CD Projekt Red has an interesting reputation with their fans at the moment. The Polish video game studio is responsible for developing the phenomenally successful Witcher games, which have been such a massive hit around the globe that they reinvigorated interest in the book series by Andrzej Sapkowski and helped spawn the Netflix television show. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt in particular has been given more than 260 Game of the Year awards and may just be one of the best open world RPGs of all time.
Yet the developer’s following game, Cyberpunk 2077, got off to an extremely rocky start. When it released, Cyberpunk was riddled with so many bugs and game-breaking issues that Sony went so far as to remove it from the Playstation store and offer an almost unheard-of blanket refund to anyone who bought the game. Since then, CD Projekt Red has been putting in a lot of legwork to regain that goodwill with fans, fixing things that were broken in the game and generally trying to bring it more in line with the studio’s original vision.
It seems the company feels they’re pretty close to achieving that goal. In an earnings call earlier this week, CD Projekt Red revealed that they believe the “vast part of the job” that needed to be done to fix Cyberpunk was completed in 2021. In particular, this is likely referencing Patch 1.5 for the game, which provided a bevy of updates including everything from fixing bugs to improving NPC behavior and even adding extra apartments, new romance interactions, and the ability to additionally customize your character.
The breakdown of the company’s different resources in the call showed that they are scaling back the resources they are devoting to Cyberpunk in 2022 significantly, largely as they expand focus on other projects, including the next installment in the Witcher franchise (per Kotaku.)
As it was mentioned in @CDPROJEKTRED_IR financial call moments ago, Cyberpunk 2077's upcoming expansion will arrive in 2023. Please stay tuned for more details coming later this year 🦾 https://t.co/rq1w6RDTDL
— Cyberpunk 2077 (@CyberpunkGame) April 14, 2022
A Cyberpunk 2077 expansion is coming in 2023
With all that said, the studio also reiterated that they “will obviously continue supporting Cyberpunk 2077,” and backed that up with a pretty big announcement: the long-awaited expansion for the game will be coming out in 2023. No details have been confirmed about the story or setting of the expansion, but the game’s Quest Director Pawel Sasko confirmed earlier this week that the team is hard at work on the project.
“I can assure you that we are working expansion, we’re working stuff for you guys besides that,” Sasko said on the Cyberpunk 2077 subreddit. “That didn’t change, we are still improving the game because we are all aware there is work to be done.”
"We’re very happy you guys liked [Patch 1.5], and that gives us more…incentive to work for you guys because you show your appreciation for it. That’s as much as I can tell you. We are working on stuff for you. Like I’m literally daily reviewing quests, talking to people about stuff, so it is happening."
CD Projekt Red did a pretty solid job with its two expansions for The Witcher 3, which wrapped up Geralt of Rivia’s story in an extremely satisfying way. While Cyberpunk 2077 has had a rocky run so far, it’s to the studio’s credit that they’ve stuck with it to make it a better experience for gamers. Despite its technical flaws, there’s an awful lot about Cyberpunk 2077 that is amazing. We can only hope that the studio really knocks it out of the park with the expansion.
In addition to the Cyberpunk 2077 expansion, CD Projekt Red also announced recently that they are returning to the Witcher franchise with a brand new mainline game, which has been teased to contain a new school of School of the Lynx branch of witchers. Between those two projects, the next few years stand to be pretty good for CD Projekt Red.
To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.
Get HBO, Starz, Showtime and MORE for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channels