Lore has at all times been a tough topic for followers relating to variations: Too shut an adherence to the unique textual content, and also you get a diminished model of the factor you already love; too unfastened an adaptation, and instantly the one that you love sequence is unrecognizable. I’m pretty outspoken about my perception that so far as the Netflix TV present is worried, Witcher followers have had it rougher than most relating to their franchise being sullied by poor selections. So it’s no shock that when CD Projekt Purple revealed the primary trailer for The Witcher 4, which options Ciri as its fundamental character and seemingly a full-blown Witcher, some followers (albeit a minority) met it with skepticism. Nonetheless, with three Witcher video games beneath its belt already, CD Projekt Purple has earned the advantage of the doubt.
Essentially the most comprehensible of those followers’ issues appear to be over how The Witcher 4 matches into the world and canon of Andrzej Sapkowski’s books. For example, Ciri, after the occasions of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, would have been older than regular to endure the Trial of the Grasses, and within the books, a lot of her magic was taken away from her as she saved Ihuarraquax — but within the trailer, she makes use of magic freely. What’s complicated about these issues from followers, nonetheless, is how unaware they appear to be of the connection between CD Projekt Purple’s video games and the Witcher canon already. It’s not that the 2 have diverged, essentially, a lot as it’s that they weren’t ever tightly certain to start with.
The Witcher video games have by no means been strict adherents to the books they’re based mostly on. As an alternative, they’ve at all times been extra about committing to the spirit and themes of Sapkowski’s sequence than about giving digital life to his phrases. And, as a fan of Sapkowski’s books, I feel that’s one of many biggest virtues of CD Projekt Purple’s recreation sequence. The wealthy complexity and element of the world and characters that Sapkowski created at all times felt like they may very well be stretched much more broadly past the pages of his novels and quick tales, and within the succesful fingers of CDPR, we’ve been capable of see that enlargement of the world.
That is a part of what makes The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt arguably the very best entry of any selection in your complete Witcher franchise. That recreation jumps previous the established canon of Sapkowski’s novels, imagining a barely extracanonical story that takes place a number of years after the books’ story has ended. It’s an enlargement and continuation of the tales of Geralt, Yennefer, and Ciri, but it surely grasps the essence of their characters, and of The Witcher’s whole world, in addition to something within the sequence’ historical past.
All through The Witcher 3, Geralt’s mission to search out Ciri, then to save lots of her, brings him into contact with the strangest inhabitants of his world. And whereas the sport provides you selections about the best way to cope with them, CDPR’s writing does a powerful job of maintaining you in your toes, continually giving Geralt’s quests sudden and sometimes tragic outcomes regardless of his greatest intentions — maintaining them thematically resonant with the very best of Sapkowski’s quick tales. In different phrases, it’s every little thing the Netflix sequence has failed at; so far, the artistic workforce for the present has fairly intently tailored the plot of Sapkowski’s novels, however appears wholly tired of his themes.
However what’s much more complicated for the self-proclaimed followers of The Witcher 3 who now categorical skepticism over Ciri’s evolution in The Witcher 4 is that her transformation was first launched in Wild Hunt. Relying on the alternatives gamers made all through the sport, Ciri might both finish The Witcher 3 useless, because the queen of Nilfgaard, or on the trail to turning into a Witcher. The query of how she bought from that path to the place we see her in The Witcher 4’s cinematic trailer appears much less like a plot gap and extra like the precise plot of The Witcher 4 itself, one thing that was confirmed Friday on X by CDPR studio head Adam Badowski.
And the reality is, as a fan of Ciri and of Sapkowski’s books, I really feel fortunate that CD Projekt Purple is dedicated to persevering with her story and giving her a story future. Given the studio’s observe file to this point of capably increasing on Sapkowski’s characters and world, it’s exhausting to think about her in higher fingers — together with these of her unique writer. The one actual draw back is that it may very well be fairly a number of years earlier than we truly get to see how her story performs out.
