Here's why The Witcher 3 never showed us Geralt's 100-year-old wang

The Witcher is pretty saucy. The books, games and now TV show love a bit of skin, and here at PC Gamer we obviously can't get enough of Geralt soaking in the tub. But CD Projekt Red never let us see 'little Geralt,' for instance, even if we saw his lovely bottom. The answer is apparently regional restrictions.

It probably won't come as a surprise, as developers are often limited to what they can show by regional rating boards, especially in stricter countries like Australia where they didn't have an 18+ rating until 2013, and Germany, which until recently imposed massive restrictions on what media covering World War 2, or anything that featured Nazis, could depict.

GameStar reports that, in the case of The Witcher 3, nudity was especially an issue when it came to its playable characters, Geralt and Ciri. While we see both of them undressed several times, the scenes always stopped short of full nudity.

Quest designer Philip Weber told the German website that there were a range of restrictions in all countries where The Witcher 3 was published. You can see them chatting on a Twitch stream, but you'll need to understand German.

CDPR's Fabian Mario Doehla confirmed this, adding that "The moment you have (active) control, it is always evaluated differently." My German isn't exactly up to snuff, so this comes via Google Translate.

The German rating board USK gives extra weight to nudity when it's a playable character swinging their cock around. "There is a greater risk of impairment," says CDPR's Carolin Wendt, referring to the USK's fears that playing a naked character could affect a young person's psychological development.

The USK confirmed this, telling GameStar that nudity itself wasn't considered a problem on its own or damaging to young people, but "if undressed people are depicted in a sexual or violent context, a development-impairing—in extreme cases even a youth-endangering and therefore relevant to indexing—is quite possible."

So if you want to see Geralt's 100-year-old willy, you're just going to have to hope CD Projekt Red makes him an NPC in another game. One can dream.

Cheers, PCGamesN.

Fraser is the UK online editor and has actually met The Internet in person. With over a decade of experience, he's been around the block a few times, serving as a freelancer, news editor and prolific reviewer. Strategy games have been a 30-year-long obsession, from tiny RTSs to sprawling political sims, and he never turns down the chance to rave about Total War or Crusader Kings. He's also been known to set up shop in the latest MMO and likes to wind down with an endlessly deep, systemic RPG. These days, when he's not editing, he can usually be found writing features that are 1,000 words too long or talking about his dog.