Image: CD Projekt
The publisher of The Witcher trilogy and Cyberpunk 2077 has announced that it’s stopping all sales to Russia and Belarus.
The Witcher and Cyberpunk 2077 game publisher CD Projekt has announced that it will be halting all business in Russia and Belarus, including the sales of physical game stock and digital games sold via its PC store platform GOG. This move follows the Ukraine vice prime minister calling for PlayStation and Xbox to ‘leave the Russian market’.
The Polish studio’s statement reads:
In light of the Russian military invasion in our neighbouring country of Ukraine, until further notice the CD Projekt Group has made the decision to halt all sales of our games to Russia and Belarus. Today, we begin working with our partners to suspend digital sales and cease physical stock deliveries of CD Projekt Group products, as well as all games distributed on the GOG platform, to the territories of Russia and Belarus.
CD Projekt then reasserts that the company, “stands firm with the people of Ukraine,” and hopes that this move will, “further galvanize the global community to speak about what is going on in the heart of Europe.” This makes CD Projekt the first major game publisher to halt business in Russia and Belarus since the former’s invasion of Ukraine.
Major motion picture studios have begun to pull their movie releases out of Russia as well, including Sony, although the company’s PlayStation gaming division has yet to follow CD Projekt’s lead or respond to the Ukraine vice prime minister's plea. It is likely that CD Projekt won’t be the last company in the games industry to halt business in Russia, but time will tell.
