The game series “The Witcher” is based on the novels of the same name by Polish writer Andrzej Sapkowski. The author largely stayed out of the development of the games, but he saw a need for action on one detail and wrote a letter.
Where does the information come from? Gry Online’s Adam Zechenter and Maciej Pawlikowski spoke to Artur Ganszyniec, who wrote the story for the first two Witcher titles. Ganszyniec took the opportunity to talk about what happened behind the scenes.
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Author was bothered by the naming
What was that letter? As Ganszyniec reports, The Witcher author Andrzej Sapkowski stayed out of the development of the games, which didn’t particularly interest him anyway. In addition, the writer is said to have had a very pragmatic view: he knew that he could write books, but he doesn’t make films or games, how could he advise?
Nevertheless, the developers included him in certain aspects, such as the map and the naming of the characters. In such a case, Sapkowski probably didn’t like the game at all and made this clear to the team:
We sent him a list of such names and got a rather scathing reply, clearly saying he didn’t like the names. As is usual with Sapkowski, it was language full of complicated expressions, sharp and sarcastic. Of course we took this ‘pill’ and changed the names of many characters.
Artur Ganszyniec via Gry Online
In particular, the author is said to have been bothered by some Slavic names in the game, because initially there were names like Janko or Wojko, which were then changed.
How did the letter come into play? According to Ganszyniec, the letter itself was so “distinctive” that they integrated it into the game without further ado.
Inaccurate, inappropriate, and excruciatingly primitive
Where is the letter in the game? Ganszyniec reveals that there is a playable item to be found in The Witcher 1’s third act that incorporates some quotes from Sapkowski’s letter.
This item is the Professor’s Report in the Kikimore Queen’s corpse. You can read the content here:
…I regret to have to question the merits of our alliance with Princess Adda. The slut is incredibly spoiled and hard to convince. She was incapable of creating an emergency, and her clumsy forgeries led the witcher to her trail. For the time being we keep our word and play Adda’s game. However, since Foltest is likely to return soon, we should tackle the second part of our plan. I’ll probably solve the problem with Geralt of Rivia myself, I think – quickly and drastically. However, I must insist that you no longer refer to him as “son of a bitch” – such names are utterly inaccurate, inappropriate and painfully primitive.
As expected, the delivered substances allow us to control the kikimores and their mother. At least the lab is working properly so we can use Kaer Morhen’s secrets.
professor
The team didn’t take the author’s harsh words too badly in the letter: He just said what was necessary and that was helpful. Incorporating parts of the letter into the game was her way of alleviating the whole thing a bit and at the same time the text was immortalized.
But that was Andrzej Sapkowski’s only influence on the production.
Some fans of another popular franchise would probably prefer the author of the underlying books to stay out of the production of works based on them like the author of The Wichter. Because every new entry into the Harry Potter universe triggers a discussion about the extent to which authors can be separated from their works.
The Harry Potter author has scathingly responded to calls for a boycott of the new Hogwarts Legacy game