The DRM-free PC game store GOG has been acquired by CD Projekt and GOG co-founder Michał Kiciński, branching it off from the CD Projekt Group and going private.
There’s no plans to change GOG’s business model, which continues to focus on providing a source for classic games, now with a dedicated preservation programme to ensure a select library continue to run on modern systems, and to sell all titles (old and new) without DRM.
While now independent of CD Projekt Group, they have immediately penned a deal to ensure that CDPR games remain on GOG going forward.
So, why the change? Was GOG in trouble? All parties say that no, it was doing well and is profitable on its own terms, but the CDPR want to focus fully on developing games.
“With our focus now fully on an ambitious development roadmap and expanding our franchises with new high-quality products, we felt this was the right time for this move,” said Michał Nowakowski, Joint CEO of CD Projekt. “For a long time now, GOG has been operating independently. Now it’s going into very good hands — we are convinced that with the support of Michał Kiciński, one of GOG’s co-founders, its future will be full of great projects and successes.”
Kiciński was a co-founder of both CD Projekt in 1994, and then also their digital storefront Good Old Games (rebranded simply as GOG) in 2008. He left the company at the end of 2010, but has remained one of its largest shareholders, with 9.99%, and his brother is a chair on the board.
In the announcement, he said, “CD Projekt and GOG share the same roots and values: freedom, independence, and a genuine sense of ownership. I believe that CD Projekt, with its exceptional AAA games, will stand, as always, behind the GOG offering — making GOG the best place on the planet to purchase The Witcher and Cyberpunk games, both existing titles and the new ones we all anticipate so much.
“GOG and Michał Kiciński are aligned by a shared belief that games should live forever,” said Maciej Gołębiewski, Managing Director of GOG. “In a market that’s getting more crowded, more locked-in, and forgets classic games at an increasing pace, we’re doubling down on what only GOG does: reviving classics, keeping them playable on modern PCs, and helping great games find their audience over time.”
Source: GOG
