Geralt, the hero of The Witcher series of games, nearly had a considerably different face. He actually did, briefly, but the game's community disliked it so much CD Projekt Red panicked and changed it back. The problem? Anatomical correctness. The community didn't think Geralt was alien-looking or ugly enough. The year was 2010 and CD Projekt Red was ready to debut its brand new Witcher game, The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, to the world. A couple of leaked videos preceded the formal announcement but when a clutch of screenshots was eventually released, it debuted a different looking Geralt to the one people were used to from The Witcher 1. Whereas Geralt had previously had the proportions of a triangle, roughly, which angled to a point on his nose and didn't seem to involve a chin of any kind, he now had much easier-on-the-eye proportions and looked like an actual person. He was even, dare I say it, handsome. It simply wouldn't do. Some of this was to be expected. The transition from Witcher 1 to Witcher 2 included a transition for the game's engine, moving from BioWare's Aurora engine, which once powered Neverwinter Nights, to CD Projekt Red's internally made engine Redengine. A facial design that worked well in one engine wouldn't necessarily work in both. Geralt fights a baddie in The Witcher 1. | Image credit: CD Projekt Red "The problem was that The Witcher 1 was heavily stylised," CD Projekt Red art director Pawel Mielniczuk explained to me. "From an art point of view, it was a much simpler visual fidelity than was in The Witcher 2 and Witcher 3. It was based on this Aurora engine from Neverwinter Nights - low poly, you know - so the character looks great there but the face of Geralt in The Witcher 1 wasn't very anatomically correct. It was making a good impression. "When we got to The Witcher 2, we had a better engine - larger budgets for polygons, more artists to sculpt nice faces, and we actually got better at making characters, already being a studio that released one game. And Geralt's [existing] face just did not match the style of the rest of the characters," he said. "It was not realistic human proportions." The solution was clear: redesign Geralt's face. "Let's make Geralt from scratch - nobody will notice that," Mielniczuk said, and laughed at the memory. "So we made it at the very beginning of The Witcher 2 production and we released it with this first bunch of screenshots to see what the response was, and the response was horrible! Our community just smashed us on the forums - there were almost riots there." Geralt's redesigned face, unveiled in the debut screenshots released for The Witcher 2. | Image credit: CD Projekt Red Sadly I can't find those riots on those company forums now; 15 years of chatter has buried it. But Mielniczuk told me the comments there were to the effect of: "True Geralt: he's supposed to be ugly and inhuman!" CD Projekt Red backtracked as a result of the backlash, and it would take a further two years of tinkering, and testing and re-evaluating, to get Geralt's look right for the game. "And was a hybrid of The Witcher 1 Geralt and a real human," Mielniczuk said. By the time The Witcher 3 development came around, in around 2011-2012, the opportunity once again presented itself to tinker with Geralt's face, but this time the studio resisted. "With The Witcher 3, we actually used exactly the same model from Witcher 2, added more polygons, updated textures, but we did not touch it," Mielniczuk said. Geralt as pictured at the beginning of The Witcher 2. | Image credit: Eurogamer / CD Projekt Red That's not to say Mielniczuk didn't want to alter Geralt's face for the third game. He was the lead character artist on The Witcher 3. He hand-sculpted both Ciri and Yennefer's face, and he could see glaring issues with Geralt's. "If you look at the profile of Geralt: he has this incredible profile but the tip of his nose is a completely straight line from his forehead, kind of Greek proportions, and it was not fitting his face, so we wanted to fix that. But we did not," he said. "We made a decision, 'Okay, that's Geralt, he's recognisable, people are loving our character. We pass. We cannot make this mistake once again.'" Which brings us around to The Witcher 4, which is now in full production and we know will include Geralt to some degree. The new game will also move the series to a new engine, Unreal Engine 5, so once again there's an opportunity for a Geralt-face redesign. Will CD Projekt Red take it? Even the box art changed quite considerably over the course of the game's development. | Image credit: CD Projekt Red "It's such a grounded character right now I would really not dare to touch it," Mielniczuk said. "And in general, it's a very successful character because his face is recognisable, probably also because of these features of inhuman proportions in the upper part of the body. So no, I wouldn't update anything, just textures, normal maps, adding more details on the face, make it realistic through the surfaces, but not through the anatomy and proportions." But there is one thing that might tempt Mielniczuk to update Geralt's face, or rather one person, and that's Henry Cavill, the former star of The Witcher Netflix TV show. Mielniczuk is a big fan of his. "Henry was just perfect," he said. Then he added, laughing: "If I would do something to the face, I would be easily convinced to scan Henry and put him in The Witcher 4!" I spoke to Pawel Mielniczuk as part of a series of interviews looking back on The Witcher 3, a decade on, through the eyes of the people who made it. You can find that full piece on Eurogamer now.

Crossing Eden Member Oct 26, 2017 58,491 Doug Cockle had some words to say to people who think Ciri being the protag of the Witcher is some "woke" sin or affront to the material of the Witcher. The Witcher 4 was officially announced at the 2024 Game Awards, and it kicked the hornet's nest by daring to have Ciri star as its protagonist. Geralt's voice actor, Doug Cockle, strongly defends the choice. "It's a cool character from the Witcher, and they're gonna focus on that character," he says during a Fall Damage video, responding to a post regarding people calling Ciri's newfound spotlight "woke." "I think that's awesome. You can't just have Geralt for every single game for The Witcher ad nauseam through eternity." Click to expand... Click to shrink... To avoid any doubt on where he stands, he continues: "Celebrate Ciri, I celebrate her being the protagonist. So all you people who think it's 'woke' [blows raspberry]... If you read the books, then you understand why CD Projekt went down this avenue. Click to expand... Click to shrink... As the years have gone by, the books have become more about Ciri. Geralt may be a witcher, but he's getting old, so passing the torch was inevitable. It's either that, or no more Witcher. Click to expand... Click to shrink... More at the source. "You can't just have Geralt for every single game" says his voice actor, and if you think The Witcher 4 making Ciri the protagonist is "woke," then "read the damn books" The story was always going in this direction www.gamesradar.com Highkey tho, And yes that applies to the people who wrote entire essays about how women can't be witchers because A)that's fucking stupid B)CDPR already reinforced that retcon by including the School of The Cat in TW3  Last edited: 17 minutes ago closer Member Oct 25, 2017 5,592 Asking ppl who call it woke to read is sort of a large ask   Zukkoyaki Member Oct 25, 2017 14,290 Jokes on him because reading is woke   Catchphrase Member Nov 28, 2023 2,329 if those chuds could read they'd be very upset   MarcosBrXD Member Aug 28, 2024 1,701 9/11 for chuds   Kadzork Has got mad skills!! Member Oct 27, 2017 24,158   Jedi2016 Member Oct 27, 2017 20,058 Just got my lynx medallion a few days ago, it's hanging right next to my wolf medallion. I'll be there day one.   SomeOneInaHat Member Nov 9, 2017 1,135 Edit: Beaten by better version  Xterrian Member Apr 20, 2018 3,552 Any female protagonist is "woke" to these people. It's just that some were too engrained in pop culture/their franchises before the whole chud movement got started, so they're seen as "female protags done right." If Lord of the Rings was done today, there'd be endless rage over Eowyn being the one to kill the Witch King. Same with Leia's role in Star Wars.  OP OP Crossing Eden Member Oct 26, 2017 58,491 Xterrian said: Any female protagonist is "woke" to these people. It's just that some were too engrained in pop culture/their franchises before the whole chud movement got started, so they're seen as "female protags done right." If Lord of the Rings was done today, there'd be endless rage over Eowyn being the one to kill the Witch King. Same with Leia's role in Star Wars. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Hard ditto on Leia, this shit would break people's minds if only because so many characters who're inspired by Leia break their minds.   Lotus One Winged Slayer Member Oct 25, 2017 124,050   bitcloudrzr Member May 31, 2018 20,757 MarcosBrXD said: 9/11 for chuds Click to expand... Click to shrink... That was KCD2.   ClickyCal' Member Oct 25, 2017 65,480 Xterrian said: Any female protagonist is "woke" to these people. It's just that some were too engrained in pop culture/their franchises before the whole chud movement got started, so they're seen as "female protags done right." If Lord of the Rings was done today, there'd be endless rage over Eowyn being the one to kill the Witch King. Same with Leia's role in Star Wars. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Yeah. Like to them, Jill Valentine, Samus, Lara Croft and some others are grandfathered in, but would break them.   jmood88 Member Oct 28, 2017 1,726 It's not going to change much, but it's always nice to see someone explicitly push back against the disingenuous conservative bullshit.   Lotus One Winged Slayer Member Oct 25, 2017 124,050 bitcloudrzr said: That was KCD2. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Or Stellar Blade  DoradoWinston Member Apr 9, 2019 8,387 idk how you play witcher 3 and not think Ciri (who everyone also LOVED btw) wasnt going to be the protag for 4 lol   Yerffej Prophet of Regret Member Oct 25, 2017 29,455 I just wish every answer about these creeps and their likes and dislikes was met with "who fucking cares about them or what they want?" Every time. And that's all. Because they do not matter.   Dark Fairy Princess Member Feb 5, 2025 338 Dracula’s Castle Hate these sexist losers that calls everything woke. I tried not to pay attention to them but it's frustrating to see how stupid and hateful some people could be. Hope Witcher 4 becomes even more successful than 3 just to piss them off more. Witcher 3 is one of the best games I've played. Most of the characters were well made. I like Geralt but always liked Ciri more and wanted more parts with her so I'm glad they went with her as the main character.  OP OP Crossing Eden Member Oct 26, 2017 58,491 ClickyCal' said: Yeah. Like to them, Jill Valentine, Samus, Lara Croft and some others are grandfathered in, but would break them. Click to expand... Click to shrink... They unironically argued that these are woke ugly versions of Jill and Lara, so yes they did get broken by them.   NHarmonic. ▲ Legend ▲ The Fallen Oct 27, 2017 10,778 Catchphrase said: if those chuds could read they'd be very upset Click to expand... Click to shrink... Instant reminder of that "reading is gay" tweet from mastermind turd Tate.