- Lead story designer, Artur Ganszyniec, says the development team didn’t know the Wild Hunt were elves while making The Witcher
- He says The Witcher remake will need to change this detail to fit in with what we learn in The Witcher 3
- The designer also revealed that the game’s twist ending wasn’t planned by the story team, calling it a “mistake”
The Witcher‘s lead story designer Artur Ganszyniec has revealed new behind-the-scenes details about the development of the 2007 game ahead of its remake.
Ganszyniec has been playing through the role-playing game (RPG) while delivering his commentary on YouTube, and in the developer’s latest video, spoke about what The Witcher remake will need to change to align with events that take place in the following games (via GamesRadar).
The designer touched on the Wild Hunt, the mythological group of hunters that appeared in the first game, and again in The Witcher 3i. He said the team at CD Projekt Red didn’t know that they were elves at the time of the first game’s development.
“In the first The Witcher, the Wild Hunt is more like the Wild Hunt from the legends,” Ganszyniec said.
“We didn’t know yet they are elves in armor. We really thought of them as wraiths, and omens of death, and tools of destiny. This part will probably need to be changed a bit in the remake.”
The Wild Hunt is referred to as “an omen of war and tragedy” in the game, which fits their mythological roots as spectral huntsmen; however, Ganszyniec points out that in The Witcher 3, it’s revealed they’re elves trying to stop a magical infection known as the White Frost.
“Here the King of the Hunt is the personification of death,” he remarked when showing the scene where Geralt meets the Hunt’s leader, “and that will take some retrofitting in the remake, I think.”
In the same playthrough, Ganszyniec also revealed that the game’s twist ending wasn’t something the team originally planned, and thinks it was a “mistake”.
At the end of the game, Geralt goes to collect payment from King Foltest and ends up running into a mysterious assassin. After a sword fight, it’s revealed that the assassin is a witcher.
According to Ganszyniec, that’s where the story team wanted the game to end, “like with an open question and open future.” However, while finishing the game, it was decided to include an animated outro that set the stage for The Witcher 2.
“While we were finishing the game, someone decided—like the board decided, or [CD Projekt co-founder Michał Kiciński] decided that we needed an animated outro of the game,” he explained.
“And the script for this … it was created not really involving the story team. So it was sort of, we weren’t really paying attention. And that was a mistake I think.”
Ganszyniec continued: “It became evident that the next game will have to follow up on this and tell a story about witchers who are killing kings for some reason. And that’s why the second Witcher is very political and there’s not really much room for exploring who Geralt is, his family, his history, and stuff like this.”
CD Projekt Red has confirmed that The Witcher remake is in development at Fool’s Theory. The studio is currently all hands on deck making The Witcher 4, which will be the first game in a new trilogy of Witcher games that it wants to release within a six-year time frame.
There have also been rumors that CDPR is working on a third expansion for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, which is reportedly releasing this year.
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