348. Why None of Us Saw Cyberpunk Coming Apart I Michal Nowakowski. joint CEO, CD PROJEKT RED from Deconstructor of Fun

348. Why None of Us Saw Cyberpunk Coming Apart I Michal Nowakowski. joint CEO, CD PROJEKT RED

1 hour 2 minutes Posted Sep 14, 2026 at 10:50 am.

From Polish distributor to a global studio 04:43 Buying The Witcher rights 08:15 Why owning the IP was non-negotiable 14:12 Poland's coding culture and the talent pipeline 18:54 Scaling to 350 developers on The Witcher 3 26:16 The Cyberpunk 2077 launch and the hardest week 34:03 The decision to fix the game instead of cutting losses 39:14 Unreal Engine 5 and rebuilding production 43:51 Transmedia, Netflix, and keeping games at the center 49:49 What makes the Polish gaming ecosystem work

0:00

1:02:35

Download MP3

Share at current time

Show notes

Cyberpunk 2077 sold 13 million copies in ten days, then Sony pulled it from the PlayStation Store. CD Projekt Red joint CEO Michal Nowakowski was the one taking the calls.He walks through what actually broke, why the investors weren't the reason, and how the studio went from a Polish box distributor to owning The Witcher outright. Plus the transmedia strategy, the move to Unreal Engine 5, and why Poland built the strongest gaming ecosystem in Europe.Chapters

← See all 823 episodes of Deconstructor of Fun