CD Projekt Red has made back the development and marketing costs for Cyberpunk 2077

Despite the various bugs and issues on launch, Cyberpunk 2077 has already managed to earn enough money to earn back its development and marketing costs for the entire game.

Cyberpunk 2077 reportedly had over 8 million pre-orders before its official launch day, with a slight majority getting the PC version. CD Projekt Red also announced that Cyberpunk 2077 managed to earn $50 million in two weeks from Steam alone.

Seeing Cyberpunk 2077 recoup it's development costs in literal days after release means that they absolutely could have hired a larger team, had developers work on healthier timelines, and treated their devs with dignity.But they didn't. pic.twitter.com/GRLXmKGEZa

— Amy the Amazonian (@coL_Amazonian) December 13, 2020

Despite criticism, Cyberpunk 2077 will likely be one of the best selling games

Following the release of Cyberpunk 2077, some interesting things have happened on the financial side of things. The wave of negativity following the release of Cyberpunk 2077 led to a significant drop in CD Projekt Red’s stock to the tune of 30%.

In an effort to quell nervous investors, CD Projekt Red released a memo informing stockholders and the general public that Cyberpunk 2077 had already earned enough revenue to cover the cost of development and marketing.

This means that every additional game sold, either now or months down the line after they have the chance to clean up the game, will contribute to the company’s overall earnings, and end up getting paid out to investors and workers.

But it’s not all good

Cyberpunk Success Allows CDPR To Recoup Dev Costs On Preorders Alone, Revamp Employee Bonuses https://t.co/PuytEDlQpQ @CyberpunkGame @CDPROJEKTRED

— HotHardware (@HotHardware) December 12, 2020

With a lot of media products, oftentimes a bad release can end up having a greater impact on following releases than on the bad product itself. It’s a well known phenomenon that leads to critically panned sequels to great games and movies ending up making significantly more than critically acclaimed first entries.

With CD Projekt Red, it’s likely that the good reviews for The Witcher 2 helped contribute to the monumental success of The Witcher 3, which in turn contributed to the hype and ultimate profitability of Cyberpunk 2077.

It will take years to see if the negativity surrounding the release of Cyberpunk 2077 will have a corresponding effect on whatever game CD Projekt Red releases next.