OPINION: CD Projekt Red Needs To Stop Giving Release Dates

It is delayed again.

Cyberpunk 2077 is, quite possibly, the most anticipated game of the decade. And that’s for good reason. But once again, to the dismay of many, this game-of-the-century contender has once again been delayed for the fourth time in a row. And people are understandably pissed.

For what is the fourth time the game has been delayed from its original release date back in April 16th, Cyberpunk 2077 has been repeatedly pushed back further and further into the year. It has had no less than four release dates by now and it isn’t looking too good for CD Projekt Red.

All of this in great irony, considering that just the day before CD Projekt Red announced the 21 day push back, the developers confirmed on twitter that the game would no longer experience any more delays for its supposed release on November 19.

Their reason for the delay, as reads, is because of their troubles of having to release on all consoles including current and next generations as well as that on the PC. They severely miscalculated the timeframe needed to achieve such a feat and are now opting to delay the game once again.

While I can admire their determination for polish, what I personally find unforgivable is the multitude of broken promises the developers have left on their trail. I don’t think anyone would have minded if CDPR just told everyone that they’ll be releasing the game late this year or early 2021. But they specifically left a date that they have failed to keep up with multiple times. And all this after boasting about Cyberpunk 2077 having gone gold. What sours the tongue even more, is just how close we were to the release date.

I can understand the difficulty of the situation, all things considered as they do have to work from home. But considering the limitations of what they have to work with, they shouldn’t be making promises they can’t keep. Not only has the release date been pushed back, but certain features have now been removed from the game. This is an alarming red flag to the actual state of Cyberpunk 2077 by the time of its release.

While CD Projekt Red does claim that the game is finished, I can’t help but be suspicious. They mentioned that 21 days being a generous amount of time to make “improvements” on a lot of things, but if they need that long to make improvements then doesn’t that just mean that game is really just unfinished? I’m not a game developer, but as someone who’s been excited for the release of this game that excitement has been turning into frustration and ire.

It isn’t entitled to get angry or frustrated at the developers who have broken their promises multiple times. And expressing disappointment isn’t improper considering the context of the situation. So I can understand from everyone’s perspective who complain that this bad habit CD Projekt Red is making with their delays is unacceptable.

So please don’t take it personally when I say I’m not really expecting much from the developers this December. I have a hunch that they might push the game further back into 2021. I’d be more than happy to eat my own words, but Cyberpunk 2077 doesn’t seem like it’s coming any time soon with the amount of “polish” it still needs.

What the developers need to do is stop giving us release dates that just seem impossible to accomplish. Right now, as they said on their tweet 21 days doesn’t seem like a long time so it’s difficult to believe that they could finish working on it in that amount of time.

In any case, I wish CD Projekt Red the best. But I’m quite done getting excited for Cyberpunk 2077.

Editor’s Note: The opinion of the author does not reflect the entire view of Sirus Gaming as a whole.