I was chatting with Tomas Gop (senior producer on The Witcher 2) last week while CD Projekt was in town to show off a new slice of its action-RPG. When the demo was done, I asked him directly: "How would you distinguish your game from Dragon Age 2?" Here's what he said.
Tomas Gop: "That's quite easy, actually. There are a few things that I can easily find. First, we don't have a generic fantasy world. I mean [the author] Andrzej Sapkowski spent a huge part of his life doing this. It's comfortable for us. It's consistent, it's really working. Everything is kind of logical in this world, and it works out well for us. The other thing--I don't really think it is possible to distinguish some of the things you're choosing between as 'good or bad' or 'good and evil.' We always like to think about when you have a choice in The Witcher, it's more like what I would actually do.
It's not black and white, and that's the most important thing. And we look better. I mean, sorry, seriously--I love Bethesda, BioWare games, I play them. But, c'mon. You cannot be indifferent to that, you cannot omit the difference. We simply look better."
End quote. In my deep-set fantasy where every game developer is represented by a high school archetype (Valve is the captain of the chess team), CD Projekt just made fun of BioWare's shoes. Only a proper beauty pageant can settle this. Which game's graphics appeal to you more?
The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings
Dragon Age 2
The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings
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Dragon Age 2
If your answer was "there's equal merit in a stylized aesthetic and a realistic representation of fantasy, Evan," you are a coward .
Evan's a hardcore FPS enthusiast who joined PC Gamer way back in 2008. After an era spent publishing reviews, news, and cover features, he now oversees editorial operations for PC Gamer worldwide, including setting policy, training, and editing stories written by the wider team. His most-played FPSes are Hunt: Showdown, Team Fortress 2, Team Fortress Classic, Rainbow Six Siege, and Counter-Strike. His first multiplayer FPS was Quake 2, played on serial LAN in his uncle's basement, the ideal conditions for instilling a lifelong fondness for fragging.
