The Witcher IV - Interview

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Gamespot interviewed game director Sebastian Kalemba and producer Małgorzata Mitrega about The Witcher IV:

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The Witcher 4 Director On Ciri, Gwent, And In-Game Romance

The morning after The Witcher IV was officially revealed at The Game Awards, GameSpot had the chance to sit down with the game director Sebastian Kalemba and executive producer Małgorzata Mitręga. Although the interview was primarily focused on the reveal trailer, we did speak about Gwent, in-game romance, side quests, and the gameplay.

The trailer officially revealed that Ciri will be the protagonist for the new Witcher saga. In the video, she hunts a new monster based on Serbian folklore called the Bauk--a spider-like creature that gets in the heads of its victims before killing them. As part of our interview, we also got to hear a little about the inspiration for the new monster and more of what to expect from the much-anticipated sequel.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

GameSpot: How are you both feeling after the reveal?

Sebastian Kalemba: I feel relieved, super excited, and happy. A little bit tired, but that's good, to be very honest, because we just entered production. But I'm super, super, super happy with the reaction we got so far, and we've been preparing for this moment all year and it was a really, really exciting experience. I was visualizing this moment for months and finally it blew up and I'm super happy. The team is excited and the team really deserves this moment. We finally don't have to talk about this project with the codename Polaris. We can call it Witcher IV. We can say it aloud that Ciri is the main protagonist and it's a new saga and it will take place in new regions of the world. These things we can finally reveal, and focus on the production and kick off a new year in the second with great energy.

To speak on Ciri a little bit, was that a hard decision to go with Ciri as the protagonist or was that pretty obvious from the beginning?

SK: It was an obvious choice, and I remember nine years ago we already made this call. [...] So it wasn't a hard choice. We decided [to] put the spotlight on Ciri because she deserves it. She was running most of her life and this is the moment for her to define herself. This gives us more room to expand the franchise here and there, but also to be able to tell the origin stories so new players will be able to experience this world from a different perspective but in a very appealing way.

Małgorzata Mitręga: This is a new protagonist--a new adventure--and it's the beginning of the saga, right? So this is a fresh start [that pays] a lot of respect to the sentiment to the previous installments.

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