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CDPR sold over 6 million copies of The Witcher 3 in 6 weeks [$82 million budget]

Z

ZombieSupaStar

Member
Kind of wished I forced myself through witcher 1 and 2 now that 3 seems to be done so well. I think I stopped right after act 3 started in one.
 
B

Bisnic

Really Really Exciting Member!
BouncyFrag said:
How is ng+?
Click to expand...

It's good so far, no need to hunt for materials anymore since that carries over and i already had dozens of each of them from my previous play, so I don't waste as much time as before to loot every houses I see.

You have to rebuy, loot and craft again every gear formulas though since their lvl changed, which means your original mastercrafted Witcher set will get outdated sooner or later(i still wear mine at lvl 39 though). At least, you keep your past potions and their recipes!
 
B

boskee

Member
An "open letter"

An Open Letter from Head of CD PROJEKT RED
Hey Gamers!
Time does fly! These few months since launch passed faster than you can say potestaquisitor. We’ve been hard at work delivering you new content, fixing what needed to be fixed, and secretly plotting how to rock this boat we call the RPG genre even more. We’ve just concluded our shareholder conference where we announced that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt family got a bit bigger -- we sold over 6 million copies of the game in six weeks since launch. Worry not, I won’t discuss any financial stuff here. I would, however, like to give you some insight on what that means to us as game creators.
One could think we have six million reasons to be happy and that’s it. We do, but that number is also a big responsibility and I want everyone to know that we, as a studio, realize that. For us, all your high praise, all the positive reviews, are also an obligation -- we’ve made a really good game but there’s still a long road ahead of us. Everyone here in CD PROJEKT RED is really attached to their work and how you, the gamers, perceive it. RED is full of artists, wild dreamers and people crazy about what they do (and sometimes just plain crazy). We lose sleep over that particular colour the sun has when it sets over Velen, and argue over arranging the furniture in a house the majority of gamers will probably never see. We’re not the kind of people who are easily satisfied and we always strive for more. I’d like you to know that.
Yes, six million copies is a great achievement for a company making RPGs, but this business is not only about that. If our games are a gallery of sound, picture and text - you are the visitors of this gallery. To an artist, there’s no sweeter sight than people enjoying their work. That’s why, in the name of all the devs in the studio, I’d like to say thanks to each and every one of you.
Thanks!
Adam Badowski,
Head of Studio
CD PROJEKT RED
Click to expand...
 
T

TheUnsunghero26

Member
Congrats to them! Played through The Witcher 2 at the beginning of the summer, and started The Witcher 3 a couple weeks ago. Incredible series, glad it was successful.
 
Z

zoozilla

Member
So they got 63 million bucks in profit, which is nice, but...

How is that enough to fund the Witcher 3 expansion packs, Cyberpunk 2077, and the beginning of the development of the next full Witcher game?

Can CD Projekt Red use revenue from GOG as well? I thought they were distinctly separate entities.

I guess I'm not really sure how games are funded, especially big budget games like this without publisher support.
 
H

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
Knurek said:
Say wha?
Poland has been killing it when it comes to games for a few years.

I mean, Call of Juarez: Gunslinger, Shadow Warrior, This War of Mine, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter and Dying Light just in the last few years... How is that a bad output?
Click to expand...

Shadow Warrior 2 is gonna be sick excepting something unforeseen.
 
J

joezombie

Member
Steamspy has it at around 750k. Are there any good estimates of console sales so we can guess at how many sales are gog? Always curious how these games that use their own service do outside of steam
 
D

Daingurse

Member
Well fucking deserved. So happy The Witcher series tapped the pulse of the mainstream, so it can be appreciated by more people.
 
S

Spirited

Mine is pretty and pink
zoozilla said:
So they got 63 million bucks in profit, which is nice, but...

How is that enough to fund the Witcher 3 expansion packs, Cyberpunk 2077, and the beginning of the development of the next full Witcher game?

Can CD Projekt Red use revenue from GOG as well? I thought they were distinctly separate entities.

I guess I'm not really sure how games are funded, especially big budget games like this without publisher support.
Click to expand...

We know their budget for the big Witcher 3 expansion to be a bit over 2million euro after seeing EU funding 7% of it with 150k euro.
 
L

LurkerPrime

Member
Nirolak said:
That would put it up there with the best selling BioWare games. Maybe a tad above.

I think that leaves Diablo (30+M), Borderlands (12+M), and Bethesda's games (20+M) as the better selling WRPGs.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info. This really puts the Witcher 3's success into perspective.

It really was a perfect storm of quality, appetite, and awareness. Hopefully there's many more.
 
H

His Majesty

Banned
joezombie said:
Steamspy has it at around 750k. Are there any good estimates of console sales so we can guess at how many sales are gog? Always curious how these games that use their own service do outside of steam
Click to expand...

The presentation mentions that more than 1 million copies have been activated on GoG so far.
 
N

Nirolak

Mrgrgr
zoozilla said:
So they got 63 million bucks in profit, which is nice, but...

How is that enough to fund the Witcher 3 expansion packs, Cyberpunk 2077, and the beginning of the development of the next full Witcher game?

Can CD Projekt Red use revenue from GOG as well? I thought they were distinctly separate entities.

I guess I'm not really sure how games are funded, especially big budget games like this without publisher support.
Click to expand...

They spent $32 million developing the game (some of that was loans from their distributors) and then it was $35 million on marketing (with presumably the difference between the $67 million total there and the $82 million total now coming from a mix of currency change and additional disc printing costs and marketing).

Even if they can't fund all their operations on this, which they likely can, they're not going to have any issues getting publisher loans again given how the last game went. Getting preferred revenue on a safe bet is something publishers with distribution arms love doing. It just means CD Projekt gets less profit in the end and they get more.
 
TGO

TGO

Hype Train conductor. Works harder than it steams.
Probably my GOTY, there's MGSV but from what I hear the story may prevent that from sealing it's crown.
 
Yautja_Warrior

Yautja_Warrior

Member
Congratulations CDPR. Definitely contender for game of the year for me.

The epic scale of this game is really amazing, you can tell they put a lot of love into this, glad it sold well, now I can't wait for the epic expansion.
 
Y

Yeul

Member
Really well deserved! I just started my NG+ playthrough and I'm really looking forward to the expansions and seeing some of the characters from the previous games again.
 
C

Conduit

Banned
Well deserved! My playtrough was 18 days. I explored every inch of Witcher 3's world. Btw. didn't finished Gwent quests.
 
Z

zoozilla

Member
Spirited said:
We know their budget for the big Witcher 3 expansion to be a bit over 2million euro after seeing EU funding 7% of it with 150k euro.
Click to expand...

Nirolak said:
They spent $32 million developing the game (some of that was loans from their distributors) and then it was $35 million on marketing (with presumably the difference between the $67 million total there and the $82 million total now coming from a mix of currency change and additional disc printing costs and marketing).

Even if they can't fund all their operations on this, which they likely can, they're not going to have any issues getting publisher loans again given how the last game went. Getting preferred revenue on a safe bet is something publishers with distribution arms love doing. It just means CD Projekt gets less profit in the end and they get more.
Click to expand...

Ah, I see. Thanks.

I forgot about getting EU funding, and how large the percentage of a budget goes into marketing. That's presumably where a publisher will offer the most support.
 
M

Mivey

Member
Zolo said:
I wonder how many more sales they would have gotten had they had drm to prevent piracy.
Click to expand...
All of them. Everyone would have dropped whatever they are playing in the present, and any games they were planning to play, and purchased a 150$ collector's edition.
That's how horrible piracy is.
 
E

erawsd

Member
I'm so happy to hear these guys are finally seeing the success they deserve. I wonder if that first expansion is still on track for October?
 
L

lefantome

Member
1 million activations on GOG that's huge!

I wonder how many users GOG has: 2-5 millions?
It's not a small amount considering that only 26 millions of Steam users have more than 3 games in their account and it's much easier to get games on steam thanks to bundles and free promotions.

GOG is becoming an important pc market.
 
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