CD Projekt Red is changing its gaming development strategy and will be restructuring, the Polish studio announced today in a corporate update video released on YouTube. Starting from 2022, the studio will begin to work on multiple AAA games and expansions in parallel.
Cyberpunk 2077 was launched in December after being in development for years, but the launch has not particularly gone according to plan. The game was released with countless bugs forcing Sony to remove it from its PlayStation Store. CDPR has released several hotfixes and came out with its second major patch yesterday but that has not fixed all the bugs and performance issue plaguing the game.
“We want to improve the way we make games,” said President and Joint CEO Adam Kiciński. “We want to continuously improve the working environment for every team member. We want a sharper focus on how we work together to make great games.” This is particularly important following reports of crunch so Cyberpunk 2077 could be launched. “CD PROJEKT will remain an inclusive and diverse workplace; however, we also want to emphasize the well-being of our employees and provide them with professional and personal development opportunities,” the Polish studio outlined.
In the strategy update video, the studio stated its plans for its two major franchises – The Witcher and Cyberpunk. “Single-player RPGs have been, are, and will remain our priority. However, we also perceive the huge potential of both The Witcher and Cyberpunk, and we want to expand their reach to include new areas, media and content types.” Cross-functional teams will work on projects for both IPs at the same time “which will allow different aspects of development to run in tandem without complication.”
“We have learned many things from our marketing and PR campaigns for Cyberpunk 2077 and see things that need to change in the future,” said CD Projekt Red executive Michał Nowakowski. “Going forward, future marketing campaigns will be much shorter, we’ll wait until much closer to a game’s launch before we start showing things like trailers, demos or going in-depth about mechanics, etc.”
When necessary, teasers and announcements will be made for future projects but nothing substantial. Cyberpunk 2077 had its first teaser trailer in 2013, nearly seven years to its launch in 2020 but that will change for future projects.
