Born in Limitation

Polish game development was born in a time of limitations.

After World War II, the country found itself within the sphere of influence of the USSR, cut off from modern technologies and the Western market.

Under these conditions, video games became for many a symbol of freedom, color, and another world – the culture of the West that Poles aspired to reach. Hardware entered homes thanks to private initiative, while programming books were duplicated on photocopiers, much like the leaflets of the democratic opposition. A major breakthrough came with the emergence of computer magazines, which began publishing the first programming courses.

The first Polish video game released commercially was Puszka Pandory – a text-based adventure created for the ZX Spectrum, developed by Marcin Borkowski, who later became the editor-in-chief of the legendary Polish video game magazine Top Secret.