That Badowski response is what we here in Russia are calling Slav Damage Control.
Textbook example, really. I couldn't even begin to unpack this answer.
Textbook example, really. I couldn't even begin to unpack this answer.
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[Jason Schreier] Inside Cyberpunk 2077's Disastrous Rollout (Update: Head of CDPR Responds)
- Thread starter IDontBeatGames
- Start date
Wow it's crazy how they can't just say "Yeah we fucked it up big time, we're sorry" and instead double, triple, quadrupling down on "The game is actually near perfect and we didn't see any issues, sorry that you do?". And hell I even really enjoyed the game on PC, but the technical and design issues are all RIGHT THERE.
The only thing I'll "agree" with is that the what we saw in the demo is pretty much exactly what we got in the game. The problem is a lot of features were cut that were promised. But, the final game does "look" better than the actual product. Everything else is some weird spin.
So, the actual quest plays out 100% like the demo but features like:
Third-Person cutscenes.
Mantis Blade wall climbing.
More involved hacking.
Crowd density.
NPCs with day/night cycles (to be fair, demo doesn't expressly say this but everyone inferred that's what the voice over meant).
Non-scripted ambushes.
Dynamic V Apartment.
Dynamic UI for shopkeepers.
Disposable Buffs, such as slo-down ability.
Are all missing. Like, how can you dispute developers saying the game wasn't ready for 2020 when the game STILL isn't ready. You admit the console versions, at the very least, are not functional. Yet, you're also disputing that the game was ready for a 2020 release? Which is it?
Since they're answering on Twitter now, Jason should post the whole list of questions that he sent them.
Sad thing is, that fans validated their actions. I have seen a lot of " the game is mostly fine, it just crashed about 50 times" and explains all the bugs, crashes and glitches, "but the game is good apart from all said problems".
you dont have to talk to a majority of people at a workplace of hundreds in order to report on a workplace culture. ubisoft has hundreds of employees across the globe so did gamasutra have to talk to a majority of those people before it could publish a report on workplace harassment at ubisoft last summer? nope, just had to make sure they corroborated what their sources told them with other sources and ask ubisoft for comment. same with literally any other news article about workplace conditions.
what a dumb, disingenuous argument
Is it really hard for them to come out and accept all the issues, try to fix them (and not just game issues, like crunch and actually properly paying their staff etc.) ?
I mean this way they're losing out on not just customer loyalty but also their own money. Pay your staff properly, don't crunch them to death, don't make false promises and you'll save yourself more money in the longterm and also a better image.
It's so absurd to me how they've still not learned a damn thing.
I mean this way they're losing out on not just customer loyalty but also their own money. Pay your staff properly, don't crunch them to death, don't make false promises and you'll save yourself more money in the longterm and also a better image.
It's so absurd to me how they've still not learned a damn thing.
The language stuff is normal, I am not sure why anyone is trying to make anything out of that. Of course there would be people using whatever language feels more natural and more comfortable. It's all about how you react when someone wants to be included. :) A lot of people here speak Swedish, for example, but when someone that doesn't understand the language wants to get involved in the conversation, then nobody has problems switching to English.
I've yet to see anyone try to be exclusive of others intentionally. I don't think people are that malicious.
I've yet to see anyone try to be exclusive of others intentionally. I don't think people are that malicious.
Classic spin job. Don't respond to questions while the article is being worked on, and then comment after the fact without touching on the most pressing points in the story.
Wow...that response is just not a good one, better to stay silent. Love how he brought up 10/10 reviews as if it meant anything to the people whom disappointed with the game.
That response is baffling. The language defense is valid since switching between languages is fairly common in a multilingual workplace, though doesn't help if people legitimately felt excluded in some cases, but the rest of that defense is just bad. This should be the point they go "Yeah, we fucked up", not try to cover up legitimate issues their employees had.
Some of Adam's points are legit but the way he framed the whole response is quite poor. Especially using game scores as an example on how it wasn't a bad launch is just hilarious.
I think their hands were completely tied when it came to the police system. I don't think anyone involved knew that the police would spawn in next to the player regardless of context and thought, "This is realistic enough."
It's just one of many planned features that they never had time, budget, or manpower to implement properly and it shows.
Just finished it this week and it was super average. I'd give it a 6 or 7 at best. Really regret paying full price for it but oh well.
Was kind of expecting a longer article and much deeper dive, this didn't seem to be super revelatory but it's good to put a spotlight on it for sure
While his response is really not great, he has 2 points:
vertical gameplay slices for demos are never 100% fake , nor are they 100% real.
They are usually a branche from the base, polished to perfection and scripting in everything they want to show that is still not in.
Is it wastefull? 100%. this team could have worked on implementations of features in the real game.
Is it a AAA bug to "have" this kind of showings? kindad, just look what hype this brought them, and other (hated but successfull) companies, like bioware, EA, ubsioft are doing it to.
Does not make it good, but is a general industry problem.
And about some speaking polish sometimes: being multicultural is hard, and its a whole different beast in central europe compared to america. It brings a huge advantage with different cultural background, a wider view on the world, etc...but it bears some complications with it. Those are totaly worth it, but judging how good it was handeled by some of those points jason made seems unreasonable.
(I've known enough people that had a problem with people speaking another language, since they where insecure and others could use it to talk about them without them udnerstanding, even if it was just a private talk between colegues that had nothing to do with work and was on their break or something)
Again, im not defending him, still not a great response, and to many things stacked against him.
vertical gameplay slices for demos are never 100% fake , nor are they 100% real.
They are usually a branche from the base, polished to perfection and scripting in everything they want to show that is still not in.
Is it wastefull? 100%. this team could have worked on implementations of features in the real game.
Is it a AAA bug to "have" this kind of showings? kindad, just look what hype this brought them, and other (hated but successfull) companies, like bioware, EA, ubsioft are doing it to.
Does not make it good, but is a general industry problem.
And about some speaking polish sometimes: being multicultural is hard, and its a whole different beast in central europe compared to america. It brings a huge advantage with different cultural background, a wider view on the world, etc...but it bears some complications with it. Those are totaly worth it, but judging how good it was handeled by some of those points jason made seems unreasonable.
(I've known enough people that had a problem with people speaking another language, since they where insecure and others could use it to talk about them without them udnerstanding, even if it was just a private talk between colegues that had nothing to do with work and was on their break or something)
Again, im not defending him, still not a great response, and to many things stacked against him.
This all makes me appreciate that Larian showed off a completely completely unfinished build of Baldur's Gate 3 that didn't even have a working save system, had to restart the entire demo because of the broken save system, and still knocked it out of the park.
I do believe most people will generally accept an unpolished look at a game as long as you're open about it being unpolished. Certainly its better than showing fakery.
I think one of the big problems is announcing games years and years out and then having to force *some* kind of demo or gameplay presentation out the door to keep people interested. It's better to announce the games a year and a half or so before release when the marketing cycle can start.
I do believe most people will generally accept an unpolished look at a game as long as you're open about it being unpolished. Certainly its better than showing fakery.
I think one of the big problems is announcing games years and years out and then having to force *some* kind of demo or gameplay presentation out the door to keep people interested. It's better to announce the games a year and a half or so before release when the marketing cycle can start.
Yeah I agree with this. I think it's the only point he made that was a reasonable defense, though.
The part where he cites the 9/10 reviews is sooooo comically defensive and pathetic.
Everything in there is relevant except for that language thing. That's a typical English-centric comment to make. I've been asked "Why would Quebecers speak French lol" multiple times in my life, always by English speakers, often Americans. Elsewhere in the world, people don't *have* to learn English to live their lives.
It's typical for Slav Damage Control tho.
'We make good things as stated by some outlets so we know better than you' kinda stuff.
Considering the company never attempted to do anything about the game's transphobia it's not a shock that they also spin heavily on this stuff too.
The company is clearly on the same page to keep touting the PC reviews, and always trying to dismiss the console versions. It's so silly that they keep calling it the OLD GEN versions, the game got delayed multiple times to just B A R E L Y release after the new consoles released, the entire development time was done when those were the current gen.
Seems like they're unified to spin the situation more than they were to develop the actual game.
Seems like they're unified to spin the situation more than they were to develop the actual game.
About the transphobia, did you know it's a 9/10 and 10/10 game in some popular websites?
/sarcasm
And they only got those scores because of being incredibly deceiving too with bonuses tied to the overall scores, them changing this policy speaks a lot as to their actions and how they know their game was perceived by the end. He picks only select few arguments, doesn't even get into the worst of the critiques, the forced crunch, the low pay, the general mismanagement talks, etc.
It's more of a selective choices of which arguments to talk about to try make a "point". A lot of people are focused on the "fake demo", but you've already mentioned this yourself that it's more of how wasteful the whole demo was. The article is about mismanagement, waste of resources and time, and the fake demo was another major example of focusing too much of their outward appearance than actual development of the game, that's what the points are meant for and that point is more diverting of the problem being address. Example he talks about It's hard for a tradeshow game to not be a test of vision, but why are they doing this in the first place because clearly internally, a lot of skepticisms into the value of wasting months making such a demo when what it sounds like everything is on fire. That's not even getting into the core problem of the demo itself which also a lot of problems with what he says, Like he says " demo is a work in progress" sure, and things changed but then by that point, if the changes are happening and features are getting cut, then why isn't the marketing reflecting this. Why are people finding this out at launch. "The ambush was in the game", yeah at one scripted sequence that's never to be seen again like the video mentioned dynamically. That employee response is terrible too, 20 is a good size sample and given the current state of the games, it clearly was not meant for 2020 and clear it was 2022.
I'm not sure exactly what the language part was meant to address but my guess in the the article, it explains that the studio expanded to hard and fast " CD Projekt wasn't accustomed to such a size, people who worked on the game said their teams often felt siloed and unorganized" and this part was an extension of not letting people knowing what people were getting into when being hired, employee's who are more comfortable in their own language, difficulty of communications that made things even worse.
Even after this talk, it makes it seem like the roadmap is even more unrealistic as if that 2022 date was bad enough, their refusal to acknowledge problems with the base game itself and nowhere near addressing the worst, basically selective point making to make it seem he may have a point.
Someone throw him a shovel I'm sure he can dig even faster.
Jason was the first journalist to break the news about CDPR's shit working practices. Let him have his pound of flesh.
Doing a stellar job at fixing all that reputational damage I see lmao
Yeah this was not a good response Adam is also suggesting we are all blind idiots in that response, by claiming the final product looked better than the 2018 demo which clearly is not true.
He sounds like all those restaurant owners on Kitchen Nightmares who are in complete denial... "Eh, microwave-defrosted calamari? It ain't so bad! I don't see the problem with it! Customers say they love it!"
Jeeeesus. What I particularly dislike about the response is that he snippets Jason's article and responds with things Jason himself mentions in the article.
I am now imagining Gordon Ramsey just busting through the doors of CDPR :P
Hello slav damage control meet pissed of worldwide audidence and American corporate attorneys out for blood.
Yeah, not much against it. Only: from a company perspective hype and marketing are things to think about. The main point is not making a great game, but making a successfull game. I dont like it, but thats our system, the more money is invested, the more people are behind it that are only interested in the success. Do we have a sign that those demoes are really a net negative (in the marketing effectiveness sense) after the cost they have on the development?
With all that said: yeah, attacking big companies for that is pro consumer and i'll be for that. Its just that from his perspective the demo probaby is something he needs to do to satisfy the investors and have something to market.
Again, youre right, from a consumer perspective. He can't admit to all (investors, legal ramifications, etc), and within the market frame they are operating it they are just trying to adhere to competition. Mentioning that things got cut, and deflating the hype is legaly (till now) not mandatory, people are either forgetting stuff or are not aware of the situation with the next game they release (usually, CP kinda fell to hard to far for the usual course). He cant argue from the consumer perspective, since then he opens hinself up to attack from investors.
Its the gaming market (and capitalism generally): not enough regulated, all legal, and it seems that in most cases its better from a financial standpoint.
Is it moral? not even a bit. but its a systemic problem.
100%. Laughable excuse, i dont even know what he could have said about that that would not seem morally reprehensible, should have kept his mouth shut.
From someone that worked in different sectors and differently sized organisations, and some with mixed nationalities:
thats the way it is. It can be better or worse, but you will always have those kind of problems, the more diverse you are.
I still think the benefits outweigh the dissadvantages, but there are no magic leadership and management techniques to put all people on the same level of understanding, knowledge of cultural differences, etc, and to gage if its more or less then what is acceptable, for that we dont have enough information.
It is also possible that it was just badly managed, no doubt. I was mentioning it, since a lot of the userbase is US based, and from their perspective his argument probably seems more outlandish than from an central european perspective.
Yeah. He absolutely did not mention those because there just is no way to talk yourself out of that. It was bad, unrealistic, and it was greed and sitting on a high hourse (we made W3), an example where the Success has turned his head.
If i would run a company and he would apply for a position, this would be a red flag that he can't decouple his personal ego from his profession responsibilities. (also the mentioning of the 9s and 10s)
Adam's responses are embarrassing. Selectively choosing a few points and not addressing other key issues brought to attention is just bad.
So much bullshit and lies, the final games is better than the demo? look at the 9s and 10s WTF
Using "reviews gave us 9s and 10s" as a way to excuse the state the game was in during launch is certainly something.
This gets mentioned over and over, even though we knew for more than a year that they will not be in the game (except at the end):
And after playing the game I think that it was a good decision to have the whole game be in 1st person.
The game would not be as immersive if the cutscenes were in 3rd person.
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