CD Projekt RED is still feeling the effects of the disastrous launch of Cyberpunk 2077. Just before the game’s release, the company’s shares were worth around 400 zł ($85) per share on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. Since then, it has fallen to 93.81 zł ($19.92). So, while the global financial market has been hit hard, CD Projekt RED is an outlier with its precipitous drop in value.
CD Projekt RED is worth a quarter of its value ahead of Cyberpunk 2077 launch
According to Business Insider Poland, the value of CD Projekt RED has dropped 75% since the launch of Cyberpunk 2077.
That’s no big surprise since Cyberpunk 2077’s launch is vying for the most disastrous event in video game history. After creating a maddening hype, CD Projekt RED released a nearly unplayable game on the latest generation consoles. Even on platforms with decent performance, it was full of bugs and evidence of a rushed development process.
The PS4 version of Cyberpunk 2077 was so bad that Sony pulled it from the PlayStation Store for six months. Despite selling more than 18 million copies of the game, CD Projekt RED has lost the solid reputation it gained while developing The Witcher 3. This number is also lower than the 25-30 million sales analysts predicted for the game during its first year.
Financially, CD Projekt RED is now where it was after The Witcher 3 launched. So where does it go next? DLC for Cyberpunk 2077 is on the table, but the game still has its issues. For example, there is still no functioning police system. The studio has The Witcher 4 in pre-production, but with its reputation turned, it’s going to take something special to get players back on board.
In other news, God of War Ragnarok will feature all nine realms, and Sony continues its esports expansion with the acquisition of Repeat.gg.