GB Feature: The Witcher E3 Preview

[GameBanshee News]

The first installment to our E3 2006: The RPGs editorial is now online, which includes a detailed preview of CD Projekt's The Witcher. An excerpt to follow:

The game’s compassion/cruelty spectrum is similar to what we’ve seen in other RPGs like Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic or Jade Empire, but it isn’t quite as predictable. To illustrate this, the team provided us with an example. After capturing a bandit that had attacked the secret witcher stronghold, Geralt is given several options, including a choice to simply kill the man, torture him for information, or let him ago. Each of these options is perfectly valid, but each has different consequences. Killing the man might give you immediate satisfaction, but without getting any information from the bandit, one of your friends will eventually be killed. Torturing him will get you the information needed to save that friend in the future, but it might cause another team of bandits to assault the stronghold again and/or cause alternate deaths. Letting him go might gain you some respect from the bandit, but it allows him to return to his camp and alert other bandits of the stronghold’s whereabouts and defenses. Decisions like these will need to be made throughout the game, which should ensure that playing through the game multiple times can result in totally different experiences.