CD Projekt rebrand makes things simultaneously simpler and more confusing

I confess, even after several years writing about videogames for money, I still have to pause sometimes and remember which CD Projekt is which. I use this handy mnemonic rhyme: If CD Projekt Red you see, that’s the folks who made The Witcher 3. If CD Projekt alone you view, that’s the parent company. Doo bee doo.

But I guess it’s time for me to throw that rhyme out, because CD Projekt is rebranding itself as CD Projekt Red, bringing the whole enchilada under the same brand. “In the opinion of the Management Board, the new company name will ensure full brand consistency and facilitate the identification of the Company with its products on the global market,” quoth the company in the relevant resolution.

Which does mean that, in the future, I will now have an even harder time distinguishing between actions undertaken by CD Projekt Red (née CD Projekt) and, uh, CD Projekt Red (the games people). See? It’s already happening. How could Marcin Iwiński do this to me?

I grudgingly admit it makes sense, though. To many of us, CD Projekt is CD Projekt Red. I am a lot more concerned with Cyberpunk 2 and The Witcher 4—both operations that fall under the company’s game-dev rubric—than I am with the wider company’s broad corporate machinations. To the public, this company is a game-development studio with some other stuff attached, even if the nitty-gritty of its corporate structure is the reverse.

So, hey, makes sense. But I need a new rhyme. If broader corporate decisions they’re making, that’s the corporate arm that used to be CD Projekt, and no mistaking. If designing Geralt’s new beard they be, that’s the game-dev arm. Fiddle de dee.

About