Today, Cyberpunk 2077 is widely considered one of the best RPGs on the market.

But honestly?

Most players still remember how catastrophic the game’s original launch actually was.

Now, developers at CD Projekt Red have opened up about one of the biggest internal mistakes that contributed to the chaos behind both Cyberpunk 2077 and earlier Witcher games — and they say it’s something they absolutely will not repeat with The Witcher 4 and Cyberpunk 2.

CDPR Admits Documentation Became a Massive Problem

During a recent Digital Dragons panel spotted by GamesRadar+, technical writer Jarosław Ruciński and senior technical writer Adrian Fulneczek discussed one of the studio’s biggest long-term development failures:

Poor documentation.

According to the developers, projects like:

• The Witcher
• The Witcher 2
• Cyberpunk 2077

were often developed without enough long-term planning regarding technical knowledge and internal documentation systems.

Which eventually became a huge issue years later.

The Witcher Remake Exposed the Problem Completely

The situation apparently became especially obvious during work on the upcoming The Witcher Remake.

According to Ruciński, the developers discovered there was almost no preserved technical knowledge remaining from the original game’s development period.

Which is honestly kind of wild considering how iconic the franchise eventually became.

Fortunately, some veteran CDPR developers who originally worked on older projects were still around to help fill in the missing gaps with what the team described as:

“Lost tribal knowledge.”

And yes — that phrase sounds exactly as terrifying for game preservation as you think it does.

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Cyberpunk 2077’s Development Became Too Large to Track Properly

The same issue reportedly exploded during development of Cyberpunk 2077.

The project grew so massive that the studio’s documentation systems eventually became difficult to maintain and navigate effectively.

CDPR used a documentation tool called Confluence to track development progress, but after the project surpassed roughly 8,000 pages of information, the system reportedly became harder and harder to manage.

At some point, documentation itself apparently started losing value because the game was evolving too quickly.

And honestly?

That sounds painfully believable considering how ambitious Cyberpunk 2077 eventually became.

Even Phantom Liberty Ran Into Similar Issues

According to the developers, the problem continued even during development of the critically acclaimed Phantom Liberty expansion.

The team had started transitioning documentation toward cloud-based systems, but ended up splitting files between local storage and cloud instances of Confluence.

That created confusion not only internally but also for outsourced development partners.

Adrian Fulneczek explained:

“If you can, don’t divide between platforms or different tools.”

Which honestly feels like advice every large studio probably learns the hard way eventually.

CDPR Says The Witcher 4 and Cyberpunk 2 Will Be Different

Thankfully, CD Projekt Red says it has now fundamentally changed how development pipelines work moving forward.

The studio reportedly introduced:

• New documentation requirements
• New development completion standards
• Shared knowledge systems across projects
• Better long-term planning structures

Now, documentation itself is considered part of the actual completion process for each stage of development.

Meaning knowledge gained during development of The Witcher 4 can directly benefit future Cyberpunk projects — and vice versa.

And honestly?

After everything that happened with Cyberpunk 2077’s launch…

…it’s probably one of the smartest lessons the studio could have learned.