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It’s been a banner week for video game delays. The Final Fantasy VII Remake, Marvel’s Avengers, and now the biggest of them all: CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077.

(It’s also the week that Sony announced it would be skipping another E3 – in the year it releases a new console – and that a seven-year-old Windows service broke Rockstar’s ability to sell Grand Theft Auto IV. It’s a funny old game.)

Cyberpunk 2077 was originally slated for April 16, 2020. That date was firmly marked on our calendars as one of the upcoming highlights of the video game year. (And it will be fun to revisit that article once all the delays are updated.)

It’s a game that’s been in development for a very long time. Until we saw our first real glimpse of Cyberpunk 2077 at E3 2018, with no real release timeframe attached, we were suspicious it might have slipped into the next console generation. Now it very nearly has.

In a statement on Twitter, CD Projekt Red revealed that Cyberpunk 2077 will now release on September 17, 2020. That’s only a couple of months before the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5, so don’t be surprised if Cyberpunk is a cross-platform game before too long.

“We are currently at a stage where the game is complete and playable, but there’s still work to be done. Night City is massive – full of stories, content and places to visit, but due to the sheer scale and complexity of it all, we need more time to finish playtesting, fixing and polishing. We want Cyberpunk 2077 to be our crowning achievement for this generation and postponing launch will give us the precious months we need to make the game perfect.” – Marcin Iwiński, co-founder, and Adam Badowski, head of studio, CD Projekt Red

There will always be people (read: empathy-impaired idiots) wailing on social media and forums about this. It’s inevitable. But for CD Projekt Red, delaying Cyberpunk 2077 by a few months is absolutely the right move.

It’s a studio that has a reputation for tough crunch conditions, for one thing. Taking the extra time – to not only ensure the game is finished to its own high standard, but to avoid killing its staff in the process – is a mature and considered decision.

And let’s be honest: we’d wait another four years for Cyberpunk 2077. Waiting another four months is no time at all. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.

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