As widely predicted by the internet speculators, CD Projekt has just confirmed that the whole "shut down" of its DRM-free web site GoG.com (Good Old Games) was just a marketing stunt. In fact the service is relaunching. The web site became inaccessible last Sunday with the site saying the service was closing "due to business and technical reasons." According to an online press conference today with GoG.com reps, 98 percent of the site's code has been rewritten for the relaunch that will allow six times the amount of users and traffic compared to the old version. The game will still offer DRM-free downloads of PC games and will still not use a download client.

While we are happy that GoG.com is coming back we are not happy at all that CD Projekt made the call to deliberately deceive the media and its customers about its status. While the company certainly generated a ton of press it did so in the wrong way, in our opinion. We will update this post with any new info that comes from the online conference.

Update: The relaunch will happen on Thursday at 8 am Eastern time and will add the original Baldur's Gate and its expansion pack to the service on Thursday as well for $9.99. GoG.com execs also said during the online press conference that the ultimate goal is for GoG.com to be the "number one alternative" to the Steam download service.