Patch For The Witcher 2 Removes DRM Shortly After Release

A reader writes with this excerpt from Ars Technica: "A little over a week after its release, The Witcher 2 is getting its first patch, and with it all versions of the game will now be DRM free. 'Our approach to countering piracy is to incorporate superior value in the legal version,' explained development director Adam Badowski. 'This means it has to be superior in every respect: less troublesome to use and install, with full support, and with access to additional content and services. So, we felt keeping the DRM would mainly hurt our legitimate users. This is completely in line with what we said before the release of The Witcher 2. We felt DRM was necessary to prevent the game being pirated and leaked before release.'"

Re:Discipline?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most pre-release games come from people working at factory level. People that can swipe a freshly pressed disc. Alphas and Betas are the ones that are either leaked internally, or hacked (like we saw with Half-Life 2).

Re:Not from the goodness of their heart

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, they always intended to remove the DRM ASAP. I have been a supporter of CD Projekt since they took similar action with The Witcher 1 (removing the godawful TAGES crap).
Originally it was their intent to have no DRM on the Witcher 2. When I found out they did a U-turn on that (a month or two ago) I contacted their customer support to express my disappointment. I got a very nice e-mail back telling me exactly why they included DRM on some versions of the game (publishing requirements, stopping before-release leaks etc.), where I could get a non-DRM version if I preferred (GoG.com) and that they intended to get rid of it as soon as they were allowed to. They delivered on this promise, which is why I am likely to buy their games again.