Cyberpunk 2077 passes Witcher 3 record for concurrent Steam players

Cyberpunk 2077 has hit unprecedented levels of success. Over the course of this week, it has risen to number one on the Steam best-selling charts, surpassing Modern Warfare 2, Apex Legends, and Destiny 2.

In addition, Cyberpunk 2077 has also crossed the number of peak concurrent players for Witcher 3,  CD Projekt Red’s previous best seller. On Sunday it crossed a million concurrent players, peaking at 1.36 million on September 25.

Reaching an inflection point?

This is easily the largest player base since the game’s disastrous launch back in 2020. It was hailed as the biggest flop in the video game industry that year, with console-specific performance issues and bugs that made it almost unplayable.

Sony pulled Cyberpunk 2077 from the PlayStation Store and offered refunds to buyers. The problem didn’t end there for CD Projekt; they then came under investigation and received class-action lawsuits for allegedly downplaying the severity of the technical issues before release. These eventually had to be settled out of court for $1.85 million.

This has been a comeback for the history books, the debut of the Netflix anime series “Cyberpunk: Edgerunners” largely responsible for the spike in numbers. The timing of the patch and anime release was perfect, drawing in anime fans to try their hand at the game and immerse themselves in the Night City across mediums.

Update 1.6 has brought Cyberpunk 2077 up to the standard of other open-world games in terms of performance and graphics, and players can finally experience the game at its full potential.

All the game-breaking glitches of the initial launch have been fixed, as well as cross-progression between platforms for people wanting to upgrade to newer-gen consoles or switch to PC.

The Absolutely Insane Update on Cyberpunk 2077

The developers have added free downloadable content, such as new gigs and outfits, and introduced additional firearms and melee weapons.

There will also now be support for mod users and content creators. CD Projekt are currently pouring all its energy into the new DLC, dubbed ‘Phantom Liberty’ scheduled for release in 2023.