It seems like a fact of life in the gaming industry that any creative, semi-successful property gets bought by one of the AAA world-eaters like Electronic Arts Inc, Activision Blizzard Inc, or…well, that’s about it. Recently rumors started flying that Witcher series developer CD Projekt RED could be in acquisition talks with EA, but the Warsaw-based studio has firmly stated that those rumors are completely false.

“@CDPROJEKTRED signing a publishing deal with EA? Pleas [sic] let this be just a stupid internet rumour,” a fan said on Twitter (via Gamespot).

“Just bumped into Marcin Iwiński – it was new to him,” responded CD Projekt Community Lead & Website Coordinator Marcin Momot. “I guess the ‘informer’ has better insight than the @CDPROJEKTRED founder. :)”

The rumor supposedly began on DSO Gaming, where a user claimed to have inside information from a CD Projekt employee about a potential buyout by EA.

“I’m employee of CDProjekt Red and I have some bad news to share with you,” DSO Gaming’s source said. “Our management is probably talking with Electronic Arts about potential take over. Electronic Arts representatives are currently visiting our studio and meeting with top management. We are not going to release any game soon, so for sure it’s not about any publishing deal, so the only possible reason for EA guys being here is that they want to buy us.”

While the rumor has ultimately proven false, the reaction by CD Projekt fans demonstrates both the strong positive reputation of the Polish studio as well as the intensely negative reputation of EA with gamers.

CD Projekt’s rapport with fans is largely due to the studio’s generosity with free downloadable content and bonus items that it includes with its games. For example, the studio released over a dozen free content patches for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, which included alternate character models, new weapons and armor, and bonus quests, as well as a New Game+ mode that allows players to restart the game with all of their abilities on a higher difficulty. CD Projekt has also given consumers extra digital content with their games such as papercraft printouts, digital comics, soundtracks, and more.

EA, on the other hand, has almost the exact opposite reputation, and the publisher was even voted the worst company in America by a Consumerist poll… twice.

Image courtesy of CD Projekt RED