CD Projekt Uses DMCA Takedowns To Slow Spread Of Stolen Code

@naija: First of all CD Projekt RED was founded in 2002. It has nothing to do with CD Projekt sp. z o.o. which was registered in 1994 as a distributor of computer games in Poland. Both companies belong to the same group, but they always have had different tasks. Michał Kiciński and Marcin Iwiński weren't cracking games, because they didn't have any programming skills. They were students at high school selling stuff they got elsewhere, often imported from Western countries. They were selling games on Grzybowska St. in Warsaw, basically marketplace in temporarily rented school building, to this day real cultural phenomenon. It wasn't just a place where you could buy new games, you could buy there computers, bootleg consoles, gamepads, disc drives, home made joysticks, tuned up tape recorders etc. You could met there interesting people, who later became important figures in software/hardware business. Many journalists were buying computer games on Grzybowska St., because there were no official distributors in Poland. Back then there was no software copyright law in Poland (it was enacted in 1994). "Bajtek" (The Little Byte) - the only computer magazine in Poland - was even the official media partner of Grzybowska st. Market. Atari and ZX Spectrum games were even broadcasted via official Scaut Radio Station. Grzybowska St. Market was a breath of freedom in a country behind Iron Curtain where officially home computers were available only in state owned stores called Pewex (Atari 800 XL cost more than 75% of average wage); Grzybowska was expanding even more in the early 90's - during transition from communism to capitalism. CD Projekt Sp z o.o. has been legit business from the very start, not based on cracking and selling pirated stuff. Most important fact is that CD Projekt Sp. z o.o. has ENORMOUS merits in decreasing computer games piracy in Poland. I'm not able to stress enough how much good they done in this area. Those merits are so huge that at some point of time, CDP Sp z o.o. had almost all major distribution licenses (e.g. EA, Blizzard, BioWare, THQ, Atari, Ubisoft etc.) and games were selling very well. It was CDP who was releasing games translated into Polish on regular basis; it was CDP who significantly decreased prices and CDP who was preparing fantastic collectors editions unavailable in other countries. I still have over 60 games releaseed by CDP, some of them in those big a$$ cardboard boxes.

Saying that CDPR started as a bunch of pirates, and they are hypocrates, is a straight lie and shows that you simply have no clue about this topic. Nobody ever did more in decreasing games piracy in Poland - and CDP achieved it via consumer friendly policy, not by sending police or going to court.

@locke90: Was GoG ever "hacking and pirating other company's games? That'd be a new one to me.

@naija: Yeah, that was some pretty interesting info . Thanks for the response. ✌

That code hasn't been compromised. This current action by CDPR is only in regard to the leaked portion of code for Gwent Online -- a game which has been CDPR's biggest failure to date. And the leaked material were only assets for the game. AFAIK, only that initial leak was made with the promise that more was to follow the next day but it was never done so it's just those assets which really don't amount to much at all.

I still question whether the whole thing was real in the first place. CDPR has been crying wolf for several years now about getting hacked, first on their official forums, then several times on their main servers. This is the first time they'd published the ransom note which many found quite oddd, its wording seeming more like some hacker-wannabe than the rather well-known group they've pretty much assumed it to be. I've yet to see any concrete proof that it was them too so I keep coming back to my original doubt.

CDPR has been caught in so many lies over the years. They can't seem to secure a damn thing that's vital to their operations. They continue to demonstrate just how amateurish they are in nearly every regard to their business operations. Why should we believe this was real? The only leaked material was for some assets for their least popular and least successful venture. The 48-hour didn't even get a chance to take a single bid before it was canceled. Their refusal to pay any ransom is suspect since presumably the hackers accepted a private offer outside of the auction to settle matters and, conveniently, the terms were that no other offers could be made or accepted and the material would not be leaked publicly.

Still sounds like CDPR staged this whole thing themselves. They hired a few modders a few years ago to work on Cyberpunk. Who's to say they didn't hire a few hackers as well, some old friend perhaps. They could have easily helped them to stage the whole thing. For what reason? For sympathy. To stall for time since their game continues to be a flaming train wreck now with the ghost of Adam Smasher roaming the game haunting the player. They'll need a hell of a lot more time than their extremely vague road map suggested in order to fix the game and this entire charade would serve to buy them some of that time.

@gleencross: That you're, most likely, out of your mind.

@naija: If Gwent was unprofitable, it would be scrapped long time ago like CDP did with The Witcher Battle Arena. Thronebreaker wasn't bestseller for sure but it still made a profit.