Andrzej Sapkowski on The Witcher Titles

Eurogamer had the chance to talk with Andrzej Sapkowski, author of The Witcher books, who inspired the RPGs from CD Projekt RED, and hear his opinion on the titles and related subjects.

As it turns out, he doesn’t sound particularly enthusiastic about CD Projekt’s work or the potential of videogames in general:

“The game – with all due respect to it, but let’s finally say it openly – is not an ‘alternative version’, nor a sequel. The game is a free adaptation containing elements of my work; an adaptation created by different authors,” he noted.

“Adaptations – although they can in a way relate to the story told in the books – can never aspire to the role of a follow-up. They can never add prologues nor prequels, let alone epilogues and sequels.

“Maybe it’s time to set the matters straight,” he went on. “‘The Witcher’ is a well made video game, its success is well deserved and the creators deserve all the splendour and honour due. But in no way can it be considered to be an ‘alternative version’, nor a ‘sequel’ to the witcher Geralt stories. Because this can only be told by Geralt’s creator. A certain Andrzej Sapkowski.”

Developers can base games on good sci-fi or fantasy books, their worlds, their stories, their heroes, and then beautify them with artwork and a bit of borrowed dialogue, Sapkowski said. “The visual effect will be stunning, the players delighted – some might even consider it to be better and easier digestible than the original book, because in the book the letters are so small…. Some will never even reach for the original book; as for them, the game will be enough,” he believes.

“But it is the book that’s the original, this book is the result of the author’s unique, inimitable talent. ‘Transfer a book into a virtual world’? Funny. It’s impossible.”