CD PROJEKT RED’s GOG service will not be releasing Taiwanese made psychological horror game Devotion that depicts Xi Jinping as Winnie The Pooh due to pressure from the CCP.
The critically acclaimed first-person psychological horror game Devotion will not be seeing a rerelease anytime soon. According to sources, China is threatening to blacklist anyone who sells the game.
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Devotion has been called a “beautiful” and “mesmerising” game with a powerful and lasting message. It was praised for its unique aesthetics, story, and gameplay and received stellar review scores across the board.
According to Valve Corporation the game was considered “too offensive” and was removed from the Steam Store. There was little information given about why exactly the game was removed but all signs were pointing to one tiny reference in the game.
One of the easter eggs in Devotion is a poster containing the words “Xi Jinping” next to “Winnie the Pooh”, in an ancient Chinese writing.
The CCP cracked down hard on Winnie The Pooh/Xi Jinping memes in 2017 after they became viral and completely removed all search results of the beloved children’s character from their search engines.
Now CD PROJEKT RED have caved as well and will not be re-releasing the Taiwanese game Devotion on their DRM-free games service GOG (Good Old Games). Just hours after announcing that they will release the game, they backpaddled.
Like Valve Corporation, CD PROJEKT RED refused to reveal the real details for their reason and instead said it was due to gamer outrage.
“Earlier today it was announced that the game Devotion is coming to GOG. After receiving many messages from gamers, we have decided not to list the game in our store,” the official GOG.COM account tweeted.
However, the real gamers are not being fooled by GOG’s statement and believe it is because of pressure from the Chinese Communist Party government.
“Gamers?” One user wrote on Reddit. “I love how they had no choice in using that word. Its either blame it on the people least likely to care or they admit they are following the wishes of a totalitarian, genocidal government.”
Even people on Twitter new exactly what was going on.
“At least you could be honest with us. You should know that we are not stupid enough to believe your statement without looking into the game and finding lots of articles as to why ‘gamers’ would opposite it,” a clued-in Twitter user posted.
Unfortunately, the only way to get a copy of Devotion outside of Taiwan is to download it, and it is becoming increasingly more difficult now that big companies like GOG and Steam have banned the game.