Archive notice: This article was originally published on October 18, 2007. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
Afterwards, The Witcher was duly celebrated in the elaborately redecorated foyer of CineStar METROPOLIS. Alongside Uwe Paulsen, chairman of the Economic Committee in the Römer, and Gabriele Gottschalk, adviser in the Hessian Ministry of Economic Affairs, representatives of the state parliament, Hessen Agentur and the Chamber of Industry and Commerce as well as city councillors from the city of Frankfurt were also present. The game developers from CD-Projekt in Warsaw had also travelled specially to Frankfurt for the German premiere.
At the beginning of the game presentation in the cinema auditorium, Lutz R. Anderie, managing director
of ATARI Germany, emphasized the high importance that the title ‘The Witcher’ had for the company, which recently celebrated its 35th anniversary. Anderie also declared
himself clearly in favor of the Main metropolis: “We are convinced that Frankfurt am Main is the leading business metropolis in Hesse, Germany, if not Europe.” From its Frankfurt branch, ATARI, one of the world’s largest producers and publishers of interactive entertainment software, manages a total of eight country markets: Germany, Austria, Switzerland as well as the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland and Russia fall within the Frankfurt publisher’s area of responsibility.
The actual presentation of The Witcher was undertaken by chief designer Michal Madej of CD-Projekt, who, representing his team, presented the respectable result of a total of around four years of development work: “We wanted to create a European role-playing game that permits complex decisions and is not based solely on the distinction ‘good/evil’,” says Madej. In order to design the medieval fantasy world in which protagonist Geralt, a monster hunter, must assert himself as realistically as possible in every respect, Madej and his team spared no effort: They designed the locations according to historical city and construction plans; the movements of the main characters were also first filmed with real stuntmen using the motion-capture process and then integrated into the game. Another company from Frankfurt am Main, metricminds, was responsible for the motion capturing in The Witcher.
The storyline is similarly detailed, as Artur Ganszyniec, Lead Story Designer, reported: ‘The Witcher’ combines over 160 speaking roles, according to Ganszyniec. In addition to approximately 12 main decision situations that significantly influence the further course of the game, three potential endings are also provided for in The Witcher.
#Wichter
