GOG’s New Owner Confirms Anti-DRM Stance Is A “Core Value”, Says “There’s No Signs That It Might Die In Any Visible Future”
In assuaging the understandable enshittification fears that arise any time a consumer-first business comes under new management, CD Projekt Red co-founder Michał Kiciński has made it clear that his purchase of popular video game sales platform GOG will have zero effect on the company’s firm anti-DRM stance.
Kiciński, who bought GOG outright from CD Projekt Red right before the calendar turned over into 2026 for zł90.7 million PLN (~$26 million USD), offered this assurance while speaking to GamesIndustry.biz‘s Lewis Packwood regarding his recent purchase.
Pressed as to his thoughts on the platform’s anti-DRM mission, Kiciński declared, “”This is a core value of GOG, and there’s no signs that it might die in any visible future.”
This is not only an ethical value, but it’s also very pragmatic. It helps people to enjoy games no matter what happens with the software provided by the platform or what internet connection they have.”
To this end, Kiciński then affirmed that GOG’s main goal would be to allow players access to a purchased game “whenever you like – and nobody can take it away from you”, especially given his own personal dislike of the recent trend “where you pay full price, but your rights are more as somebody who rents the game.”
“I experienced this a few times in my life where some games disappeared from my library, and I have no bloody idea why. So GOG is against that, and it’s a part of consumer-centric friendly politics.
“Also there are other practicalities. Since the very beginning, we haven’t seen DRM as a solution for piracy, because the games get pirated anyway, nearly day one. We see DRM as something which can make the life of a legal customer more difficult. The only reason to keep it alive can be to please the owners of the games, because that’s their requirement quite often.”
Pressed by Packwood as to whether or not this stance had ever lost GOG any business, the platform’s new owner asserted “Of course,” but also noted that “We’ve lost some, we’ve gained some.”
“Probably there are also some developers that actually choose to work with us because of this philosophy[, but] the less third-party software around the game, the better for its longevity.”
Recalling how CDPR’s 2011 decision to remove DRM from the PC release of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings landed them in hot water with its publisher Bandai Namco, Kiciński added, “Most corporate people, they make plain stupid decisions. I had firsthand experience of this with The Witcher 2, where our own publisher sued us.”
“They couldn’t understand that it [wasn’t harming] their business because the game was already pirated. But they were not sensitive to the voices of gamers complaining that the DRM was causing some errors or slowing down the game.”
“Being a healthy company means having healthy results,” he ultimately asserted. “Do a good job, have good products and good services, and then as a consequence and as a reward comes good money. But many companies fall apart on that, putting the spreadsheets first.”
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