Being a long time fan of PC RPGs, I've been following the progress of The Witcher for quite some time now. Based on a wildly popular series of books by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski, the game is an action RPG that folows the story of a Witcher named Geralt, a mutant bred and trained to hunt monsters. It's been a movie, a comic book, and a video game already, and now Atari is bringing CD Projekt's new RPG out worldwide this fall. CD Projeckt's Chief Designer Michal Madej was on hand at E3 to give me a look into the world of The Witcher.

The world of the Witcher differs from other RPG settings in that there is no clear delineation between good and evil. Much like the real world, it is a world of shades of grey, where evil is a matter of perception rather than fact. Though the setting is medieval fantasy, real-world themes are integrated into the story. Instead of having dwarves, elves and humans live in harmony, the humans have take over the other races' lands, forcing them to live on reservations. It's this sort of parallel that differentiates the setting from standard fantasy fare.

The Witcher takes the concept of your choices affecting how the story unfolds to a whole new level. Rather than giving you a choice of actions that immediately changes the way the story is laid out, your decisions can effect the story hours after you make them. Madej illustrated the point by heading to an inn to meet with an NPC who has a quest for him, only to find the NPC laying dead in his room. The game then presented a flashback to a point several hours back in the game where the main character was given a choice between handing over weapons he was guarding to a band of elves or fighting them. Having handed the weapons over, the elves then used them to start raiding human villages, causing the death of this NPC down the line. Now his quest line is gone forever, and there is no quick and dirty way to go back and change the decision you made. The mechanic has the potential to add tremendous replay value to a game already touting 80-100 hours of gameplay. OF course this means I will never have enough time to fully experience the game, but such is the plight of the gaming press.

There are no numeric stats in The Witcher. As you level you are granted abilities in three categories; gold, silver, and bronze. By the time you reach the highest level in the game you will have earned enough points to have purchased 100% of the bronze abilities,30% of the silver and only 10% of the powerful gold abilities, assuring that while every character has the same basic abilities their more powerful traits will separate them, creating even more replyability I will never get to experience. Madej also pointed out that every ability has some sort of physical representation in the game world. One might add an extra, flamboyant attack animation, while another might alter your character's appearance.

At first fighting seems like an overly simply series of mouse clicks, but the system digs a bit deeper than that. There are three fighting styles in the game. Group fighting allows your attacks to hit multiple enemies, heavy fighting attacks your enemies weak spots for massive damage, and quick fighting is perfect for dispatching weak enemies. As you fight, your cursor flashes, and if you click at the right moment you string together flashy combo moves that continue as long as your timing holds up. Very fluid and graceful, the combat animations were some of the best I've seen in a PC RPG. Aside from swordplay you'll also be able to use magic, with each spell consisting of a quick and easy version and a more powerful charged version that can completely decimate your enemies.

The Witcher looks quite spectacular. Powered by a modified version of BioWare's proprietary Aurora Engine, doing away with the tile-based construction of the original version to allow for environments to be created in 3DS Max and then imported into the game, allowing for much richer environments. The motion captured animations are graceful and fluid beyond anything I have seen in a PC RPG. You really cannot tell that this is the engine used in the original Neverwinter Nights.

I'd daresay The Witcher could end up one of the best RPGs of the year when it comes out this fall. When I was shown the game there was a freelance journalist there who said he only had ten minutes worth of time to spare, and Michal Madej assured him that once he saw the game he would stay longer. Thirty minutes later the both of us were still there, enthralled by the world CD Projekt had created. A very good sign.

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