The Witcher is one of the few Eastern European franchises to achieve worldwide fame and recognition. In his book, Raphaël Lucas set out to tell the story of how this franchise came to be.
I know that many fans of both the games and Andrzej Sapkowski’s literary original were thrilled when this book was announced. It quickly became a coveted gift for any occasion. I’ve read the main saga (except for the later novel that stands somewhat apart) and played through all three games in the series adapted by CD Projekt RED. My feelings toward the books are lukewarm, which has earned me the disapproval of some of my more fervent fan friends. Among the games, I especially highlight the third one, where the developers clearly sold their souls to the devil (and I say this with firsthand knowledge of what it takes to create games).
That said, I’m always interested in reading about how such iconic products come to life, especially from industry peers, so it didn’t take long for me to pick up the book—luckily, it’s not very long.
While expecting a comprehensive overview of the franchise, I knew this wouldn’t just be about the games (even though the cover prominently features a poster from the third installment). However, the author started from an even earlier point.
The first third of the book has almost nothing to do with The Witcher. In this section, Raphaël Lucas delves into the birth of the role-playing game market in Poland and the early days of CD Projekt (yes, CD Projekt, which at that time wasn’t even making games). This part is crammed with facts and references, reading more like an academic research paper than a biography of a franchise. Even as someone from the industry, I found myself losing interest in all those details and eventually losing track of the narrative.
The story of the development of gaming in Poland is interesting in itself, but dedicating a third of the book to it might be a serious disappointment for fans who likely bought the book for entirely different reasons.
Yes, the book mentions that the entire franchise originated with the works of Andrzej Sapkowski, but it pays surprisingly little attention to the literary source material and the Eastern European folklore it draws upon. In fact, the book feels more like a story about CD Projekt than about The Witcher franchise itself.
For me, the sections about game development were more engaging than an attempt to describe the struggles of an author creating such a world. It’s fascinating to learn that the creators initially aimed to make a game resembling both Diablo and the legendary Gothic series. The book details the challenges of making the first game and essentially confirms many industry rumors about the company. Tales of insane crunches, a lack of clear strategy, and uncertainty about what kind of game they were even making abound. Not to mention the chaos of “100 Fridays a week” and a tendency to push problems onto someone else. Still, it can’t be denied that the first game was released and succeeded, paving the way for the second and eventually the legendary third one.
However, the narrative is uneven. While the ups and downs of creating the first game are detailed extensively, the section on The Witcher 2 focuses more on the studio’s financial troubles and legal issues than on the game’s actual development. In terms of the game itself, the story is summarized as: many projects were launched in parallel, financial disaster hit, most projects were canceled, the studio was almost sold (but wasn’t), and The Witcher 2 was cobbled together with The Witcher 3. Oh, and alongside all this, GOG (Good Old Games) was launched as an afterthought.
Some parts of the book aren’t even directly related to the franchise but are older articles by the author that were inserted here as “sort of relevant” transitions between chapters about The Witcher. These clumsy “stitches” are glaring, as when a person giving commentary is introduced, quoted, and then reintroduced in the next chapter as though the reader forgot about them within a page.
The penultimate chapter, focusing on the masterpiece The Witcher 3, emphasizes the narrative, which was central to its development. It’s fascinating to see how the game’s creators navigated the constraints of the source material and their own storytelling: how they reconciled the absence of Ciri and Yennefer in earlier installments, integrated Geralt’s amnesia, and built the folklore. This provides valuable insight into the creative process.
Yet even here, the book shows the brutal conditions under which the final part was developed, how many developers working on subsequent studio projects suddenly found themselves adrift, and how managerial incompetence is still blamed for many issues. It’s hard for me to comment here. On the one hand, the final game turned out to be phenomenal. On the other, crunch culture is something many in our industry know all too well. CD Projekt RED managed not only to deliver an outstanding game but also to replicate its success. And just a couple of weeks ago, a fourth part focusing on Ciri was announced.
The book was released in French in 2019, so the Netflix series was already known at the time, having premiered later that year. While the author delves more deeply into the issues with the first Polish adaptation, his comments on the forthcoming American version are limited to a few lines, sarcastically highlighting the director’s claim that the show was filmed in Hungary because “it couldn’t have been set anywhere else.” The book also clarifies that the series is based on the books, not the games (oh, how wrong he was! Even Henry Cavill eventually left the series, unable to tolerate the distortion of his beloved character).
In conclusion: the book is interesting, but it would have been better if the author had cut out the redundant articles and made it shorter and more cohesive.
My rating: 3.5/5
 | Raphael Lucas “L’HISTOIRE DE THE WITCHER” (in French) | buy |
