The Witcher 2 - Interview @ Eurogamer

Eurogamer interviews Senior Producer Tomasz Gop. They talk about the death of boxed PC games, exclusive content to retailers, Dragon Age 2 and more:

Eurogamer: You mention the competition. Is Dragon Age II The Witcher 2's biggest competitor?

 

Tomasz Gop: They are similar games in a way. It is competition, but we're not thinking that they're going to kill us, or wipe us out with their marketing.

 

We're thinking, if people like role-playing games they will buy all of them because you get two or three role-playing games a year – triple-A ones. OK, yes, they are competition, but if one competitor wiped out another one, it would mean a 30 per cent decrease in the role-playing game market. Who wants that? That's not good for anyone.

 

They are competition, but it's nothing we're afraid of.

 

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Eurogamer: Dragon Age II's combat is more action-driven than the first game's, and so is The Witcher 2's. Why are role-playing games becoming more action-orientated?

 

Tomasz Gop: You're right, but it's misleading for a lot of people. I can't say it's not true. It is true. Developers want to have more action in their games. Boring games are not good. It's not like you're changing the genre of the game. Role-playing games will not become shooters... I mean, Mass Effect was an exception. OK, we're not doing Mass Effect.

 

What I'm trying to say is a lot of things that were happening in role-playing games on a daily basis years ago are too hardcore right now. It's not like we're doing a completely different genre. This is what the role-playing game is right now.

 

The story is never dumbed down. Good role-playing games kept really good story, and you experience the story in an even deeper way than you would previously because of better graphics, direction and cut-scenes.

 

Combat is more spectacular. The means to express it is just to make it real-time. Previously combat was more turn-based. We don't have turn-based combat right now. It's a better means of expression.