A studio long rooted in Polish soil took its first step beyond national borders in March 2021, when CD Projekt Red formalized a three-year working relationship by acquiring Vancouver's Digital Scapes. Rather than building anew in unfamiliar territory, the company chose to deepen what already existed — a quiet acknowledgment that trust, once earned through shared labor, is itself a kind of foundation. The move signals not merely geographic expansion, but a studio reckoning with the scale of its ambitions and the distributed effort those ambitions will require.
CD Projekt Red Acquires Digital Scapes to Establish Vancouver Studio
Building bridges between Canadian and Polish game development
Mark
Why would CD Projekt Red buy an existing studio instead of just hiring people in Vancouver from scratch?
Mimi
They'd already been working with Digital Scapes for three years on Cyberpunk 2077. The team knew the codebase, the workflow, the culture. Buying them meant keeping that institutional knowledge intact rather than starting over with strangers.
Luke
Right, but we should note that Digital Scapes was a support studio, not a lead developer. They were optimizing and implementing features, not designing the game. That's an important distinction about what CDPR was actually acquiring.
Mark
What does a support studio do, exactly?
Mimi
They handle specialized work—in this case, optimization, feature implementation, and multiplayer development. They're not the creative core; they're the team that makes the core's vision actually work across different platforms and systems.
Luke
And that's why the press release specifically mentions their multiplayer expertise. Cyberpunk promised online modes that still haven't shipped. This acquisition looks like CDPR positioning Digital Scapes to finally build that.
Mark
Is this a big deal for CD Projekt Red?
Mimi
It's their first studio outside Poland, so yes—it signals they're thinking bigger than one country. But it's also pragmatic. They needed more hands on Cyberpunk's post-launch work and the next-gen updates they'd committed to.
Luke
We should be careful not to overstate it. This isn't CDPR opening a major creative hub in Vancouver. It's acquiring a team they already knew and trusted to keep doing support work, just now as employees instead of contractors. That's expansion, but it's a specific kind.
Mark
What does Marcin Chady bring to this?
Mimi
He's the bridge. Polish Canadian, so he understands both cultures. He's positioning this as good for Canadian developers—a chance to work on major franchises—and good for CDPR—access to Canadian talent and expertise.
Luke
That's the pitch, anyway. Whether it actually opens doors for Canadian developers or just means CDPR has a cheaper labor pool in Vancouver—that's something we won't know for a while.
Le Pouls
- CD Projekt Red, still absorbing the turbulent launch of Cyberpunk 2077, is moving quickly to shore up its technical and creative capacity by planting roots in North America.
- The acquisition transforms a quiet support partnership into a fully integrated studio, raising questions about what CDPR is quietly preparing to build next.
- Digital Scapes' highlighted multiplayer expertise points directly at Cyberpunk 2077's still-unfulfilled online modes — a promise the studio has yet to deliver.
- With next-gen console updates for both Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3 already confirmed, the new Vancouver team inherits an immediate and substantial workload.
- The studio's new leader, a Polish Canadian, frames the merger as a cultural bridge — positioning it as an opportunity rather than a corporate transaction.
A studio long rooted in Polish soil took its first step beyond national borders in March 2021, when CD Projekt Red formalized a three-year working relationship by acquiring Vancouver's Digital Scapes. Rather than building anew in unfamiliar territory, the company chose to deepen what already existed — a quiet acknowledgment that trust, once earned through shared labor, is itself a kind of foundation. The move signals not merely geographic expansion, but a studio reckoning with the scale of its ambitions and the distributed effort those ambitions will require.
CD Projekt Red spent its entire history operating from Poland, but March 2021 marked a turning point: the studio announced its first international presence by acquiring Digital Scapes, a Vancouver-based team that had spent three years working alongside CDPR on Cyberpunk 2077. Rather than starting from scratch abroad, the company chose to formalize an existing relationship, folding Digital Scapes into the organization as the foundation of CD Projekt Red Vancouver.
Chief technology officer Pawel Zawodny framed the move as a natural evolution of a trusted partnership, noting that Digital Scapes had contributed meaningfully to Cyberpunk 2077's development and optimization during its difficult production cycle. The Vancouver team, he suggested, would continue supporting CDPR's projects while also helping refine the studio's core technologies.
Leading the new operation is Marcin Chady, a Polish Canadian who brought a personal lens to the announcement — describing the acquisition as a bridge between two game development communities, and an opportunity for Canadian developers to work on some of the industry's most recognized franchises.
The detail that drew the most attention was the press release's emphasis on Digital Scapes' multiplayer expertise. Cyberpunk 2077 had launched in December 2020 in a notoriously troubled state, and the studio had already promised online multiplayer modes that remained undelivered. Acquiring a support studio with proven multiplayer capabilities suggested CDPR was quietly positioning Vancouver to lead that effort — while also helping manage the additional burden of upcoming next-gen console updates for both Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3.
CD Projekt Red, the Polish studio behind The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077, has spent its entire history rooted in one country. That changed in March 2021 when the company announced it was opening its first international studio—not by building from scratch, but by acquiring Digital Scapes, a Vancouver-based support studio that had already spent three years working alongside CDPR on Cyberpunk 2077.
The acquisition came as part of what the company called a strategy update, and it represented a deliberate pivot toward geographic expansion. Digital Scapes had contributed substantially to Cyberpunk 2077's development, handling optimization work and various feature implementations during the game's troubled production. Rather than leave that relationship behind, CDPR decided to formalize it by bringing the entire team into the fold as the foundation of CD Projekt Red Vancouver.
Pawel Zawodny, CDPR's chief technology officer, framed the move as a natural evolution of an existing partnership. He emphasized the three-year working relationship and the trust that had developed between the companies, noting that Digital Scapes had invested significant effort in both developing and optimizing Cyberpunk 2077. Zawodny suggested the acquisition would serve a dual purpose: the Vancouver team would continue supporting CDPR's projects while also helping the studio refine its underlying technologies and expand its technical capabilities.
Marcin Chady, who would lead the new Vancouver operation, brought a personal dimension to the announcement. As a Polish Canadian, Chady saw the acquisition as an opportunity to build connections between the Canadian and Polish game development communities. He positioned the move as mutually beneficial—a chance for Canadian developers to work on CDPR's major franchises while giving the studio access to Canada's established talent base and development expertise.
The press release specifically highlighted Digital Scapes' multiplayer experience, a detail that suggested where CDPR might be directing the new studio's efforts. Cyberpunk 2077 had shipped in a notoriously rough state in December 2020, requiring extensive post-launch support and fixes. The acquisition of a support studio with proven multiplayer capabilities hinted that CDPR was preparing to tackle one of its most ambitious promises: the online multiplayer modes for Cyberpunk that had been announced but not yet delivered. By the time of the acquisition announcement, the company had already confirmed that both Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3 would receive next-generation console updates later that year, adding to the workload that a larger, geographically distributed team could help manage.
Citations marquantes
The well-known Digital Scapes team is our trusted partner. For three years we have been closely working together, and we trust them completely.— Pawel Zawodny, CD Projekt Red CTO
Being a Polish Canadian, I personally take great satisfaction in building bridges between Canadian and Polish game development industries.— Marcin Chady, CD Projekt Red Vancouver head
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