Now it’s official: computer games are political. On the other hand, parts of the scene and some developers had recently vehemently resisted. They preferred to see the games as pure entertainment. The war in Ukraine has now finally made this ducking away untenable. A number of publishers and developers have now joined the sanctions against Russia. Microsoft supports Ukraine against cyber attacks and no longer sells games in Russia. Also other big studios like Activision Blizzard, Ubisoft and EA have joined the boycott. The games from these developers and providers can still be played in Russia, but can no longer be purchased.
Many developers also donated money or took other actions. The company Wargaming for example, donated $1 million to the Ukrainian Red Cross and fired a developer who posted his support for the Russian attack on Facebook. Polish studio CD Projekt Red, known for the “Witcher” games and “Cyberpunk 2077”. donated more than 200,000 euros to an aid organization. And legendary programmer John Romero did released a new level for his 1994 classic “Doom 2”., which you can download for five euros. So far, 25,000 euros are said to have been raised, which will go to the Ukrainian Red Cross and the United Nations relief fund.
The companies and developers will follow suit Appeal by the Ukrainian digital minister Mykhailo Fedorov on Twitter, who demanded that Russian and Belarusian players be banned from all e-sports events and have their accounts blocked. The gaming sanctions do not go that far. The ban on sales is likely to have an economic impact, but not have a major impact on civil society, if only because the trade in pirated copies is booming in Russia. And due to the sanctions imposed by Western credit card companies, purchases in the companies’ digital shops were already difficult to do anyway.
The measures taken by the first e-sports companies are also more symbolic. The German organization ESL two Russian teams allegedly linked to the Kremlin banned from events. However, players are still allowed to compete if they are not representing their country, team or a sponsor.
Blocking all Russian accounts across the board, on the other hand, would probably have a really big impact on civil society there, but it might not be the most sensible measure at all. Epic Games, which distributes the popular game “Fortnite”, among other things, announced that deliberately not to switch off their services: “The free world should keep all avenues open for dialogue,” the company wrote on Twitter. In fact, the platforms on which digital games run have taken on the role of social networks, especially for many young people. There is already speculation as to whether information that contradicts state propaganda could be sent to Russia via these channels. Then nobody could really claim that computer games are apolitical.