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Welcome back to the second part of Kyle and Claudia’s Q&A on The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. Please check out Part 19 of this retrospective to see the first part of this discussion.
The Witcher 2‘s Narrative Choices
CLAUDIA: Let’s talk about your favourite subject, Triss. I’m going to talk about the larger narrative and then circle around to Triss as I think she is indictive of a larger problem with the game. The first game tried hard to capture the energy and feeling of the short stories. I really appreciated that about it, even though it wasn’t super accurate all the time, there was just an element of love that shown through.
In this game, no offense to it, but that stuff kind of starts to go away in favour of this story the studio is trying to tell. I completely understand where they are coming from, they have a story and they want to tell it. However, the story all over the place is very contradictory to what I come to associate with the characters. So this is a little bit my opinion on the books coming in to mess with my opinion of the games, which is interesting because this is the first time that has happened, I was much more forgiving of the first game. But now that they have had a little time to get this stuff sorted, I’m sitting here and like “You know, Geralt wouldn’t hang out with Foltest.”
KYLE: Oh, yeah!
CLAUDIA: And I get that the entire point of an RPG is to make decisions, but Geralt also wouldn’t pick sides the way the game purposes he would pick sides.
KYLE: Yep!
CLAUDIA: As a character, Geralt always ends up picking sides whether he wants to or not, but it’s always done in a much more personal way. I thought it was interesting that throughout this game they are weaving in and out his backstory which was so much more in character. There is a difference between choosing to aid the Scoia’tael versus humans are causing a riot in a city and I’m sitting with my non-human friends and fuck it, I’m tired of this shit! There is a big difference, one of those is someone that is used to being at the end of their rope and the other is someone who is being positioned as a hero. And that’s where that feeling of Geralt is right starts shinning in, because why does it matter? Why should he pick a side? At least in the books, they work to give you a sense that there is a larger world and therefore in some ways, Geralt doesn’t matter, that’s why he ends up the way he does.
This game fights really hard against those core ideas that are found in the books, nothing embodies this more than the role of Triss Merigold. The first thing that pops out about this game is that no character seems inclined to fill Geralt in about Ciri or Yen. They have known him for years and no one wanted to mention to him “Hey, you had a child with this woman, and you got involved in this war and you did all these things.” Seriously, no one wants to talk to him about it! I was like “Everyone in this room knows who you are. Dandelion went with you up until nearly the very fucking end!” If anyone was going to be capable of telling him what the fuck went down, it was going to be Dandelion. Instead, the only information he is given about his past is Triss telling him kind of briefly on a boat.
It is obvious at this point that CDPR is moving towards telling their own version of this story and turning Triss into a different character than she was in the books. I’m glad they kept her as a member of the Lodge of Sorceresses, that was a smart move. Though I feel Geralt should have been pissed with her about her being a part of the Lodge without telling him, but whatever. They never even touch upon her previous relationship with Philippa. Just so much is left out in order to make room for a streamlined narrative. I found it very frustrating because the Scoia’tael and that entire plot makes sense, but it doesn’t feel like it would happen in the Witcher world. I love Saskia, I hate her armour because of the boob window, but I don’t think she is possible in the confines of the Witcher universe. I’m like “This would never work! Of course, you got fucking poisoned! You are going to be dead in two weeks.” I just thought it was interesting and frustrating, and I was curious to hear your thoughts on that.
KYLE: The thing about the general plot is that it is very in line with the books, but it happens to be the parts that Geralt are not involved in. This is very much the political side of the Witcher universe. Philippa is incredibly in character and I adore her.
CLAUDIA: She is in character, but I hate her still.
KYLE: The thing is that Geralt hates this shit and he’s done with it.
CLAUDIA: Yeah, the most realistic thing about this game was the idea that Geralt and Yennefer were just hanging out on an island and like “Fuck this world! This is where we live now. Ciri, I hope you have fun in King Arthur land.”
KYLE: One of the things I hate about the prologue is that I can’t just tell Foltest to go fuck off, because that’s what Geralt would do. This is the Geralt who to Queen Calanthe’s face when he was ordered to kill Duny, said no. He outwardly mocked and disobeyed her, and she had every right to execute him on the spot, but she didn’t because she knew he was right. This is a guy who doesn’t give a flying fuck what royals think of him.
CLAUDIA: People will use the argument that he doesn’t have his memories. But it feels like if he doesn’t have his memories, he should be more aggressive, part of the story in the books was how he has to learn to tone shit down and accept he has a role in these events.
KYLE: Absolutely, him and Yarpen even have a discussion about that in Blood of Elves. It just annoys me and throughout the entire game I’m like “Why is Geralt continuing on this path?” Out of the choice we are given out of Roche or Iorveth, it feels more like Geralt to go with Roche because Geralt hates the Scoia’tael and everything they stand for. They are bigoted assholes that take out their anger in the guise of we are fighting for freedom, they’re not good people. And one of the things about Geralt is that he is one of the good people in this universe. The Scoia’tael are hypocrites and it boggles my mind that Geralt would even bother dealing with them. So, I choose Roche when I first played, but the problem is that Iorveth’s path has the better characters. Roche’s side has some really interesting plot developments but Iorveth’s side has Yarpen Zigrin and Philippa Eilhart, it has all your favourite characters there so you kind of just want to choose that one. I like the story they tell; I have some issues with characterization and continuity, but beyond that I like what they were trying to do. I don’t think Geralt should be involved in any of it, he should just leave. Perhaps the most in-character thing is at the very end when he has all his memories and Letho is telling him about what Nilfgaard is planning and his response is “That’s just not my concern anymore.”
CLAUDIA: Yep, he’s just like “Sounds nice, see you later.”
KYLE: Yeah, he’s like “I know where Yennefer is now, so I’m going to find the love of my life! See you.” So, I don’t know, I like the story they tell. It’s highly political, it’s very much the kind of thing I love about the Witcher universe. But all these political machinations in the books happened around Geralt not to Geralt. And it feels very out of character for him to be as involved as he is. If you look at the Thanedd Coup from Time of Contempt, which you can tell they are pulling heavily from, just see what Geralt does there. After Vilgefortz and Philippa each spring their coups, Geralt doesn’t give two shits who is on who’s side. All he cares about is Ciri. So while it was out of character, I know this world, I know these characters, I know these countries, and I know how politics in this world work, so I was invested in it anyway. It’s a contradiction and I both like it for what it is trying to do and hate how out of character it is. It’s far better told than Witcher 1, I’ll give it that.
CLAUDIA: Yeah, and that was never in question. They have improved in a technical perspective, but for me the story didn’t do much. It was interesting but it just didn’t emotionally move me. I think that is something the Witcher games lack is the lack of members in my party I care about.
KYLE: There is no party system in the Witcher games.
CLAUDIA: I know, but that’s kind of the problem. Like they don’t need to be in my party gameplay-wise, but there is just no sensation for me of these characters being living and breathing and being interactable. This is something Mass Effect does very well, you feel like you are befriending these people. And if you think about it, one of the best parts of Geralt’s story is him learning to kind of do that. It’s hilarious to me that is not even a factor here. The closest you kind of get is Zoltan and Dandelion, but that’s kind of it, even Triss you can’t really talk to her and hang out and be friends.
KYLE: I see what you are saying. In Mass Effect, every time you come on board the Normandy, there will be something new to say to your crew. In the Witcher games, everything you can say to the other characters, you can say when you first meet them.
CLAUDIA: Which is such a disappointment because there is so much character development they could pack into these NPCs if you staggered that out.
KYLE: Another problem with the story is the fact that you only get half a story each time you play. While they did an amazing technical achievement with the branching paths, there are just some bits of the story that are not explained if you don’t play both sides. For instance, if you only play Roche’s side, you wouldn’t know that Saskia is the dragon.
CLAUDIA: Kudos to them because they basically made two games, but oof that’s such stupid game design. It’s a very experimental thing to be doing, they were still trying to figure out who they were as a studio.
Triss Merigold in The Witcher 2
KYLE: You ready to hear my opinions on Triss?
CLAUDIA: Yeah, let’s go!
KYLE: Okay, so, Triss has a quest that pisses me the fuck off and I want to kill her so bad. So, you know that Rose of Remembrance quest?
CLAUDIA: Oh, yeah!
KYLE: You knew that was coming. So, she asks for you to have her tag along, I never do. If you go there by yourself, you get the Rose of Remembrance, you don’t get anything special there and it continues on like a rather lacklustre quest. That entire quest is designed for you to have sex with her, so it wants you to have her tag along.
CLAUDIA: Yep.
KYLE: The thing is, this is how I read that quest. She actively takes a chance of Geralt getting his memory back, which means Yen, and says “Look at my hot, sexy body, don’t you want to have sex with me?”
CLAUDIA: To be fair to her, the game developers did that, not her.
KYLE: But Triss the character does it too!
CLAUDIA: I know, I know, I get you.
KYLE: Philippa has my favourite line when she is on the megascope with Triss, which only happens if you choose the Iorveth path, Triss talks to Dethmold if you choose Roche. Philippa says “Triss, stop thinking with your vagina and get a hold of yourself.” I lost it because that is what I have always wanted to tell Triss ever since I met her in the books. I hate her god damn guts. Philippa just said everything I have ever wanted to say to her. It’s just so annoying that Triss actively manipulates Geralt and we don’t talk about it.
CLAUDIA: What’s interesting about it is that they don’t paint it as active manipulation.
KYLE: But it is!
CLAUDIA: I know it is. It is if you know the context, but it is so interesting that the game developers don’t paint it like that. It makes you wonder if they just really hated Yennefer or something.
KYLE: I was going to get into this when we got to The Witcher 3, but I will say it now. There have been interviews with some of the development team, and a large portion of them said they don’t understand Yen or even why Geralt loves her. This isn’t universally true, there are members such as Mateusz Tomaszkieicz who has questioned why Yen wasn’t involved from the beginning of the games. So at least some of them like her, but there seems to be a bias against her from a large portion of their team.
CLAUDIA: Ah, okay. So, they were just making Triss a replacement.
KYLE: Yeah because they don’t like Yen. They don’t understand the most complex character in the entire Saga.
CLAUDIA: That’s partially because you can tell there is like no women on their development team. At least not in The Witcher 1 or 2. The reason I joke about there not being any women on the development team is specifically because some of the writing choices. Like having Geralt walking in on Philippa doing sexy times with Cynthia, it’s not funny, it’s just sad and pathetic. It’s just incredibly sexist writing. Also, Triss shouldn’t be collapsing every five minutes when she does magic, I know she isn’t as cool as Yennefer, but I was just like “Really?” That scene where Triss collapses when she does the shield spell and Roche picks her up and she is like “Get your hands off my ass.” And he’s like “At least I’ll die holding it.” Like maybe some women talk like that, but if I was a powerful sorceress there would be things, I would do that they don’t do. It’s like the only thing they care about is looking hot for men and I’m like “You can literally fry people alive and there are other ways to look hot.” It’s just weird and the dialogue comes off as what a man thinks a woman says rather than what actual women say. It’s incredibly disgusting, it’s just bad, it’s kind of just gross, and just knocks the writing down a few points for me.
KYLE: Fair enough, I agree. I didn’t notice the amount of times Triss fainted, but I have a thing where whenever Triss is on screen, I check out. I wish she wasn’t there. The thing about Triss is she is so manipulative, and the game never acknowledges just how incredibly toxic she is, and it doesn’t help that Dandelion calls the relationship between Geralt and Yennefer “Toxic.” Toxic? That is not a word I would use to describe a deeply personal, poetic, and fairy tale-esque romance.
CLAUDIA: I mean at certain stages in their relationship, I would have used the word toxic.
KYLE: It also doesn’t help that Letho actively mocks Yen. He says, “I can’t fathom what you saw in her, but I suppose there’s no accounting for taste.” And I’m like “Oh my god! It’s clear what these writers think of Yen!”
CLAUDIA: Yeah, I noticed that too.
KYLE: And speaking of the sexualization, in order to promote the game, they made risqué pictures of Triss and put it in the Polish edition of Playboy.
CLAUDIA: That’s hilarious, that one I almost find funny. I don’t know why, but maybe because they went that far, it spun around from being incredibly sexist right back into hilarious.
KYLE: But I hate Triss, everyone reading this retrospective knows this. How did you take the Rose of Remembrance quest, her taking something very personal to Geralt and turning it into sexy times?
CLAUDIA: I don’t care about the sex; I think you are reading way too much into the sexy time. Geralt is the one that suggests the bath, he is the one that came onto her, not the other way around. This is why I like blank-slate characters.
KYLE: But Geralt is a character that actively told Triss he didn’t love her in the books!
CLAUDIA: Because you have given someone else control over how you play him, this is something you have to accept about his characterization. I’m not mad at Triss, I’m just waiting for Yen to show up. And it’s curious to me how Geralt’s relationship with Triss is taken for granted in both these games when it kind of feels like it comes out of nowhere. It does feel a little bit manipulative, but I can tell they are not going to paint it that way.
KYLE: Oh, it doesn’t help that if you choose Shani in Witcher 1 or not to romance anyone at all, it is just brushed aside. Because for this plot to work, Geralt and Triss have to be in a relationship in The Witcher 2. If you choose Shani, you get an obligatory mention in the game journal that you parted ways, so it just erodes that plotline. And if you didn’t romance anyone, like I did, it just assumes you are sleeping with Triss. And I’m like “I didn’t choose to sleep with Triss in Witcher 1, she forced herself onto me in Act 3!” This game really cements my hatred of Triss, and it will only get worse when they actively change parts of Yen’s personality in The Witcher 3 in order to make Triss seem like a viable option.
Philippa Eilhart in The Witcher 2
KYLE: Let’s talk about your favourite subject, Philippa Eilhart.
CLAUDIA: I hate her in the books and I still hate her.
KYLE: I want to discuss how they handle Philippa, how they write her, and the thematic implications of the loss of her eyes. So, what is your opinion on her, not why you hate her, but how they wrote her and what they did with her?
CLAUDIA: They wrote her very accurately to how she was written in the books, and I didn’t like her in the book so it’s not shocking that I didn’t like her here. I didn’t care that her eyes got spooned out because I don’t care for her. Her motivations have always been pretty shallow, I think she is done a little bit better here in the games because there is a little more active manipulation. She is getting her hands dirty in a way she never did in the books.
KYLE: You said you skimmed over a majority of the sorceress stuff, so you missed a lot of her great moments in the books. So, I would not say she has never got her hands dirty, but whatever.
CLAUDIA: I think I’m going to go back to the statement I had with the books, I hate her but I hate her because she is a boring and uninteresting character to me and doesn’t do anything that makes me want to pay attention. It’s just like “Oh, cool, you’re a villain.” And it was so obvious she was going to betray them, maybe that’s me coming from the books, but I was like “Really, guys? Are you this stupid?” All I could think about when they were scooping out her eyes was “Oh, I’m pretty sure she can regrow those. She’ll have new ones later, it’s fine.”
KYLE: That’s actually part of the plot in The Witcher 3 that she is trying to regrow her eyes.
CLAUDIA: See, I called it!
KYLE: One of the things is that it is supposed to be a really dangerous magic thing to do and she is like “Vilgefortz did it.”
CLAUDIA: Yeah exactly, and all the witches at the hill had very serious injuries so I figured that was just par for the course. I guess she was a little less boring here than in the books if only because there was some voice acting that help elevates her. But it’s still her trying to do things that she thinks will make the world a better place and I don’t care.
KYLE: I want to quote a bit of The Lady of the Lake because I’m amazed at how they pick up on this and what it says thematically with her eyes. One of the things about Philippa is at the centre of her character is pride and arrogance. When Geralt is talking to Cynthia, she even brings this up as her one weakness, “Ambition. Infinite. Boundless. And burning like the Korath Desert” And if you remember in the books when we get a flashback to her as a child, she sees her reflection in a pool of water and becomes obsessed with it. She is the most self-absorbed person in the world, the most selfish. For context this is after the Peace of Cintra and people are celebrating and Radovid is mourning the death of his father while Hierarch Cyrus Engelkind Hemmelfart takes all the credit.
No one is going to shout ‘Long live Radovid’, thought the prince blocked by the hierarch’s fat backside. No one’s even going to look at me. No one will raise a cry in honour of my mother. Nor mention my father, they won’t shout his glory. Today, on the day of triumph, on the day of reconciliation, of the alliance to which my father, after all, contributed. Which was why he was murdered.
He felt someone’s eyes on the nape of his neck. As delicate as something he didn’t know – or did, but only in his dreams. Something like the soft, hot caress of a woman’s lips. He turned his head. He saw the dark, bottomless eyes of Philippa Eilhart fixed on him.
Just you wait, though the prince, looking away. Just you wait.
No one could have predicted then or guessed that this thirteen-year-old boy – now a person without any significance in a country ruled by the Regency Council and Dijkstra – would grow into a king. A king, who – after paying back all the insults borne by himself and his mother – would pass into history as Radovid V the Stern.
Andrzej Sapkowski, The Lady of the Lake, pg. 434
CLAUDIA: That’s pretty good!
KYLE: Yeah, I love how they pick up on that! He has grown up under the gaze of Philippa all his life, being told what to do, you know “You will jump when I say jump. You will talk when I tell you to talk.” And he can’t take being under her gaze anymore, so he plucks out her eyes with a spoon. Amazing!
CLAUDIA: I like the fact that they went ahead and followed through on that plotline. That’s called writing a good sequel.
KYLE: In the books, we got this hint of things to come in the Witcher universe because when something ends, something begins. And the way they pick up these things is great. Because not only what it says thematically about her, the fact that she was obsessed with her image and now all she sees is darkness, she can no longer she how amazing she is, but also how Radovid has grown to hate being under her gaze. Love it! I can talk so much about Philippa as a character, I love her.
CLAUDIA: I almost understand your love for her a lot more than I do some other characters. There is enough there that I can see the interesting character she could have been for me if she had done things differently or been written a different way. She is just to the left of someone I would like to read about.
KYLE: And we kind of touched upon Cynthia and the weird sex thing with them.
CLAUDIA: Oh gosh, I wish the only lesbian/bisexual character in this game wasn’t outright evil.
KYLE: She’s true neutral!
CLAUDIA: I know you have been of that opinion but she’s evil, selfishness is oftentimes a form of evilness, at least a lot people would consider it one.
KYLE: There are also some unfortunate connotations that I don’t think they fully thought through with the weird way the Philippa and Cynthia relationship is portrayed. Before we started recording, we were talking about the comic Sunstone and how it portrays a positive look at a BDSM relationship. In this, Cynthia is her leashed sorceress and they make it clear that Cynthia calls her mistress. There is just this really weird poorly done BDSM allegory that isn’t portrayed as very positive.
CLAUDIA: It’s not an allegory, they are in a BDSM relationship or at least the Witcher equivalent.
KYLE: Like, Philippa is totally a domme, but beyond that, I don’t think they thought the implications through.
CLAUDIA: No, they were just thinking it would be a fun sexy time scene. They didn’t think beyond that and you can kind of tell.
KYLE: I do love the irony that Cynthia turns out to be a Nilfgaardian spy because if you remember Philippa had Cantarella that she used to spy on Vattier de Rideaux. So, her own tactics are being used against her.
CLAUDIA: It is ironic, but I do question if she would really fall for it. I mean it’s possible, she is vain.
KYLE: She is super vain. As a matter of fact, this entire plot happens because she gets so arrogant, she makes a mistake. And if you remember in the books, it was stated that the Witch Hunts would start as a result of Philippa making a mistake and she would later be revered as a martyr.
CLAUDIA: That’s actually cool how they are beginning to tie in all these little bits of the future history of the Witcher world.
KYLE: And I love that The Witcher 2 leads to the Witch Hunts that the books said would happen. All because Philippa made a mistake, she got too arrogant.
CLAUDIA: That actually makes the plot of this game make a lot more sense. I was kind of looking at in the vacuum and questioning some of their decisions, but now you say that it’s pretty cool.
KYLE: It’s always important when looking at Philippa to remember that at the centre of her character is endless arrogance and pride, many mistakes she makes here and in the books is because of that. To quote Vilgefortz, “You mistook the stars reflected in the pond for the night sky.” That’s what she did, she mistook Letho as nothing more than a mindless killing machine that she could use, and really, he was using her, and he brought her entire world crumbling down. All because she was too arrogant to think anyone could get the better of her.
Roche Vs. Iorveth
CLAUDIA: So, I kind of voiced my dislike of the narrative of this game forcing you into this two-pronged decision, both of which Geralt wouldn’t have made. But they were both firmly looking at the humans versus the non-human conflict in this world, and as a person that always plays an elf, it’s hard not to just choose them. What was your experience with this because it doesn’t feel like the most nuanced conflict they could have looked at?
KYLE: The books go out of their way to explain that both sides are wrong and are hypocrites. I don’t like either side. Like I said, first playthrough I went with Roche because he made the most sense for Geralt.
CLAUDIA: Which I get, I like Roche in this. He was weirdly a charming character.
KYLE: Iorveth is an interesting character when you get to Act 2.
CLAUDIA: Yeah, he is so boring before that.
KYLE: Act 1, he is very much hiding behind the standard Scoia’tael mentality. The humans hurt us, so we are going to hurt them back mindset. He is so much more interesting than that and he is their take on Isengrim Faoiltiarna and I don’t know why they just didn’t use him. Because he does have an open-ended ending in the books. He escapes the execution of the officers of the Vrihedd Brigade, which by the way they change the number of officers sentenced to death to be 53 when it was really 32, and then takes on a new name.
CLAUDIA: It’s just like that weird shitty kid from The Witcher 1.
KYLE: Alvin.
CLAUDIA: See already forgot his name, he’s that unimportant.
KYLE: The thing about the human and non-human debate in the Witcher universe is that it is interesting because no side is truly right. It’s a cycle of violence that continues over and over again because everyone is immigrants to this world. Whichever one shows up the newest just tries to take over, this time it was the humans, before them it was the elves, and before them, it was the dwarves and so on. Yarpen even calls this vicious cycle out in Blood of Elves. This game even briefly touches upon this idea with the Vrans who once owned Loc Muinne, and you also have the Wild Hunt in this game, and they are basically Nazi elves from another world. But it’s only the backdrop for the far more human-centric political story.
Saskia aKA Saesenthessis
KYLE: You mentioned you liked Saskia, so why did you like her so much?
CLAUDIA: She was like a complete Joan of Arc analogue and I have been on a bit of a Joan of Arc kick lately, so that influenced it. She was also functionally the most non-sexist female character in the game. Even though she a huge ass boob window, she was still well regarded for her combat ability, as a leader, she had respect. People made insulting comments about her, but it was always the bad guys that did that. People whose opinions matter think she is legit. Of course, in my mind, she would never last as a leader in the Witcher universe, she would get killed so fast. It was cool and charming to see them attempt to put a good guy in this game because she is the closest you can get to the good guy archetype you can get in this setting.
KYLE: What’s interesting about her is that this is CDPR demonstrating that they love these books and hate them at the same time. They make some horrible decisions in terms of characterization, but they pick up on some really great ideas. For instance, if you remember Villentretenmerth was protecting his child in “The Bounds of Reason”
CLAUDIA: Yeah! I’m glad you pointed that out.
KYLE: And one of the things I like about it is they make her the good guy. Because if you remember from “The Bounds of Reason”, Geralt and Villentretenmerth have a discussion about what destiny means for them. And Villentretenmerth talks about how he is destined to protect a saviour for his kind, a defender, much like Geralt is to do with Ciri. So, it’s explicitly mentioned that the drake in that story will grow up to shepherd the downtrodden and protect them. And they pick up on that and it’s very smart.
CLAUDIA: And I actually have a lot more respect for the character now that you mention that. I’m glad I’m talking to you about this because you pay such close attention to the material and you pull these connections out that others wouldn’t have. My biggest issue was that she was a little too perfect for what she was, but in that context, it almost makes sense that she was too perfect.
Playing As Different Characters
KYLE: In The Witcher 2, they try to emulate Sapkowski’s writing style by having us take control of other characters other than Geralt at different points in the story. Did that work for you or did you feel it was janky?
CLAUDIA: I’m always into that, both as a storytelling technique and a games technique, so I didn’t mind. It was a little janky just because the bad thing about that sort of stuff is once you get used to playing as a character, getting swapped out to a different one can really fuck up your ability to get through anything. But like, one of my favourite scenes in Mass Effect 2 is when you take over Joker.
KYLE: I brought this up in The Witcher 1, but I hate the fact that Geralt is a predefined character, but I’m still allowed to have dialogue choice with him. It just feels odd to me. You can make the excuse of he doesn’t have his memories, but by the end of this game he has them and they continue the dialogue choices into the next game. But the weirdest thing is when you take control of a character that’s normally an NPC, potentially one you haven’t even interacted with yet, and you have dialogue options. For instance, in Act 2, if you choose Iorveth you control Stennis and if you pick Roche you control Henselt, in the negotiation between the Aedirnians and the Kaedwenis. If you are a book reader, you know who these people are, but if you are not then you will be very confused.
CLAUDIA: Yeah, you are just like “Who did I just get handed and why?” That’s fair.
KYLE: Also, in that same act when you go into the blood curse fog and take over the soldiers, it’s a good idea but boy does it get annoying. Especially when you have to fight multiple enemies and you don’t have Geralt’s abilities, so you are like “Oh, shit! Don’t kill me!” But I did like it as a way to convey the multiple perspectives thing that the books have.
CLAUDIA: I would actually play that Witcher game, the one where you don’t actually play as Geralt, but you go through a bunch of different characters.
Geralt’s Amnesia
KYLE: We briefly touched upon Geralt getting his memories back and you mentioned in the last retrospective that the amnesia is a bit of a gaming cliché. You talked about how this is shown as a good example because they make it a plot point. Do you like the way they handled him getting his memories back?
CLAUDIA: Yes. I don’t like that he didn’t have his memories in the first place, it was cheap. But I like the flashbacks and I also really like the art that accompanied them. They have been gorgeous.
KYLE: This started in The Witcher 1 and continues to The Witcher 3, that whenever your decisions come into play, you get Geralt monologing over some art. That feels perfect because Geralt is someone that is always analyzing the morality of his actions, always second-guessing himself. I like how they portray that part of his personality through the choice and consequence system.
CLAUDIA: It was pretty consistent, things that reminded him would trigger the flashback and it became a motivation for him to get these memories back. It was a part of the game. However, if these games had started instead with Geralt in a field just having lost his memories and the first two games where just him discovering who he is and who Yennefer is, it would have been such a different experience but it would have been awesome. They could have done this lone wanderer thing and he could meet old friends, make new friends, and everyone could act in character and explain what happened to him, it would have been so much more interesting. We could have this interesting reverse heroes journey or at least a reverse of the books, and his motivations were more “Who am I?” rather than politics, and the rest of the game was him stumbling upon the remains of the world that we would have been familiar with from the books but would have been kind of new to him, it would have been a much more focused narrative experience. Whereas the first game is them trying to retread a lot of the old book material. There was an interesting story to be told here, a very Geralt story, about how he slowly gained more people until he finally found Yen.
KYLE: I just like by the end of the game he is the character he was always supposed to be. I always hated the amnesia because it was a cheap trick to allow exposition and player choice. And it undoes the ending of the books which is almost sacrilegious to me, because it’s a perfect ending, but whatever. I do like that they acknowledge their mistake in the first game, make it a plot point, and get rid of it by the end of the second game, so that Geralt can just be Geralt.
This Conclave Is Adjourned But The Witcher Saga Continues On
And that concludes Kyle and Claudia’s thoughts on The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings. Join them next time as they get ever closer to the end of this retrospective as they talk about the much acclaimed The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.
