Implementing Geralt’s swimming proved to be a complex challenge.
CD Projekt RED co‑founder Adam Badowski recently shared memories from his time working on The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. His sensible remark about the swimming mechanic ultimately led to a substantial amount of additional work.
I recall the moment I asked a deceptively simple question: there is water — so where is the swimming? The entire room fell silent.
At that stage the Witcher 3 team worried they might have to remove content to avoid the need for a swimming mechanic.
In the end Geralt was given the ability to swim. Without swimming, the character would either be prevented from entering water or would simply sink — both of which would break immersion. For Badowski, the question of immersion propelled ideas forward:
If there’s water, there should be swimming; if there’s swimming, there should be diving; if there’s diving, entirely new locations need to be created. And the team is like, “well, that’s logical!” Sometimes we — as developers — simply overlook that chain of logic.
Source: iXBT.games