What is CD Projekt Red

CD Projekt Red
	CD Project Red
size of company	400+
Founded by	Marcin Iwiński and Michał Kiciński
Typic of Company	Video game creators
Founded	May 1994
Place	Poland
	v; t; e;

CD Projekt red is a video game company that was founded by Marcin Iwiński and Michał Kiciński, who started the company in Poland in 1994. The period of time was around the time Poland was still recovering from soviet occupation during this time. They are known for making RPGs and especially the Witcher series.Before CD Projekt RedMarcin Iwiński was introduced to video games thanks to his father Mr. Iwiński, who made documentries and was able to leave the country, as a child he acquired a "Spectrum Sinclair" computer which allowed him to play some of the first video games to come out like Atic Atac. And after this he would use his father's ability to leave the country to get games he could sell. This would him to get in touch with small game sellers in america which allowed him to get hold of bootleg games he could sell in the Warsaw computer bazaar's in Poland as during that time there were no laws against doing so in the country making it legal ^[1]. After meeting Micheal Kiciński in High school another person who sold games they would team up later on and created their company CD Projekt in 1994 at the age of 20.^[2] The company would become known for their RPG games after the release of The Witcher 2: Assasins of Kings.

History^[3]

CD Projekt Red got its name because of the practice of burning CD ROM's with multiple games that was employed to get games into Poland at the time however as the company was made they were able to get legitimate contracts to localize video games in Poland. this was the original business that was run at the time however their was some interest in making video games of their own expressed by the founders of the company but they did not know how to get started. This changed when in 1999 CD Projekt Red gained some experience making games by prepared the video game "Baldur's Gate" for sale in Poland on behalf of Bio Ware who needed the game to be compatible with PC as most people in Poland used computers to play games. This decision was smart for the company as the game was a hit in Poland and not many pirates people were not willing to sell it cheaper as it was on seven CD's. The success would lead into a second Balder's gate game (Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance) being sent to CD Projekt however this deal fell through on Bio Ware's side and seeing this as an opportunity CD Projekt decided to create their own RPG considering they had already built a team of PC Developers so in 2002 their first official studio was founded.^[4] They would acquire the rights to make a video game of a book called Wiedźmin ("veedj-min") which in English translates to The Witcher from the author Andrzej Sapkowski and used it to create an RPG, in 2003 work on the Witcher began, the game was set in the world of Polish writer Andrezej Sapkowski and the game would become a success for the company in 2007 while not winning big awards it still managed to make a lot of money which would led to more success with "The Witcher 2: Assassins of kings" in 2011 which many awards and then they would only get more success with the 2015 release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt which would go to win even more awards and game of the year. The company has been going strong they made a few games and expansions between these events however all were either DLC and smaller games. their Present work the RPG CyberPunk 2077 which is their first game that does not have connection to the Witcher series.

Reputation

Fans

Fans of CD Projekt Red point out that it is a company that has only show growth over the years producing quality RPG games that are on par with triple-A titles.^[5] They feel the company has expressed a need to keep the fan-base happy while other companies tend to lose sight of what made them so good in the first place.

Critiques

In response most critics point out that the company has been portrayed as the pinnacle of what a video game company should be when in actuality they are no different than any other company. The company has had its share of scandals with subsidiaries like GOG making jokes about trans-phobia.^[6] They do participate in the culture of overworking employees with mandatory over time and while they stated that this practice would not be mandatory in its upcoming game cyberpunk 2077. They later assured investors other wise after delays(the gamer).