Sony: Despite Cyberpunk 2077's relisting, PS4 players should still expect issues

CD Projekt quietly announced Cyberpunk 2077's impending return to the PlayStation Store earlier today, but Sony wants to make sure players know the relisting does not mean the game runs flawlessly on PlayStation consoles.

Cyberpunk's absence from the PlayStation Store has been sorely felt over at CD Projekt, but until just recently it was unclear when the infamously buggy game would return to the PlayStation Store after Sony made the unprecedented decision to remove it within a week of its December 2020 launch.

Since then, CD Projekt has shared roadmaps and launched patches in an effort to fix both the game and its relationship with scorned players, but we haven't known until this week if those efforts would be enough to convince Sony to allow the game back on the PlayStation Store.

While a regulatory notice earlier today confirmed that Sony had given it the OK to return on June 21, a Sony Interactive Entertainment statement provided to IGN cautions players that that base PlayStation 4 consoles will continue to see issues despite the relisting.

"SIE can confirm that Cyberpunk 2077 will be re-listed on PlayStation Store starting June 21, 2021," reads that statement. "Users will continue to experience performance issues with the PS4 edition while CD Projekt Red continues to improve stability across all platforms. SIE recommends playing the title on PS4 Pro or PS5 for the best experience."

Every console version of Cyberpunk 2077 featured its share of bugs and performance issues at launch, but last-generation consoles fared the worst. Shortly after launch, CD Projekt leadership lamented that they hadn't focused enough on the console versions of the game, and that showed through in the frequent crashes and graphical issues that rendered the game unplayable for those on older PlayStation 4 generation hardware.

Just last week, PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan touched on the decision to delist, noting that it was a tough decision but "ultimately we had to act in the interests of the PlayStation Community, and not knowingly sell a game that might result in a bad experience for them."

Recent updates have addressed some of those issues, but clearly many still persist on PlayStation 4 and (speaking from experience) PlayStation 5. While Cyberpunk 2077's return to the PlayStation Store seems to indicate that CD Projekt has restored Sony's faith in what Cyberpunk offers to its players, SIE's own guidance to use either a PlayStation 4 Pro or PlayStation 5 if possible suggests that the game still has a long road ahead.