The Witcher

(from Polish: Wiedźmin) is a computer role-playing game for the PC developed by CD Projekt RED STUDIO and published by CD Projekt in Poland and Atari for the rest of the world. Based on the book series of the same name by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski,[2] the game uses BioWare's proprietary Aurora Engine.[3] It was released in Europe on October 26, 2007 and in the US on October 30, 2007.[4]

The Witcher follows the story of Geralt, one of a few remaining "witchers" — travelling monster hunters for hire, gifted with unnatural powers. Taking place in a medieval fantasy world, the game implements detailed visuals. The natural light during various phases of the day is realistically altered, and the day and night transitions serve to enrich the game's ambience. The weather can dynamically change from a light drizzle to a dark, stormy downpour accompanied by thunder and lightning.

Story / Plot

The game tells the story of Geralt the Witcher, who at the beginning of the game suffers from amnesia. He gradually learns that he's a very renowned witcher, and that he has had friends and enemies almost everywhere who remember him but whom he does not remember. Through the player's actions he will redefine those relationships and choose his path in the political intrigue that surrounds him.

Many parts of the plot actually depends on the choices of the player since non-linearity is one of the game mechanics which the developers tried to emphasize in The Witcher.

Gameplay

There are three camera styles available when playing The Witcher. The game can be played from one of two top-down perspectives, in which case the mouse is used to control everything, or it can be played from an over-the-shoulder view, which brings the player closer to the ingame combat, but limits visibility. In all the views the keyboard and mouse controls can be changed to be primarily mouse focused or a combined keyboard and mouse approach.

The combat system in The Witcher represents a departure from most RPGs. Players choose one of three fighting styles. The quick style allows for faster, less-damaging attacks with a greater chance of hitting faster enemies; the heavy style deals more damage in exchange for a slow attack speed, and a lower chance to hit faster enemies; and the group style, which features sweeping attacks best used if the player is surrounded.[5] The player can switch between the styles at any point.

Each of these stances has its own unique combat style. Both of Geralt's main swords - the steel and silver ones - have distinctively different combat styles from the rest of weaponry, and serve very distinct purposes: where the steel blade is used to fight humans and other flesh-and-blood beings, the silver one is more effective against supernatural monsters and beasts (against some of which steel may have no effect whatsoever).

Alchemy is a major part of gameplay. The player can create potions that increase health or endurance regeneration, allow Geralt to see in the dark, or provide other beneficial effects. The recipes for these potions can be learned through scrolls, or by experimentation. Once the player creates an unknown potion he can choose to drink it, but if the potion is a failure it will poison the character. Each time Geralt drinks potions they increase the toxicity level of his body. This can be reduced by drinking a special potion or by meditating at an inn or fireplace.

In addition to potions, the player can also create oils and bombs, respectively used to augment the damage done by weapons, or as weapons in combat. Neither can be created until talent points have been allocated into the corresponding skills.

A time delayed decision-consequence system means that the repercussions of players decisions will make themselves apparent up to 10 -15 hours later in the game. This prompts the players to put more critical thinking into making each decision, and circumvents a save-reload approach to decision making. It also allows the game to have a unique approach to replay value, as the consequences resulting from the player's decisions can lead to great difference in the events that take place later, and ultimately a very different gameplay experience than in the prior play-throughs.

The nature of the options faced when playing the game rarely falls into the typical black-and-white morality present in most regular computer RPGs, and the players often find themselves choosing from the lesser of two evils rather than making a clear choice between good and evil, a situation more reflective of real life morality.[6]

Game engine

The Witcher is powered by a heavily improved version of the Aurora Engine by BioWare, modified for a single-player experience. A number of changes have been introduced to the original engine, some of them are described below.

[edit] World visualization

One of the most important features of the Aurora Engine is how the developers design the game world, and then implement that design into the final game. In BioWare's Aurora Engine the world is designed exactly as it was envisioned rather than using a tile-based system. All the environments are developed in 3ds Max and then exported into the game engine. As a result, developers can create unique game worlds, rather than recycling the same tiled objects over and over again.

* Light maps

CD Projekt's version of the engine supports lightmaps generated in 3ds Max. Shadows generated this way are reported to look more realistic, and provide better game performance.

* Texture paint

This is a special tool that allows the developer to paint the environment using custom textures. This enables the developer to make the game world truly unique.

* Skybox and water effects

New realistic skyboxes and water effects designed specifically for The Witcher were added to the engine.

Rendering

All the in game and tool set rendering is done using DirectX9, and the engine now supports many different shaders (water effect, bump mapping, environment mapping, etc). Additionally the whole rendering system has been unified and a new light manager was added.

Other changes

Other important changes include the following: motion-captured animation, physics effects, new mechanics and combat system. There are also many other modifications, like introduction of portals, additional graphical effects (glows, advanced dynamic shadows, blurs).

TAGES Issues


Źródło Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Witcher_(computer_game)