The Kremlin has said that it has no information on whether Russian President Vladimir Putin plays any video games.
“I am unaware that the president had played video games. I have never seen it and have not heard this from him,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday.
Putin briefly mentioned video games during his meeting with a group of young entrepreneurs at a business expo in Moscow on Tuesday.
Vasily Ovchinnikov, the head of Russia’s Organization for the Development of the Video Game Industry, asked the president if he had “played on his off-days.”
“I play on my working days,” Putin replied, in what was widely understood as a joke.
The president previously agreed to bring up opening BRICS markets to Russian developers at the upcoming summit in August.
In 2022, Putin said he found it “concerning that video games are more in demand than books and music.” He argued that, apart from being entertaining, good games should be educational and help “develop one’s intellect.”
Russian media reported in December that the government was considering investing up to $50 billion in the video game industry to help support more developers and titles.