Cyberpunk 2077: Did CD Projekt force RED to crunchtime? Serious allegations

Cyberpunk 2077 has been postponed several times. Now the developer CD Projekt RED is said to have forced the employees to crunchtime. A journalist wants information.

Update from October 16, 2020 : Jason Schreier continues to stir up the fire around the crunchtime allegations against CD Projekt RED in the development of Cyberpunk 2077 . On Twitter, the Bloomberg journalist shared a Reddit comment allegedly written by a developer at the Warsaw studio. In it he describes other circumstances that should have prevailed at CDPR over the past two years. The descriptions should be authentic, Schreier phoned the author of the comment. According to these descriptions, crunch culture is a very real thing at CDPR.

In the comment on Reddit, the developer criticizes the well-known crunch, above all the way the management team works and their lack of communication with the developers . In his words, some departments have been in crunch since mid-2019 , while others have been working overtime continuously since 2018 . He accuses the management of being stuck in pre-production for far too long, which is why the development crunchtime occurred. In addition, the developers had not been informed that Cyberpunk 2077 would move twice, nor that the game Would have achieved gold status.

In fact, the developers only found out about these events when they were made public via the Cyberpunk 2077 Twitter account . Jason Schreier quotes the developer on Twitter : ” I had a lot of fun with my work there until they decided that a death march was the only way to a finished game “. With the death march, the anonymous developer means the two previous development years in which the employees were forced to work overtime.

Among the tweets of Jason Schreier , opinions split. He has received great support from some for his investigation into the crunch culture and appreciation for giving a voice to the employees who suffer from it. Others are indifferent to the topic. Many claim that CD Projekt RED is not the only company that does this and that hard work leads to higher quality compared to the competition.

Cyberpunk 2077: employees forced to crunchtime? Developers under fire

Warsaw, Poland – CD Projekt RED has probably the hottest iron of the year in the fire with their sci-fi RPG Cyberpunk 2077 . In the past, the game for PS4 and Xbox One as well as next-gen consoles PS5 and Xbox Series X had to be postponed twice. For the release on November 19, the game actually seemed to be on course, but different reports accuse developers CD Projekt RED , contrary to previous statements, of crunchtime culture in the company.

Cyberpunk 2077: Is the crunch getting the better of the developer from Warsaw?

Cyberpunk 2077 should actually be released in September and before that in April. Developer CD Projekt RED postponed the game twice under the promise to protect its employees from the dreaded crunchtimes of the industry. Crunch Time has become for the final phase of development of a video game a winged phrase, in which massive overtime everyday life of developers and developers belongs to that particular game in time for the release to be able to finish.

Recently, however, the developer from Warsaw broke the promise made and from then on let employees work on Cyberpunk 2077 for a six-day week . According to a report by the American colleagues at Game Informer , however, this is a self-imposed fate. Employees were reportedly informed of the latest progress of the game and were supposed to decide whether the game should be postponed again – despite promises Cyberpunk 2077 not to move further – or if you crunch for release in Novemberwant to accept. A nice story, which, according to gaming journalist Jason Schreier , never happened.

Cyberpunk 2077: Crunchtime was never in question – employees had to obey

If you believe Jason Schreier , the Game Informer report is anything but true. As proof, the Bloomber editor published an email from CD Projekt RED boss Adam Badowski to his staff. In it he apologizes to the relatives of the employees that they can no longer be active on the “home front” due to the countless additional hours of work . The finish line is in sight, however, and now it is only necessary to hold out once more.

Jason Schreier also tells on Twitter that he asked various developers from CD Projekt RED about the shifts and the crunch . But none of them confirmed that they had ever had a choice. The additional working day until the release of Cyberpunk 2077 was simply decided and as a normal employee you had to obey: “We got the mail and then a meeting with our team leaders. There was never any other option, it was out of the question. “

Schreier exhibited further that the benefit of crunch time a development studio would make far from being evil or an enemy, but he never had so many employees of companies who do not want to acknowledge or twist the truth would have seen.

Cyberpunk 2077 is on November 19, 2020 for PC, PS4 and Xbox One and later for PS5 and Xbox Series X appear.