Due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, CD Projekt Group has announced that they will be halting all sales to Russia and Belarus. This decision applies to digital sales, physical stock deliveries of CD Projekt Red products, and all games distributed on the GOG platform. While some developers and publishers have spoken out about the war in Ukraine, having CD Projekt Red onboard is a pretty big deal. Previously, the company donated 1 million PLN (about $240,000 USD) to Polska Akcja Humanitarna, and have now gone much further then that.
Here's a portion of CD Projekt Red's announcement below:
The entire CD PROJEKT Group stands firm with the people of Ukraine. While we are not a political entity capable of directly influencing state matters, and don't aspire to be one, we do believe that commercial entities, when united, have the power to inspire global change in the hearts and minds of ordinary people. We know that players in Russia or Belarus, individuals who have nothing to do with the invasion of Ukraine, will be impacted by this decision, but with this action we wish to further galvanize the global community to speak about what is going on in the heart of Europe.
There's been a lot of action in the video game industry over the past few weeks over Ukraine. Even Wargaming.net, a publisher and developer based in Belarus (but with studios in both Russia and Kyiv), has become involved by pausing ads for World of Tanks, with one ad showing off tanks and asking "why haven't you played World of Tanks yet?" definitely suffering an acute case of unfortunate timing.
What isn't unfortunate is 11 bit studios raising over $715,000 for the people of Ukraine, which is due to customers buying This War of Mine on every available platform. GOG is donating their store cut to Ukraine as well, and has also created a page of games with several developers to support Ukraine. The sale ends in just under two hours, so if you want to help that way you don't have much time left.
For more information on how the gaming industry reacts to the ongoing war in Ukraine, stay tuned to TechRaptor for more information.
