CD Projekt joint CEO Michał Nowakowski has issued a strongly worded response to accusations that the studio “is in a lot of trouble right now” because of “diversity hires,” saying the people peddling such nonsense need to “stop looking for conspiracy theories.”
“Seems we live in times where anyone can record complete nonsense and make a story out of it,” Nowakowski said in response to a post on X by YouTuber Endymion, who has a long history of stridently complaining about diversity and “wokeness” in videogames.
“CDPR talent leaving? We have the lowest rotation of people in recent years. DEI-driven recruitment? We hire based on merit and talent alone, just as we make games driven by artistic vision alone. Why did we choose [Unreal Engine]? Because it enables us to work on our games more efficiently and we remain cutting edge tech-wise. The Witcher 3’s director left? Well, yeah, more than 2 years ago… Now, can we stop looking for conspiracy theories and go back to making cool stuff?”
Many triple-a games are going to shit, they’re made with the goal of maximizing profits, they aren’t a labor of love and creativity in the way that indie games made by a small team or even a single person are. Of course the people spouting “get woke go broke” either don’t understand this or they don’t care because they have an agenda. So they push the idea that “wokeness” the idea of portraying LGBTQ people in a positive light, or even recognizing them at all, is what is ruining games, and not corporate greed and cutting of corners that AAA companies often do because they think it’ll maximize profits.