[nicolaslem]

I don't think it's fair to call Cyberpunk 2077 a colossal flop. It had an awful release, but the company stood behind it and fixed everything that needed fixing. Five years later it is now an acclaimed game that sold 35 million copies.

[paxys]

Yup, Cyberpunk 2077 has sold more copies in the same time frame than Witcher 3, which is routinely highlighted as one of the best and most successful games of all time.

You have to give kudos to CD PROJEKT for not just abandoning the game after a bad launch (which is what every other major studio would have done in its place) but patiently fixing problems and constantly adding content over 5 years to get to the state it is in today. And the game has no online requirement, no multiplayer, no microtransactions. Just one paid expansion which added a ton of new content. Rare to see this behavior in the industry today.

[mashlol]

> which is what every other major studio would have done in its place

Afaik CDPR doesn't make many games. If one flops, that might be the end of them. I don't see abandoning a game as a valid option for them from a financial perspective. Makes much more sense to fix the issues and sell more.

[Aeolun]

I think it’s more related to their reputation? People will buy the next one if they trust CDPR will fix anything wrong with it even if it flops.

Kinda how you trust paradox strategy titles to get several years of updates and expansions.

[SXX]

Studious dont abandon failed releases because they are evil. Its just releases fail because they run out of money so there just nothing to burn to save them.

CDPR just was lucky enough to make enough money of failed release to fix it. Most companies get no chance to do it.

[kryptiskt]

EA is notorious for throwing games out there and abandoning them as soon as they don't turn out to be massive hits. That is a company that has plenty of resources to support the games and fix the bugs.

[SXX]

Not gonna protect EA the company here, but lots and lots of other games also flop on release because money.

[mikepurvis]

Definite kudos to them for that, though notably it's down to 65% off now, so presumably many of those copies were for not-full-retail price.

And the Switch 2 port likely cost considerable engineering effort and underperformed as well.

[jama211]

The fact that sales exist is a thing for every game just about

[mikepurvis]

Sure, but when you speak of Arc Raiders selling 7M copies by late November, basically all of those were at $70-80 because the game just came out.

Maybe I'm not contributing meaningfully to the dialogue, but talking about total sales across a 5 year lifespan means you're necessarily including all those packrat users who picked it up on deep discount and haven't even booted it up once (or, like me, played two hours and in that initial window wasn't especially grabbed by the story, characters, or progression systems that the game was wanting me to engage with). It's different when something really pops off on release and sells all those copies in the first few months.

[jama211]

Sure, might make some difference. Probably not that helpful given we’re just doing back of the napkin stuff anyway