponed its release. ). The console versions were the most impacted due to their poor calculation efficiency and the difficulty in cross-platform portability. We do not find it hard to believe that many players have uncorked more than a few bottles of sparkling wine, sitting comfortably on the sofa, admiring the evolution of the bug after bug affair. Those who faced the Old-Gen console experience found themselves paying the most expensive price, so much so that the co-founder Marcin Iwinski publicly apologized from CD Projekt RED's official Twitter account. At this point, a legitimate question arises: is it right and profitable to dare to give today's players such an enveloping experience and for this reason so complex in terms of design?
A road paved with difficulties
These are difficult times for the Polish software house, given the countless problems that have plagued the production. After 7 years of development, the various obstacles encountered along the way and Covid-19 which undoubtedly played a central role in the delays, it is now a fact that insiders have had problems in adapting their product. to Old-Gen consoles. To this situation we also add the porting for the Next-Gen consoles, and here it is that a real minefield will emerge made up of very palpable disasters at every step. Adapting the source code to other hardware is a long and difficult process that will surely require countless extra hours of overtime for the developers, who not surprisingly have shown a strong resentment towards the management. After the stock market crash that hit the company in early December - whose shares lost about half of their value - legal problems followed. After the first lawsuit filed by the Polish antitrust against the Warsaw software house, there are rumors of a second legal action, which has as its key principle false or at least misleading statements. according to which the title seemed to be easily playable even on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Well, on the eve of the second class action, let's try to measure the risk in relation to the revolution from the gameplay point of view that CD Projekt RED has tried to bring to the gaming market.
The approach with which the title was developed appears to be nothing short of revolutionary. Witness the freedom of action that you have in the open world, the approach of the AI towards the protagonist that changes according to fame and his actions and, not in the second line, the stratification of the game itself. The latter allows the player to approach missions in many different ways, as is the feeling of each usable weapon. Such a diversification, combined with an attention to texture details and a narrative vein that is not so binding in terms of history, is the product of an immense development effort. It is even possible to complete the game without finishing the main campaign! Cyberpunk 2077 is all of this, and has been subjected by numerous users to the inquisition for having gone a little too far with release times and for the flawless finish and portability, transcending the fact that it is a title that is already effectively revolutionizing. the world of gaming. Lately we have the feeling that a video game manages to go down in history more for its failures than for the innovation it introduces. We understand the disappointment of the players in buying in pre-order a copy of a highly anticipated title that then turns out to be too "young" to be released on the market, but having to do with a product of this magnitude - coupled with a not particularly vast -, some hiccups were to be expected. The videogame market today is becoming more and more pressing in terms of use of games, and for this reason even the software houses must put the fourth to develop new titles.
Innovation or static?
All this frenzy in wanting to bring to light increasingly complex, vast and articulated productions inevitably leads to an increase in the risk factor. Cyberpunk 2077 took on a heavy load to say the least, but in such a ruthless market, software houses need a lot of time and as many resources to shape a high-level gaming experience, although in this sense the public does not seem to perceive the effort required in terms of development. If the trend for the future were to be risk-free we would find ourselves playing only derivative titles, thus eliminating the innovation that we players expect from a new title. Changing the point of view and analyzing the situation from the perspective of the software houses and not the end user, thinking from the point of view of absolute profit, detaching oneself from the formulas and approaches that work would raise the risk factor of failure too much, especially when for a house development proceeds are the numbers that really matter to survive. A precedent is provided by the review bombing of The Last of Us part 2. Under the title, which boasts a respectable metascore equal to 95/100, we find thousands of ratings from users who assign a rating of 4/10 to the game and there is no lack of ratings of 0/10. Reviews like these, in our opinion, significantly negatively impact the advertising that the game has on the marketplaces of the network. With the phenomenon of review bombing on the rise, consequently also the feedback of the players towards the developers can be affected, discouraging the latter to undertake pioneering-revolutionary development paths as in the case of cyberpunk 2077.
Summing up in today's gaming landscape, the big question we ask ourselves is: is the reaction of players who rejoice towards this kind of issue an attitude that in the long run will lead to discouragement towards the development of games that really aim high? What really went wrong with Cyberpunk 2077? The answer, in our opinion, is that CD Projekt RED has miserably failed developing a video game that has multiple problems, which go beyond simple bugs or glitches, but at the same time it brought a breath of fresh air to an area where there had been no electricity for some time. These, again in our opinion, are the situations in which bankruptcy is contemplated. On the other hand, even when you walk, for a very small fraction of a second, you lose your balance in the name of progression and making no mistake means that you are not daring enough.
