Activision Blizzard and Epic Games suspend sales in Russia due to its Ukraine attack

Activision Blizzard and Epic Games are the latest publishers to suspend sales in Russia because of their attack on Ukraine. Activision Blizzard and Epic Games have joined a developing list of distributors suspending sales of their games in Russia because of the country’s continuous invasion of Ukraine. In a representative letter it shared publicly on Friday, Activision president and chief operating officer Daniel Alegre said the organization would stop selling its games to Russian consumers. It will likewise temporarily quit offering in-game microtransactions to those equivalent clients.

One day after Activision’s declaration, Epic Games said it also was ending transactions within the country.

“We are committed to helping those impacted by the terrifying violence taking place in Ukraine,” Activision Blizzard wrote on Twitter.

“Today, we are announcing the suspension of new sales of and in our games in Russia while this conflict continues, as well as other efforts to assist Ukraine,” its statement continued.

Activision Blizzard additionally encouraged it would match representative donations to alleviation associations; hitherto, $300,000 USD has been raised.

In the meantime, Epic Games declared it will likewise suspend sales in Russia, however won’t go as far as to block communications tools within the region.

“Epic is stopping commerce with Russia in our games in response to its invasion of Ukraine,” reads a statement. “We’re not blocking access for the same reason other communication tools remain online: the free world should keep all lines of dialogue open.”

Last week, we revealed that Microsoft and EA had suspended sales in Russia, with Sony’s Gran Turismo 7 additionally pulled from digital marketplaces.

It’s unclear on the off chance that Epic’s decision includes the two its own titles and any in-game microtransactions it offers in Fortnite. Also, strikingly neither Activision nor Epic referenced Belarus in their respective declarations.

In stopping sales to Russia, Activision and Epic join organizations like Microsoft, Electronic Arts, and CD Projekt Red. Russia isn’t a small market either. As indicated by a 2021 estimate from Statista, the country, with around $2.7 billion in industry revenue that year, was the eighth biggest market for video games.

Activision Blizzard and Epic Games are in good company to suspend their sales in the country. Microsoft, which is hoping to secure Activision Blizzard in a $68.7 billion deal, stopped “all new sales of Microsoft products and services in Russia.” That incorporates Xbox consoles, Microsoft-published games, and the Xbox Cloud Gaming service as well as the organization’s different products.

Electronic Arts and CD Projekt Red have made comparative declarations. Between these five organizations, large numbers of the world’s most famous games can never again be bought in Russia, including Call of Duty and Battlefield to Fortnite and Cyberpunk 2077 being impacted. Cd Projekt Red has additionally stopped sales through its GOG platform in Russia and Belarus.