Adam Badowski, co-lead of CD Projekt Red, confessed that before The Witcher 3 launched he harbored serious doubts about whether players would embrace the game’s grim atmosphere.
In an interview he said that it was only the success of the series Game of Thrones that convinced him audiences were prepared for brutal, adult-oriented fantasy.
We understood that The Witcher 3 would offer players something different. Still, I had many reservations about the project, including commercial concerns. The production was costly and complex, and the studio was much smaller at the time.
He pointed out that back then RPGs were commonly associated with lighter, more heroic settings like Skyrim and World of Warcraft, while The Witcher—with its moral ambiguity and somber tone—felt alien to that prevailing image.
“The Witcher” is dark fantasy. I remember it wasn’t widely popular then, and I worried whether people would grasp its conventions. But when Game of Thrones took off, I thought, “Alright — people do respond to that darkness; they actually enjoy it.” That moment changed everything for me — I realized we had tremendous potential.
Source: iXBT.games