The Witcher 2 Enhanced Edition Interview

GameTrailers has recently kicked off a “Side Mission” blog feed, and one of the first interviews to be featured there is a Q&A with CD Projekt RED’s Adam Badowski about the success they’ve enjoyed with The Witcher series, their ambitious plans for The Witcher 2 Enhanced Edition, what it means for the series to make its debut on consoles, and more. A sampling:

DK: There used to be a distinct difference between RPG titles and Action or Adventure titles, but those lines have been blurred in recent years as gamers crave more intense combat situations in tandem with engaging, interactive plot lines. How do you see the RPG genre evolving over the next generation and what role do you hope to play in that process?

AB: Sometimes it worries me where RPGs are going nowadays. As I said we are inspired by classics. For us the two main features of an RPG are freedom and story. They have to coexist in a good game of this genre.

The polarization of these two in modern RPGs is not where we are going. We know that a 100 per cent sandbox game will make the story suffer. And a completely narrative driven game will limit the choice. The industry often doesn’t put effort to combine the two. It’s a hard job and requires a lot of time and work, but I think we’ve accomplished it.

The Witcher’s world isn’t the most open, but we give complete freedom when It comes to the story. As our slogan for the Enhanced Edition says a true hero forges his own story. That’s what Geralt does. Maybe you can’t wander the world as you wish, but surely you can straw around different gameworld states you wander around storylines, they are completely up to you.

Modern RPGs don’t go this way, because it requires a lot of effort to create a chapter of a game that a player may not see because of his choice, but that’s what we did. Even if RPGs introduce more action they can’t lose those two elements story and freedom. And our games will always have these traits.

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DK: Obviously, bringing the franchise to the console crowd opens it up to a much wider audience. In this day and age, it’s important for franchises to differentiate themselves by possessing a certain quality, or (identity), that the masses can come to know and love. Have you considered the (identity) of The Witcher as a franchise? If so, what is it and how do you think it stands out from other high-profile franchises on the market today?

AB:I would point out the things I already mentioned: the types of choice you make their moral greyness, their consequences and the character himself. I don’t recall an RPG for this generation of consoles, which treats players like we do.

We think immersion is one of the most important things while playing an RPG and we achieve this by making players feel real emotions. We didn’t want players to react by calculations no. If Geralt has to make a quick decision, it has to be based on what the players feels, on his emotion-driven instincts not by gameplay features he wants to achieve, like a karma meter increase. Just like in real life you don’t care about an non-existing point system that rewards you for good deeds.