Cyberpunk 2077 is on the up and up, breaking records it hasn't come close to touching since its launch night. As many are likely familiar, Cyberpunk 2077 was billed as the "next big thing" in gaming and many believed it would define the PS5/Xbox Series X era of RPGs. It fell from grace, and it fell hard. No game deserves to be deemed a failure, and Cyberpunk 2077 has been able to pull off something that Anthem and other games have not. Cyberpunk 2077's Phantom Liberty DLC is its chance to push that envelope even further, as it has generated a ton of hype.

That should be applauded, but December 2020 and everything that followed should not be forgotten. The game was pulled from the PlayStation Store for a reason, and it's no secret that the release date was a surprise to devs. Executives boldface lied to consumers, and overall, it was a very bad look that hurt CDPR. While some enjoyed it at launch, it was heavily criticized and a lot of those criticisms still stand—even if it is a much better game. However, in all of this, there is one thing that happened with Cyberpunk 2077's initial release that cannot be repeated with Phantom Liberty, lest CDPR risk another debacle on its hands.

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Cyberpunk 2077's Hype Train Went Off the Rails

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Cyberpunk 2077 released in full organ failure—there wasn't one issue that made it a bad release, but a plethora of them. What makes each of these system failures worse is that CDPR had time to fess up, but because the video game industry is a business (and sometimes worse for it) and for whatever other reasons it told itself, CDPR never admitted how bad Cyberpunk 2077 was. There are a lot of self-justifications here, but the bottom line is simple: it was delayed not once, not twice, but three times.

CDPR should have never announced a release date, plain and simple, because it clearly wasn't ready. Once it did, the trap was sprung. It was delayed from April to September, from September to October, and from October to December. There were even reports on crunch for Cyberpunk 2077 that should have forced the issue, but day in and day out, it was all a hype-building lie. While it would have been a major hit, delaying it from April or even September to late 2021 or early 2022 would have been its best move. A lot of the current growing pains wouldn't be hitting as they are now.

It's worth noting that, with how secretive the industry is, there's potentially an untold number of outside factors here. That shouldn't be ignored, but it can't exactly be factored in either. Cyberpunk 2077 was delayed so often that the yellow associated with the brand became associated with delays, and yet Cyberpunk 2077 did not delay enough, at the end of the day. It had time to communicate its failings and adjust; instead, the delays built anticipation as fans expected the game to be going through various degrees of polish, not...whatever led to its release.

CDPR should not announce a release date for Cyberpunk 2077's Phantom Liberty until it knows for sure that it's ready. Underpinning everything wrong with the game's launch was a plethora of lies, and it's great that Cyberpunk 2077 and CDPR devs have got to come back from the executive failings. It cannot go back to that hole. That's not to say Phantom Liberty has to be perfect, no game is, but it can't be day one Cyberpunk 2077 all over again.

Cyberpunk 2077's Phantom Liberty DLC releases in 2023.

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