Cyberpunk 2077 may be having a rough launch period fraught with controversy after controversy, but that hasn’t stopped the game from attaining strong financial success. Developer CD Projekt RED reported that Cyberpunk 2077 sales have reached more than 13 million as of December 20th, and that’s even accounting for refunds that have been reported back by digital storefronts and physical retailers. The only refunds that have yet to be included in this are ones requested directly through CDPR.
The announcement was made as part of an official release for investors, hence the very legal and corporate sounding wording of the below statement. The release was made to inform in case of “potential impact on investment-related decisions.”
This figure represents the estimated volume of retail sales across all hardware platforms (factoring in returns submitted by retail clients in brick-and-mortar as well as digital storefronts), i.e. the “sell-through” figure, less all refund requests e-mailed directly to the Company by the publication date of this report in the framework of the “Help Me Refund” campaign.
Shortly after its launch on December 10th, CDPR said that Cyberpunk 2077 had 8 million preorders before it even released, and had made enough money to already be profitable for the company. This means that, less refunds, Cyberpunk 2077 has sold 5 million additional copies since its launch. A breakdown of which platforms those sales were made on is not available.
Those sales numbers are in the face of a turbulent release, beginning with the obfuscation of the game’s performance on last-gen consoles. This led to a number of disappointed players who felt they’d been deceived by CD Projekt RED, and the company promised refunds in its apology to players, while also promising to fix the problems. Unfortunately, the developer didn’t have refund agreements in place with the platform store fronts, which led to players being denied refunds by Sony.
Eventually, Sony relented and started offering full refunds to players, but also pulled Cyberpunk 2077 from the PlayStation Store entirely and indefinitely. It’s not clear exactly why Sony removed the listing, but evidence points to a strained relationship between Sony and CD Projekt RED following the developer’s handling of the launch issues, as opposed to being removed for quality. After all, CDPR sent upset fans flooding to Sony’s support channels to demand refunds without consulting them first.
Xbox and multiple physical retailers eventually followed suit, offering full refunds for Cyberpunk 2077, though it hasn’t been pulled for sale entirely anywhere else.
Following multiple issues with the game—including a known problem where any save file over 8 MB will become corrupted, and numerous bugs and shortcut gameplay features—investors have been exploring class action lawsuits against CDPR. The above announcement of sales numbers, along with clear information that it includes refunds, is intended to ward off potential issues with disappointed investors, particularly after CDPR’s stock saw a massive drop that resulted in a loss of over $1 billion for its owners.
It’s unlikely we’ll ever know the exact number of refunds that were processed for the game, or how many people are disappointed but simply waiting for the proper next-gen version, which will be released free for both Xbox and PlayStation players. Still, 13 million copies sold is nothing to scoff at, showing the immense staying power CD Projekt RED and the hype for Cyberpunk 2077 has, regardless of broken trust.
Efforts are now being made to fix the various issues with the game, though our own Cyberpunk 2077 review noted a number of problems with the game’s core systems themselves, which failed to match the promise of this revolutionary game that Cyberpunk was marketed as. Are you one of the 13 million copies being reported by CDPR? Do you plan to get a refund, or wait until the game gets fixed? Perhaps you’re just enjoying the game as it is? Let us know in the comments below.
