Maker The Witcher 2 no longer sends illegal downloaders a note
Polish developer CD Projekt RED stops sending notes to people who illegally downloaded their RPG The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. The move generated too much protest from fans of the game.
Marcin Iwinski, founder of developer CD Projekt RED, direct in an open letter to fans of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, the RPG that the Polish studio delivered in May 2011. His company will no longer send peppery bills to people who illegally downloaded the RPG. Iwinski announced the measure in December. His company hired a lawyer to charge downloaders to use CD Projekt’s software. The studio charged considerable costs for this. The bill that the law firm sent could amount to more than 900 euros, while the game is now in the store for 30 euros.
The measure came to the studio with the necessary criticism, which is reason for Iwinski to stop writing to individual downloaders. The founder is afraid of reputational damage. “We are only successful because you have faith in us and we have worked hard to build that trust over the years. We are sorry to see that many gamers felt that our action was not showing respect for the trust they have in CD Projekt RED,” Iwinski said in his letter.
When the PC game The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings came out, the game was protected with DRM. However, two weeks after the game’s release, the developer already released a patch that removed the security. As in the open letter he wrote now, suggested Iwinski said he doesn’t believe that drm works. It only hinders the legal users, while those obstacles have been removed with the illegal version. He indicated at the time that he planned to apply torrent tracking and take legal action against downloaders. However, the tone was slightly different then. CD Projekts Agnieszka Szostak stated six months ago: “Yes, we track down illegal file sharers, hoping they like the game enough to change their mind and pay for it.” The developer did not mention the amount of the reminder.
The first ten minutes of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings