Currently, the Polish studio Fool's Theory is making a remake of The Witcher. The screenwriter of the original game shared his concerns about the project in a recent interview with CHIP.
Artur Ganszyniec said that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is close in spirit to what the developers originally wanted to do back then. In those years, they were constrained by budget and technical limitations:
"The Witcher 3" is closer in spirit to the kind of "The Witcher 1" we would have made if we had had the time, money, technology, and skills back then. We didn't have any of that — we had the Aurora engine, so we made what we could.
However, Artur believes that the remake developers should not copy the structure of The Witcher 3 and turn it into a full-fledged open-world game. In his opinion, if the locations are expanded, it will change the pace of the game, the quest structure, and the scale of the project.
In the original game, Ganszyniec explains, much worked because the developers knew where the player would end up. As an example, he cited the fifth act. Free movement would break everything, as the player could immediately go to the desired location, skipping part of the path that the developers had prepared in advance:
When everything in the fifth act is built around Lake Vizima on the map, a simple question can be asked: if this were an open world, would I have a boat? What prevents me from just getting in a boat and immediately sailing to the old manor? As a player, I might be happy with this opportunity, but as a designer, I already feel my hair turning gray.
Artur Ganszyniec still adheres to the idea of using Geralt's amnesia as a plot device. This allows players to get acquainted with the character and the game world, and also makes the story intimate — if the hero had not lost his memory, the plot of "The Witcher 3" would have begun.
According to the screenwriter, the creators of The Witcher remake could improve the design of locations and the combat system.