The PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X updates of CD Projekt
RED’s two open-world games, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and Cyberpunk 2077, have
been delayed until 2022, the company announced on Wednesday.
The delay was announced without much fanfare in a brief
statement from the developer’s parent company, CD Projekt. The statement simply
said that CD Projekt has decided to “allocate addition time to both projects,”
based on updates it has received from the development team.
While The Witcher 3 has been one of the most acclaimed games
of the last decade, Cyberpunk 2077’s upgrade is a little more complicated.
Between its technical glitches and the perception that it didn’t live up to
expectations, Cyberpunk was met with disappointment from many players. Since
its initial release in 2020, Cyberpunk 2077 has received many patches and
improvements that are likely to be part of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X
versions as well.
CD Projekt says that, based on its new timeline, Cyberpunk
2077 should get its current-gen upgrade in the first quarter of 2022, while The
Witcher 3: Wild Hunt’s upgrade should come in the second quarter of 2022.
Personally, I’ve been holding off on finishing Cyberpunk
2077 (I’m about 20 hours in) until the next-gen versions come out. Cyberpunk
is, by all accounts, a massively long game. Given its scope and the ephemeral,
fleeting nature of time, I’ll probably play through it just once. Why spend
time on the lesser version when one with all the bells and whistles is on the
horizon? In any case, I and anyone else in my position will have to wait a bit
longer. When the updated version eventually comes out, will it still feel like
a brand-new game, worthy of a next-gen denomination? Or will it play like a
three-year-old game, a visually stunning if still dusty time capsule from a
prior era of an industry that moves rapidly enough for three years to feel like
a minor eternity?
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