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Analyst: Cyberpunk 2077 will sell 15 million copies, and potentially even more

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Cyberpunk 2077 was just delayed out of a very busy April game release period, and it will now launch just before the new Xbox Series X and PS5 hit shelves. It’s shaping up to be one of the biggest games of the year, and according to veteran analyst Michael Pachter, it could break 15 million copies sold.

Answering a question on his show Pachter Factor regarding the best-selling games of 2020, Pachter — who Digital Trends previously interviewed for a feature on GameStop — said that Cyberpunk 2077 will likely sell around 15 million units total. This number could be higher, potentially up to 18 million units, but this would likely put it behind this year’s Call of Duty and FIFA installments.

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“Can Cyberpunk topple FIFA or Call of Duty? Sure,” Pachter added. “If Cyberpunk gets a 97 [Metacritic] review score, it could sell 30 [million.]”

It will be interesting to see if the recent success of The Witcher on Netflix, and the resurgence in popularity for The Witcher III game, will translate into buzz for Cyberpunk 2077. It’s the first game CD Projekt Red has made outside of the Witcher universe, and was met with overwhelming acclaim upon its full reveal during E3 2019. Keanu Reeves’ surprise appearance certainly helped with that. Reeves will play a companion in the game, and was featured in its announcement trailer.

Pachter Factor Episode 174: 2020 Predictions

CD Projekt Red has also found itself in hot water recently, however, after CEO Adam Kiciński admitted that the development staff would have to “crunch” in order to release the game at its new date. This is despite claims CD Projekt Red previously saying that it had committed to avoiding crunch in 2019. The practice, which involves working upwards of 80 or even 100 hours in a week to complete a game’s development, has been heavily criticized in recent years, particularly after it was seemingly glorified by Rockstar Games in the lead-up to Red Dead Redemption II‘s launch.

Cyberpunk 2077 will launch on September 17 for Xbox One, PS4, PC, and Google Stadia. CD Projekt Red is not currently planning versions for the next-generation consoles. We anticipate that changing, although it may not happen by the time they launch.

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Gabe Gurwin
Gabe Gurwin
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…
Cyberpunk 2077 support bleeds into 2023 with story expansion
Holding a gun to an enemy in Cyberpunk 2077

During an investor relations call, CD Projekt Red revealed that its long-awaited story expansion for Cyberpunk 2077 will not be released this year. Instead, the expansion is set to release sometime in 2023.

https://twitter.com/CyberpunkGame/status/1514646107434987532?s=20&t=RlvdedDMZ8OHf66Mznx86Q

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The Witcher reveal repeats Cyberpunk 2077’s biggest mistake
A player points a gun at a cyborg in Cyberpunk 2077's reveal trailer.

On March 21, CD Projekt Red confirmed a new The Witcher game while revealing a new Unreal Engine 5 partnership with Epic Games. Shortly after that announcement, CD Projekt Red's Global PR Director Radek Grabowski had to clarify some crucial details about this new game and the Epic Games partnership in a tweet:
https://twitter.com/gamebowski/status/1506022957591797760
While this tweet clarifies the biggest misconceptions about CD Projekt Red's The Witcher announcement, it also highlights that the developer announced this game way too early and vaguely. CD Projekt Red is already losing control of some of the discourse around the game and risks repeating one of the biggest mistakes of Cyberpunk 2077's development and marketing: Overpromising.
Cyberpunk 2077's big mistake
CD Projekt Red announced Cyberpunk 2077 in May 2012 at a press conference. At the time, the developer promised features like a "gripping non-linear story filled with life and detail" and a variety of character classes, weapons, upgrades, implants, and more to choose from. It said the game would "set [a] new standard in the futuristic RPG genre with an exceptional gaming experience."
Cyberpunk 2077 would not release until December 2020, over eight years later. But in the meantime, CD Projekt Red continued to tease the title with trailers and interviews, highlighting the game's ambitious scope and vision. CD Projekt Red developers hyped up how the main story and sidequests intertwined, how the game would feature multiplayer, how cops would be very reactive, and more. Although the game looked and sounded very impressive prior to its release, many of these features and promises were either missing or half-baked in their implementation into Cyberpunk 2077.
Cyberpunk 2077 Teaser Trailer
For eight years, an RPG that was supposed to change the genre forever was promised, but in the end, all we got was a fairly standard open-world RPG with a bevy of technical problems at release. The massive backlash happened because people were so excited for Cyberpunk 2077, partly because CD Projekt Red hyped up all of these ambitious features over eight years.
The reality is that game development is an arduous journey that doesn't always go according to plan. Designs change, features are cut, and sometimes the finished product just doesn't come together. CD Projekt Red probably never meant to lie to its fans, but priorities and development timelines shifted and what the developer ultimately delivered with Cyberpunk 2077 wasn't up to snuff.
As CD Projekt Red made the mistake of announcing Cyberpunk 2077 too early and overpromising, I thought the studio would what to share more details on its next game until it was close to release. That was not the case. 
Initial Confirmation
CD Projekt Red was not willing to share a development time frame or release window as part of The Witcher announcement, so it's likely that this game is still several years away. Although the developer didn't reveal many details at this time, announcing the next The Witcher game so early gives s the Polish studio plenty of time to do so. For example, the game's director is already promising that there will be no crunch during the development of this game, something people may hold him accountable for as stories about the game's development emerge. CD Projekt Red must be cautious about what it shares about this new game before launch if it doesn't want another PR disaster, and it already seems to be getting a bit out of hand.  
Grabowski's tweet indicates that there are already some misconceptions about the game. That will likely exponentially worsen as CD Projekt Red continues to tease this title in job listings, interviews, and trailers. It's a dangerous approach, so why did the developer make this "initial confirmation" happen so early? There are several reasons why this could be the case. First off, most of this announcement was focused on CD Projekt Red's partnership with Epic Games and the use of Unreal Engine 5, and the developer wanted to confirm the first game that will be part of this partnership to make it more exciting for fans. 

Meanwhile, CD Projekt Red is still recovering from the backlash toward Cyberpunk 2077's rocky launch. Announcing a follow-up title to The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt now not only restores a little bit of goodwill with fans and investors but will also attract some Unreal Engine-experienced developers who might be nervous to come to CD Projekt Red following Cyberpunk 2077. 2022 has been a year of anticlimatic and purposefully vague game announcements. CD Projekt Red's The Witcher announcement is simply the latest one to be part of this trend, but it's also one of the most worrying because this developer has made this mistake before.  
While CD Projekt Red felt pressured to confirm this game early, they need to be very careful if they don't want to repeat the mistakes of Cyberpunk 2077. The best course of action for CD Projekt Red to take now is to stay completely silent until it has a clear idea of what the finished game will entail. If that isn't the case, this could all be building to disappointment in the year 2030. 

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V looking very angry in Cyberpunk 2077.

CD Projekt Group, the company behind Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher franchise developer CD Projekt Red, is taking a fierce stance against the invasion of Ukraine by halting sales of its products to Russia and Belarus.

https://twitter.com/CDPROJEKTRED/status/1499388321050599428

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