14 DAY TRIAL // Maciej Szczesnik, the lead gameplay designer working at CD Projekt RED on The Witcher series, says that they never wanted to make the player identify with protagonist Geralt, instead aiming to generate the more elusive feeling of empathy.
The developer tells Gamasutra that, “It's similar to watching movies, right? If you can empathize with the main character, you will feel his emotions and you will be able to understand his motivations, and you'll be able to eventually understand the storyline, and you will be able to like it.”
Many modern movies and video games fail because the creators of the content fail to create a connection between viewer or player and main character and instead they focus on telling a complex story that fails to connect in any way.
Marek Ziemak, a gameplay producer on The Witcher 2, ads, “The thing we are really proud of is that some of the players say that he would probably choose this thing, and the others say he would choose the other thing. So we're delivering two choices.”
The Witcher series has always been praised for the depth of its story and for how it managed to make Geralt an interesting character without forcing the player to judge his actions.
As the two games in the series progress, players can decide on their own how they see him instead of getting that information directly from the developers.
A rumor from a Polish journalist suggests that CD Projekt RED is now working on an even darker fantasy-based role-playing game that might be launched during 2014.
The team has also recently revealed that its near future title is officially called Cyberpunk 2077 and will deliver more choice and consequences than The Witcher.
A site countdown points to more content for the RPG being delayed in less than a month.