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CDPR’s Rafal Jaki: “GMG is not a CDPR partner for W3 but they still might sell keys that will work”

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All hell broke loose earlier today when CD Projekt RED warned its fans not to buy via GreenManGaming. A lot of controversy surfaced, and GreenManGaming has issued an official statement that can be read below. But will those keys from GMG get people banned? According to CD Projekt RED’s Business Development Manager, Rafal Jaki, GMG might still sell keys that will work.

But let’s take things from the beginning. Earlier today, CD Projekt RED noticed a special promo that GMG runs for The Witcher 3, offering this highly anticipated RPG for 40 bucks.

CD Projekt RED warned its fans and claimed that it has not sold any digital keys to GMG. GMG then issued the following statement, explaining the situation:

“Green Man Gaming has an official contract with, and has been an approved retailer of CD Projekt S.A. (CDPR) products since 11th August 2011. Following a 6 month dialogue with CDPR about the launch of The Witcher 3, we were disappointed that despite the offer of significant cash advances, and other opportunities to officially work together, (we even offered to fly to Poland to discuss in detail how we could and wanted to support this launch), CDPR chose not to engage with a number of significant, reputable, and successful retailers, including ourselves, as they instead focused on supporting their own platform GOG.

We at GMG sincerely believe in getting games to gamers, and offering them a range of buying options to suit their preferences is critically important to this industry; we often go above corporate profits and commercial gain to make this happen. We, like millions of customers, are huge fans of The Witcher series, and have been eager for the launch of this amazing title. We believe that CDPR’s desire to support their own platform by working with retail outlets that would not conflict with their own is greater than that of meeting the demands of their audience, therefore we made the decision to indirectly secure the product and deliver it to our customers. To do this, we reached out to third parties and retailers that were approved by CDPR, to legitimately pass these keys onto our customers. This means that at some point, revenue has been passed directly onto CDPR, and any additional discount on the title is absorbed by us, as we want as many people enjoying The Witcher 3 as possible.

We would heartily welcome a renewed dialogue with CDPR, and are keen to continue to not only support the launch of The Witcher 3, but to keep celebrating and bringing the whole catalogue of CDPR titles to a worldwide audience, as we have done since 2011.”

But what most people wonder is whether it is safe to buy the game from GMG or not. Well, according to Rafal Jaki, if these keys were bought from official online stores that partner with CDPR – like GOG – then GMG can sell them. If, however, these keys were not obtained via such a way, then these keys are not allowed to be sold.

As Rafal Jaki said:

“We have worked with GMG in the past for w2 and they were a legit partner.

We control all digital and the codes, and because we decided not to sell Keys to GMG it came as a suprise that they are doing a special promo without buying Keys from us. We have reach out to ask for the source of they Keys but up until now there was no response. They might sell nVidia Keys (which are not to be sold but gifted with the nVidia promo), or they just bough Keys from gog just like a regular customer and now they resell them with a loss (we cannot prevent anyone from selling something).

They also list Bandai Namco as the published which is not true for w3 (namco is our box distributor in PAL), so GMG is not a CDPR partner for W3 but they still might sell Keys that will work.”