After Cyberpunk 2077 it debuted to the world and set off a trash fire of anger and disappointment, the clock starting to tick. Many wondered when this anger would manifest itself in a lawsuit for take the game’s publisher, CD Projekt Red, to court. It happened on Christmas Eve.
On thursday, the law firm Rosen filed a class lawsuit at the california central district court on behalf of investor Andrew Trampe and others who bought CDPR bonds—For example, stock—between 16 January and 17 December this year. The company, Joint CEO Adam Kicinski, CFO Piotr Nielubowicz, and Vice President of Business Development Michał Nowakowski are all accused. The firm claims that the company deliberately omitted information and lied about the game’s development or acted with “reckless carelessness for the truth”, which consequently inflated the market price of these bonds.
All that kind of falsehood came to the fore when the game was finally released on December 10. In the days that followed, players began to realize that the game they had waited for years was basically impossible to play, and the company’s stock plummeted. This week, CDPR shares have fallen 42% since closing on December 4, according to Barron’s.
The course of this disaster ended up hurting CDPR investors, argues the Rosen Law Firm.
“The Claimant and the other members of the Class knew that the market price […] were artificially and falsely augmented by misleading statements by the Company and Individual Defendants […], they would not have purchased the Company’s securities at the artificially inflated prices they bought, or in any way, “wrote the company in its filing.
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The process includes a long list of statements about the game’s development and release of the company, which knowing what we know now, looks very bad. According to the lawsuit, the lies started on January 16, when CDPR issued a statement announcing that Cyberpunk 2077 it was “complete and playable”. However, the release date would be changed from April 17 to September 7 because the company “needed more time to finish testing, fixing and polishing”.
This was the first of many delays announced by the company. On September 4, the suit cited a conference call in which Kicinski said the company was preparing for final certification and was “very close”. On that call, Kicinski said the company planned to launch the game on November 19 – another delay.
“[T]The current version, which will be released in November, will be playable from the beginning, when the next generation consoles are released, ”said Kicinski, according to the suit. “[Y]you’ll be able to play the current generation’s version in the next generation from day 1. ”
Again, he was wrong.
In retrospect, the craziest statements are probably came on a call on November 25th. According to suit, wom two weeks before the game’s launch, Kicinski said the company believes that “the game performs very well on all platforms”. When asked about bugs, Kicinski acknowledged that they existed, but they were minimal enough not to be noticed by players.
As we all know, Kicinski would end up wrong again – a point that was emphasized in a conference call the following days Cyberpunk 2077The launch of Kicinski, where Kicinski said that the console versions of the current generation of the game were far below the company’s expectations.
“After 3 delays, we, as the Board of Directors, were very focused on launching the game. We underestimate the scale and complexity of the issues, ”said Kicinski, according to The suit. “It was a wrong approach and against our business philosophy.”
TClass action, which the lawsuit claims could have hundreds or thousands of affected parties, has not yet been certified, said the Rosen Law Firm in a Press release. The firm is asking the court to approve the class action and is asking people interested in contacting it.
Gizmodo contacted CDPR and the law firm Rosen for a comment on the case. We will make sure to update this post if we receive a response.
Since its launch, Cyberpunk 2077 and CDPR are falling out of favor. Sony pulled the game from your online store and is offering a full refund to anyone who purchased it through your store. Microsoft is offering refunds on its own. To your credit, CDPR apologized and also left and said it will restitution unhappy players. Ironically, CDPR is back to old habits, promising quick solutions and improvements for its broken product on a specific date.
“[W]we will fix bugs and crashes and improve the overall experience, ”said the company in a Twitter statement on December 14. “The first round of updates has just been released and the next will come in the next 7 days. Expect more, as we will updatefrequently whenever new improvements are ready. After the holidays, we will continue to work – we will release two major patches starting with Patch # 1 in January. This will be followed by Patch # 2 in February. “
Since that statement, the company has launching fixes. However, there is still time remaining before the supposed release of Patch # 1 and Patch # 2. We’ll see if the company keeps its word this time.