"Witcher" interview, via 'Codex

[morgos]

:cool:

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hey guys, what is the subject of the chat? :">

 

the sith shall RISE AND WIN AND FRECKIN JEDI'S SHALL SUFFER

[Darque]

The Witcher game

[kumquatq3]

CAT FIGHT! MEEEEEEEEEOW!

[Dark_Raven]

There are no cat fights, move along loco goto.

[Shadowstrider]

I still do not understand.

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Darque doesn't think like you and me. Years of killing zombies with poor controls schemes have left her bitter at the world.

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You win, Darq has been OWN3D.

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Says the person who ran around the thread clueless yelling "I still do not understand"! "

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Point not found? Do not be mad that you were OWN3D, it happens to everyone.

 

Plus I do not understand the short hand version of all of the names here. DQ

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Stop spamming in the thread.

 

Back on topic:

 

The Witcher has been in development for several years, and I have seen very little evidence of progress. This means, at least to me, that the game's preliminary announcement was too early and full of hype, or that the game has progressed very little since the original anouncement. I'm inclined to believe the first over the second. In either case, I am going to wait for reviews and user-feedback before even considering a purchase.

[Dhruin]

What do you mean by "very little evidence of progress"? What sort of progress are you expecting to see?

 

On a general note, yes, the game was "announced" early (it was more revealed than formally announced at the time). The team was small - about a dozen people - and there was no firm release date for some time. I'm not sure why anyone would think they had cancelled - there has been a pretty constant flow of material over the time as far as I recall. We were then told they wanted to be code complete at the end of 2005 with "several months of polishing and balancing" to follow...so something like Q2 2006. The delay to 2007 puts it something like 6-9 months behind schedule -- quite like an awful lot of projects really. Can't think of too many that ship on time.

 

At this stage, any comparison with STALKER is a bit unfair. Time will obviously tell how it all pans out. The reaction at RPG Codex sort of underscores one of the possible reasons for an early announcement: it's just plain hard breaking into gamer's consciousness for some projects. Look at how many people over there have said "hey - this looks alright!"...but all of that info has been out there for 2 years or so.

[Tigranes]

Well, I tend to agree with SS that we haven't seen that much new info except for changes to the combat system, but perhaps that's because I/we aren't following it vigorously. (e.g. the DA debate a couple days back.)

[StillLife]

The Witcher has been in development for several years, and I have seen very little evidence of progress.  This means, at least to me, that the game's preliminary announcement was too early and full of hype, or that the game has progressed very little since the original anouncement.  I'm inclined to believe the first over the second.  In either case, I am going to wait for reviews and user-feedback before even considering a purchase.

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This game was only announced what, like two-three years ago? The announcement probably was way too early, but perhaps they were trying to strike while the iron -- or in this case, the Aurora engine -- was hot, and draw some interest from NWN fans and maybe a publisher? Earlier when it was announced, I read quite a bit about it and it struck me as little more than a professional Diablo Clone/NWN mod based on a fiction novel. After this recent interview, it sounds like they've actually tried to put a fair amount of depth and complexity into it. Sounds like solid progress to me.

 

Even if it is coming along slower than it should, I'd think that could be an equally good or bad sign. I'm personally always much more wary of games that have short development cycles *cough*Obsidian Isle*cough*, than long one's, as rushed games usually leave something to be desired in one area too many.

 

Fargo from Gamespy made a comment about the game recently on the forums there:

 

Yeah, the problem with The Witcher is that it's been in development too long -- it was looking HOT a couple of years ago. By the time it ships the graphics should be nice but not earth-shaking. Don't know if you can see it from the trailer but there's lots of nice detail with ground clutter, puddles, weather effects, fog, day/night cycles -- it looks pretty good.

 

The combat has a weird combat system where certain types of attacks are more effective against enemies and you can build up certain combos. It's hard to tell whether it'll be fun or not, but it looks good.

 

The thing that I thought was the most interesting is that as a Witcher you can drink magical potions, which are basically poison for normal people. But, if you drink too many, you succumb to the poison. So, as you drink more of this stuff, your screen bleaches out the color, and grows red around the edges, and you get these red floaters and can start to hear your heartbeat. You're always trying to find this balance where you can juice yourself up with all these magical buffs, but without killing yourself.

 

So, it's too early to tell, but even if it IS looking a little long-in-the-tooth, Witcher could be one of those sleeper hit games.

 

Sounds kinda cool to me.

 

Look at how many people over there have said "hey - this looks alright!"...but all of that info has been out there for 2 years or so.

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Yep, I was one of them.

Edited April 20, 2006 by StillLife

[kumquatq3]

It will be looking "long in the tooth" in 2007 I'd guess, still looks pretty good now imo

 

 

at the very least it avoids the plastic look all these new games have. Whats the deal with that anyways.

Edited April 20, 2006 by kumquatq3

[mkreku]

I thought both The Witcher and STALKER looked awesome when they were first announced. Now they both look inferior to an already released game: Oblivion. Imagine what the common player will think in 2007.

 

It seems to me that those two development houses have some artistic talent and some programming talent, but they seem to lack something. Someone who can force them to complete the projects on time. Maybe they lack a Feargus?

[Dhruin]

I think you are way off with that. Oblivion was delayed 4 months and that wasn't announced until after the anticipated release date, not to mention Bethsoft's prior reputation (fairly deserved or not) for timely releases. Do they need help releasing on time?

 

What will the average player think? They won't. The Witcher is never going to achieve Oblivion's hype prior to release no matter how good it is (or isn't). Most players won't know it exists unless the game gathers an audience and even then the awareness will be peripheral. Personally, I like the darker art style regardless of the technical aspects. I still think it looks better than NWN2 and that doesn't come out until Sept.

[Fighter]

STALKER people are just over ambitious. They had a great engine with physics and nice graphics. But they wanted to build a huge fully explorable world, freestyle gameplay, unscripted AI and blah, blah, blah....

 

It's just too much ambition. They should have just made a story focused FPS like Half-Life. Now their game already looks outdated.

Edited April 20, 2006 by Fighter

[mkreku]

I think you are way off with that.  Oblivion was delayed 4 months and that wasn't announced until after the anticipated release date, not to mention Bethsoft's prior reputation (fairly deserved or not) for timely releases.  Do they need help releasing on time?

Oblivion was released. The Witcher and STALKER are still in development. No, I don't think Bethesda need any help, they are obviously capable of finishing projects on their own.

 

I still remember one of the early press releases I got regarding STALKER. It was from THQ announcing that they bought the world-wide publishing rights and that STALKER: Oblivion Lost would be released in 2004. The press release was from very early 2003.

 

I think The Witcher will be released.. sometime in the future. STALKER on the other hand.. Who knows.

[Dhruin]

I'm not debating STALKER - I just think that's an unfair comparison for The Witcher at this point. I accept nothing is proven of them - not the quality, not their ability to deliver; no argument. But a self-financed company that has been around for a decade taking a perfectly common period of development time...what's the problem? It may turn out to be crap but this attitude seems at odds with the oft-seen complaint that games are rushed and released before they are ready.

 

You'll see the same thing over at BioWare's Dragon Age forums.

[Shadowstrider]

What do you mean by "very little evidence of progress"?  What sort of progress are you expecting to see?

 

On a general note, yes, the game was "announced" early (it was more revealed than formally announced at the time).  The team was small - about a dozen people - and there was no firm release date for some time.  I'm not sure why anyone would think they had cancelled - there has been a pretty constant flow of material over the time as far as I recall.  We were then told they wanted to be code complete at the end of 2005 with "several months of polishing and balancing" to follow...so something like Q2 2006.  The delay to 2007 puts it something like 6-9 months behind schedule -- quite like an awful lot of projects really.  Can't think of too many that ship on time.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

STAND TRUE! DEFEND THE CAUSE!

 

Sorry, not buying it. You can dress an announcement up in any fancy title or adornment, it is still an announcement.

 

What sort of progress am I expecting to see? How about any? I've seen several screenshots of ambience and action, but none of how dialogue will work. How about character management? I'd settle for a single, placeholder interface screen saying "this is what it might look like." Tons of concept art and "ohhhh look at this" but nothing of substance.

 

This is the most substance I've seen from the game:

http://www.thewitcher.com/inc/show.asp?n=365&t=1

"A local harlot helped us with distracting one of the guards. Now it's gonna be easier to complete the quest."

 

At least I can get the ladies of the evening to help me!

 

Does the game look bad? No. Does it look good? Kinda. Is there enough information readily available to make any judgments on the game? Not by a long shot. When a game is delayed and the information is already sparse, it doesn't inspire confidence.

[kumquatq3]

Sorry, not buying it.  You can dress an announcement up in any fancy title or adornment, it is still an announcement.

 

What sort of progress am I expecting to see?  How about any?  I've seen several screenshots of ambience and action, but none of how dialogue will work.  How about character management?  I'd settle for a single, placeholder interface screen saying "this is what it might look like."  Tons of concept art and "ohhhh look at this" but nothing of substance.

 

You should get the PR dept. at Beth to teach them about regular updates and press releases of substance!

 

(It was there! I had too!)

 

 

Seriously, they said in the interview that they would release a bunch of new info/images pre-E3. So, I guess we see if your point stands up then.

[Hurlshort]

The Witcher doesn't look impressive enough to need a 4 year development cycle. It's only being released on one platform, whereas Oblivion had to spend time getting prepped for the 360. It's not like they are building a new engine. I don't really get the hold up. It's a single player RPG. 2-3 years should be an easy timeline to meet.

 

PS:T, BG2, and Icewind Dale games never took 4-5 years to make. They churned them out rather quickly because the engine was done.

[kumquatq3]

Those eastern Euro games tend to take awhile

[astr0creep]

The Witcher doesn't look impressive enough to need a 4 year development cycle.  It's only being released on one platform, whereas Oblivion had to spend time getting prepped for the 360.  It's not like they are building a new engine.  I don't really get the hold up.  It's a single player RPG.  2-3 years should be an easy timeline to meet.

 

PS:T, BG2, and Icewind Dale games never took 4-5 years to make.  They churned them out rather quickly because the engine was done.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I would say QA and localization.

[Shadowstrider]

Sorry, not buying it.  You can dress an announcement up in any fancy title or adornment, it is still an announcement.

 

What sort of progress am I expecting to see?  How about any?  I've seen several screenshots of ambience and action, but none of how dialogue will work.  How about character management?  I'd settle for a single, placeholder interface screen saying "this is what it might look like."  Tons of concept art and "ohhhh look at this" but nothing of substance.

 

You should get the PR dept. at Beth to teach them about regular updates and press releases of substance!

 

(It was there! I had too!)

 

 

Seriously, they said in the interview that they would release a bunch of new info/images pre-E3. So, I guess we see if your point stands up then.

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There was nothing in my post about "regular" press releases.

 

As for press releases of substance, there was plenty of information out there about Oblivion. At E3, a year before release, there was demo movie revealing how dialogue would work, what the interface looked like, how combat handled and tons of other schtuff.

 

The information continued to roll out, perhaps not steadily, but certainly continued to roll out.

 

P.S. Not a thread about Oblivion.

[kumquatq3]

As for press releases of substance, there was plenty of information out there about Oblivion. At E3, a year before release, there was demo movie revealing how dialogue would work, what the interface looked like, how combat handled and tons of other schtuff.

 

The information continued to roll out, perhaps not steadily, but certainly continued to roll out.

 

So, considering The Witcher is scheduled for this time next year, wouldn't you say it would be fair to wait to see what E3 holds this year (The E3 a year before its release)?

 

 

P.S. Not a thread about Oblivion.

 

Sorry boss

[Dhruin]

STAND TRUE!  DEFEND THE CAUSE!

 

Urgh. I was hoping to have some sort of conversation before accusations of fanboyism came up.

 

Sorry, not buying it.  You can dress an announcement up in any fancy title or adornment, it is still an announcement.

 

Fair enough.

 

What sort of progress am I expecting to see?  How about any?  I've seen several screenshots of ambience and action, but none of how dialogue will work.  How about character management?  I'd settle for a single, placeholder interface screen saying "this is what it might look like."  Tons of concept art and "ohhhh look at this" but nothing of substance.

 

I'd like to see more of that too but isn't exactly unusual. I must have missed all the official screens Bethsoft put out for Oblivion with reasonable shots of dialogue. I don't see any here, although the PC screens do show a single screen with three topics, if that counts as showing "dialogue". Much as I hate that UI's often aren't shown, I'm pretty sure you know the UI is often one of the last things nailed down and those pesky marketing folks tend to prefer action shots.

 

This is the most substance I've seen from the game:

http://www.thewitcher.com/inc/show.asp?n=365&t=1

"A local harlot helped us with distracting one of the guards. Now it's gonna be easier to complete the quest."

 

At least I can get the ladies of the evening to help me!

 

There is certainly more than that if you look. You can download video footage of the demo from E3 or Leipzig last year where you will see different examples of multiple approaches - including the interface and a little dialogue. There are also other videos and plenty of previews with different examples.

 

Does the game look bad?  No.  Does it look good?  Kinda.  Is there enough information readily available to make any judgments on the game?  Not by a long shot.  When a game is delayed and the information is already sparse, it doesn't inspire confidence.

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I don't necessarily disagree with any of that except the "sparse". I think they have released quite a bit - more than many other games and certainly as much as had been released for Oblivion by the original anticipated release. I'd definitely like to see more dialogue and I'm curious about how other things they have released info on actually turn out in the gameplay.

 

Just to be clear, I only use Oblivion as the most recent and obvious example - not to bash it.

 

It's a single player RPG. 2-3 years should be an easy timeline to meet.

 

PS:T, BG2, and Icewind Dale games never took 4-5 years to make. They churned them out rather quickly because the engine was done.

 

Yeah...I'm not a dev but I'm confident there are as many (more?) single-player projects that exceed 3 years than those that run under it. I also suspect completely rewriting NWN's renderer and using the engine in a game that has no resemblance to D&D or the combat in NWN sounds like quite a lot more work than re-using the Infinity Engine. The 2007 release (if met) would mean heading for 4 years, not 5.

[Shadowstrider]

The problem with comparing it to Oblivion, at all, is the announcement to release timeline.

 

Witcher was unveiled as early as E3 2004. I have seen no progress in the game, and it is 2 years later. The information regarding the game is sparse in terms of substance. Sure, we've seen dozens of "Action" and "Ambience" shots and clips, but I am only aware of the one instance of dialogue, which was far from substantial.

 

The E3 video of Oblivion had more dialogue, and I'm sure I could dig up videos or screens with more substance than the Witcher's, but I'm a bit busy at the moment (packing to go out of town). I'm 99.999% sure that I knew more about Oblivion in November '05 than I know about the Witcher now, and I had much less interest in Oblivion in November '05 (almost 0) than I have for the Witcher now.

Edited April 21, 2006 by Shadowstrider

[Shadowstrider]

So, considering The Witcher is scheduled for this time next year, wouldn't you say it would be fair to wait to see what E3 holds this year (The E3 a year before its release)?

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Sure, if the Witcher had only just been announced. First glimpses of Oblivion were pretty much the same as those at release. On the other hand, the Witcher has been in the public eye for at least 2 years, and I've seen very little progress.

 

Beginning to see the difference?

[Dhruin]

We simply see it differently. I acknowledge that Oblivion's "public" timeline is considerably shorter, although I'm not sure why that makes much of a difference to the material that gets released over that period.

 

I disagree that there was more "substance" available for Oblivion, unless you simply count a higher profile or more previews because of the level of anticipation. Every Oblivion preview came from one of three sources including the original E3 demonstration and the roadtrip in 2005 - the first person to publish gameplay impressions from independent play (as opposed to Bethsoft demos) was Desslock in late 2005 for PC Gamer. I don't want to waste your time on such a trivial matter but feel free to have a look through Oblivion's E3 footage - there simply isn't much real dialogue shown. Other demos were mocked up for the display - the woman and the dog on fire just isn't a real experience for an actual Oblivion player.

 

The Witcher's E3 demo played through two gameplay segments multiple times, showing two or three different approaches for those segments. That's more substance to me than mocked up RAI displays.