They were bleeding talent long before the CP 2077 release. I have never seen anything to indicate that the chief executives are capable of learning from their often-repeated mistakes. So I think they're perfectly happy to be going down this road. I agree with you that it doesn't bode well for the companies long-term prospects, but corporate CE's in general are obsessed with short-term profitability -- get in, do whatever's necessary to maximize short-term profits, secure their golden parachutes, and then get out before sh*t hits the fan.

The globalized economy is a casino economy. Anyone who thinks these folks are truly interested in sustainability is the sort of person that buys software on release expecting that it will reflect the marketing hype.

Was there much left among the original userbase to begin with, though?

Add to that, they likely lost some more when they released the Piggyback DLC(which is more or less always on DRMd) recently for 2077.

It'll be great in 45 decades or so!

Oh wait I'll be DEAD!

At least it's not Hitman GOTY

The nicest thing I can say about Hitman GOTY is that it isn't CP2077. Win/win.

Nah, the nicest thing to say about hitman goty is that I didn’t preorder it only to find out that only galaxy users get to pre load it. Still has lovely online gated content.

Trying to think of something nice to say...

It's not in my library O.o

Perfect! ;p

Which reminds me, one of these days I'm going to buy Goat Simulator.

I think you mean at least Cyberpunk 2077's DRM is weaker than Hitman GOTY. ;)

Hitman: GOTY's pretty awesome as a game, if you ask me - but it's progression-system, unlocks, and other stuff locked behind online-only server-side crap is absolute garbage.

And I really don't like that Back 4 Blood is taking this all to the next level w/ always-online for solo mode; and playing in solo mode (even while forced-online!) doesn't net you any Achievements, Stats, and/or Progression.

A fair point, I think. The AAA landscape is a barren wasteland for the most part. So much so that I'm very thankful for companies like Supergiant, that make excellent single-player games. Baldur's Gate 3 is shaping up to be an excellent game, too, if you put the name aside and judge it solely as a new RPG. Looking forward to it's completion, and hoping that the world hasn't completely gone to shit before it releases. ;p

Yeah, that's what I meant(for the main 2077 game, that is, not including the piggyback DLC)

Agreed

I finished the game and I can finally say something nice about the game. First of all I noticed that ending cutscenes are made in 3rd person perspective view and they are awesome, they look good and in my opinion the ending is the best part of the whole game, very emotional. And the Arasaka ending is the best ending ever, it's extremely sad and dark, I don't like to be in a bad mood all the time, but I respect if a game or a movie can force me to feel such strong emotions and even scare me at times.
The decision to switch from 3rd person view to full-on first person view was incredibly bad one. The ending part is so different you might even think that it was done from the beginning with core staff designers. I heard and read that many major members left the team due to difference of opinion. The whole game is like a big Deus Ex game in open world like area with clumsy (awful) driving mechanics, but the ending (I witnessed only 4 out of 5) is really worth it.

Another thing I liked was the romance quest (Judy). The bad part is that after you complete it there is nothing else to it, extremely lazy decision in my opinion. But still the romance part was one of the best if not the best if compared to other games, mostly developed by Bioware. Come to think of it there is almost no romance in *immersive RPG* games.

It's based off a tabletop game. Maybe it has Panam the best girl.