Nothing and no one will change CD Projekt’s mind about putting Ciri in the spotlight for The Witcher 4, and the talks around this choice began much earlier than we imagined. Sebastian Kalemba, the RPG’s director, says this was already decided 8–9 years ago.

One of the most talked-about aspects of The Witcher IV is how it shifts the focus away from Geralt of Rivia to put Ciri at the heart of the story. This decision has stirred up plenty of reactions on social media, and the developers at CD Projekt RED are well aware that their biggest challenge is to “convince players” that “the Lion Cub of Cintra is as important—if not more—than the witcher we’ve been playing all this time.” While some fans have criticized this move, it turns out the team has been discussing this change for many years.

GameStar recently spoke with Paweł Mielniczuk, art director at Project Hadar, Sebastian Kalemba, director of The Witcher IV, and Marcin Momot, global community director at CD Projekt RED. In the interview, posted on their YouTube channel, they discussed both The Witcher III’s development and what’s next for the franchise—meaning it didn’t take long for Ciri to come up.

This is where CD Projekt RED revealed that the decision to put Ciri in the lead role was made long before we ever expected. “We knew it from the very beginning,” Kalemba says. “I remember talking to Badowski [Adam Badowski, head of the studio] during Blood & Wine [The Witcher III’s DLC], about why Ciri was the perfect choice. Eight or nine years ago, we already had a strong motivation for why it mattered and why it needed to be the next step for us.”

So even when The Witcher IV was just an idea, CD Projekt had already decided to make the Lioness of Cintra its next fantasy RPG protagonist. “We already knew it. Sure, it wasn’t fully fleshed out, but the big idea was already there, written in stone,” Kalemba concludes.

Geralt’s Voice Actor Speaks Out

It’s not just CD Projekt’s developers who are backing this decision: Geralt of Rivia’s voice actor, Doug Cockle, also voiced his support for the Polish studio. In response to the backlash, he said: “If you think the RPG is ‘woke,’ read the damn books.” After all, Andrzej Sapkowski’s novels do shift the spotlight more and more onto Ciri’s role in the saga.

Source: 3djuegos