Top 10 Cyberpunk 2077 Controversies
Top 10 Cyberpunk 2077 Controversies
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Welcome to WatchMojo, and today, we’re taking a look at the Top 10 Cyberpunk 2077 Controversies. For this list, we’re going over the numerous controversies that have plagued “Cyberpunk 2077”, some coming after its launch while others occurred well before. Did any of these problems get your goat? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
#10: Transphobia
“Cyberpunk 2077” has been accused of depicting trans people in a negative light in a couple of different cases. For starters, the character creation may offer choices in genitalia and pronouns, but some players found it problematic how the voice options - “Masculine” and “Feminine” - end up generalizing gender choice. Other players took umbrage with the “Mix It Up” posters you see plastered throughout Night City, claiming it only fetishizes trans people. And then, there was the joking tweet made by the “Cyberpunk” Twitter account about assuming gender. Whether you agree or disagree with these viewpoints, it has certainly become a point of contention.
#9: A Buggy Launch
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This is arguably the more prolific problem in Cyberpunk’s history. It’s no secret that “Cyberpunk 2077” has come plagued with all kinds of bugs and glitches. There’s animation bugs in cutscenes, characters walking around while stuck in their T-poses, missions that can glitch out and lock players out of progressing… It’s a mess, and we even addressed that when naming it as our Game of the Year. While patches have made the game more stable for some players, there’s been so many glitches and bugs that we’ve managed to make an entire Top 10!
#8: Delays
It’s always a bummer when a game gets delayed, especially when you’ve waited for a game as long as we did for “Cyberpunk”. However, there comes a time when release dates need to stop being announced, and that was certainly the case here. First, we were told the game would arrive April 16, 2020. That would soon be pushed back to September 17, 2020, which would become November 19 before finally arriving on December 10, 2020. What was just as ridiculous as the multiple delays was how the last one occurred AFTER the game went gold! We suppose this could have been the first sign that the game wasn’t going to arrive in a decent state.
#7: AI Problems
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During our time with “Cyberpunk 2077”, we enjoyed driving through Night City and meeting some of the unique characters that inhabit it. As much as we can appreciate the amount of world-building on display, the game seems to have suffered in its AI, which can break the immersion. One can encounter NPCs walking back and forth in the same small area, and enemies may choose to just sit behind cover rather than put up a fight. Cops are restricted to spawning behind you and will not chase you when you’ve raised your Wanted level. As for driving AI, well...it’s great seeing cars driving right through barricades.
#6: Lying to Investors
Several people have felt that CD Projekt lied and cheated customers out of their hard-earned money, but we’ll get to those in a bit as this goes beyond the average consumer. Allegedly, some investors may be looking into suing CD Projekt, and it’s possible they may have the grounds to do so. In late November 2020 - mere days before launch, CD Projekt CEO Adam Kiciński said during an investor’s call that “Cyberpunk 2077” ran “surprisingly good” on base PS4 and Xbox One consoles. As many would point out, this could not be further from the truth.
#5: Delisting
As the first week of “Cyberpunk 2077’s” launch progressed, it seemed as though nothing could make things worse for CD Projekt. Sadly, we were mistaken. On December 18, 2020, Sony suddenly pulled the game from the PlayStation Store and began offering refunds to its playerbase. Many games have been delisted before, but it isn’t everyday that a major AAA title turns out so muddled by technical problems that it gets delisted. This was supposedly a decision made by Sony AND CD Projekt, but liked tweets from one studio executive tells us one party wasn’t too thrilled about it. Xbox, on the other hand, has not delisted the game, but is still offering refunds to its playerbase.
#4: Possible False Advertising
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Remember those people we mentioned earlier, the ones who feel they’ve been cheated by “Cyberpunk 2077”? Well, this isn’t just about missing or scaled down features, but rather how CD Projekt went about marketing the game. Many have accused the publisher of false advertising due to how no footage of base PS4 and Xbox One performance was shown. Just about everything shown in trailers, showcases, and commercials was done on a high-end computer, which not a lot of people have access to. Given the state of the game at launch, we can see why someone would try to hide those versions. Now, CD Projekt is under the watchful eye of Poland’s Office of Competition and Consumer Protection.
#3: Review Embargos
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Some reviewers were given a code for the PlayStation 4 version the day before launch, with an embargo that had already passed by that time. Turns out there may have been a reason as to why these outlets got their codes so late. Review codes for the PC version were given out days prior to release, and while that version of the game received exceptional reviews, CD Projekt had placed a tight restriction on video reviews - no one could show any footage of the game that had not been approved already by CD Projekt. Not exactly a “customer-friendly” move.
#2: Epileptic Seizures
As developers continue pushing the limits of graphics and technology, the more we need to be aware of how these flashy games can affect those with health problems. CD Projekt came under fire for supposedly neglecting players who suffer from epilepsy. When starting a braindance, players would experience intense flashing lights, which triggered a seizure in one staff member from Game Informer. While CD Projekt did include a seizure warning in its End User License Agreement, who really takes the time to read those? Thankfully, CD Projekt has put a much more explicit warning that shows during Cyberpunk’s bootup sequence.
#1: Mandatory Crunch
Over the past few years, CD Projekt has been celebrated as one of the few AAA studios to avoid mandatory crunch, with one of its co-owners claiming the company has a “non-obligatory crunch policy”. However, in September 2020, it was revealed that the developer would be requiring it’s staff to work mandatory crunch for the next six weeks in order to get the game finished in time. The results of the final product only prove that crunch does not help a game’s development - it only hurts it, and it’s very obvious that a lengthy delay would have helped the game big time.
