The Witcher author Andrzej Sapkowski's disdain of games

[cvv]

They enjoy plenty of that if it's from Japan - oppressively difficult akshun, weird-ass horrors.

You feel oppressed by the Souls games because you suck.

I love Souls games and you suck your mom's drooping clit.

Then use the appropriate adjective, moronic piece of shit. http://www.dictionary.com/browse/oppressive

Knowing your mom, "drooping" is very appropriate.

 

[hilfazer]

Fragment of Polcon 2016, english subtitles

Here we can learn that this

Moreover, he consistently denies any connection between the novels’ rising popularity – and thus increased sales – among the Western audience and the games’

is not quite true and this

However, even after taking that into consideration, Mr. Sapkowski was far from withheld, saying, “[If they didn’t want to give me a copy,] they could at least kiss my ass – which they hadn’t done, either”

is a mistranslation. Maybe done on purpose, maybe translator was just shitty.

He's also talking about book covers problem i mentioned before.

 

[Perkel]

Yeah english bookcovers are horrid pieces of shit totally not connected to content inside. Hell most of them are just TW2 concepts using cdpr art.

here is how polish edition looks and few other:

What i don't understand is why they don't use this instead :

 

[J_C]

Yeah english bookcovers are horrid pieces of shit totally not connected to content inside. Hell most of them are just TW2 concepts using cdpr art.

Shit

here is how polish edition looks and few other:

Shit

It's OK.

What i don't understand is why they don't use this instead :

It is great.

 

[Jazz_]

Are there 60+ people who are gamers? I have never come across one.

 

[Konjad]

here is how polish edition looks and few other:

These are old. The first one is very old, the second one is quite a few years old, after Twitcher 2 release they used this one:

But the newest edition (not sure if finished for all the books yet) uses:

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Are there 60+ people who are gamers? I have never come across one.

I've met a German dude once who was well over 50 and a massive Morrowind fan. This was way back so he's probably nearing 70 by now.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Are there 60+ people who are gamers? I have never come across one.

I saw an 80 year old grandmother on youtube thoroughly enjoying her play-through of Oblivion once. She played a Khajiit, and screamed "God fucking damn it! I forgot to put my sword away!" when she entered a town and the guards bellowed, "Come with us, citizen!" I jumped.

 

[Perkel]

Are there 60+ people who are gamers? I have never come across one.

I've met a German dude once who was well over 50 and a massive Morrowind fan. This was way back so he's probably nearing 70 by now.

Well i am glad that soon there will be one less fan of morrowind...

 

[taxalot]

I had an ex whose mother played better games than the daughter.
"I just completed The Longest Journey" isn't something you hear from your average 60 y.o lady.
A shame her daughter was criminally insane and had too tight of a vagina.

 

[deranged]

Compared to this:

which looks like a cover for second rate soft porn, the original polish edition covers seem pretty solid.

 

[ghostdog]

I think the best covers are the German ones. I've made custom ebook covers based on them:
http://imgur.com/a/RgUF0

 

[Lambach]

In what order would you guys recommend I read the novels/short stories? I had no intention of bothering with them initially, but I see a lot of myself in Sapkowski, both of us being grumpy, drunken Slavs, so it might click for me.

 

[Carrion]

In what order would you guys recommend I read the novels/short stories? I had no intention of bothering with them initially, but I see a lot of myself in Sapkowski, both of us being grumpy, drunken Slavs, so it might click for me.

Start with The Last Wish, then Sword of Destiny, then Blood of Elves and onwards. The short stories already establish many of the key elements that come into play later on, and there's no reason to deviate from that. The early stuff is by far the best anyway, so if you don't like it, you can just stop without feeling bad about it.

 

[deranged]

In what order would you guys recommend I read the novels/short stories? I had no intention of bothering with them initially, but I see a lot of myself in Sapkowski, both of us being grumpy, drunken Slavs, so it might click for me.

Start with The Last Wish, then Sword of Destiny, then Blood of Elves and onwards. The short stories already establish many of the key elements that come into play later on, and there's no reason to deviate from that. The early stuff is by far the best anyway, so if you don't like it, you can just stop without feeling bad about it.

What he said, but make an effort to read up to Time of Contempt since imo it's the best in the entire series.

 

[Perkel]

Yeah last wish then sword of destiny and then novel from blood of elves.

 

[Rahdulan]

I think the best covers are the German ones. I've made custom ebook covers based on them:
http://imgur.com/a/RgUF0

I'm totally stealing those covers. Can't seem to find any other unified ones that don't fall on YA bullshit side or are inconsistent. Great job.

 

[Talby]

What i don't understand is why they don't use this instead :

This looks familiar...

 

[LESS T_T]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...-sapkowski-the-writer-who-created-the-witcher

[...]

Sapkowski and his Witcher Saga were famous years before CD Projekt had anything to do with it. Indeed, CD Projekt wasn't even the first to try to make a Witcher game. Adrian Chmielarz (Bulletstorm, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter) and studio Metropolis have that honour. I've spoken at length to Chmielarz about 'The Witcher game that never was' before. The game got as far as a publisher and screenshots but was too ambitious and quietly died.

CD Projekt came sniffing around in the early 2000s, another history I've written in detail before. Sapkowski doesn't remember how the conversation went but he remembers agreeing to the game. "Well they brought a big bag of money!" he says. It was the same reason he said yes to Chmielarz. "What I expect from an adaptation: a big bag of money. That is all."

Sapkowski wouldn't say how much money changed hands. Chmielarz, for his part, mentioned paying "good money for Poland in 1997"; and CD Projekt co-founder Marcin Iwinski mentioned an offer that "wasn't a huge amount of money".

Sapkowski continues: "I agreed they would write a completely new story using my characters, my ontology of this crazy world. But they would create completely new stories. I said, 'Why not? Please, please, show how good you are.'"

Simply, he didn't think it would amount to much. He thought games were stupid, had done ever since shooting Martians on an old console plugged into a TV. "OK let's play cards or let's drink vodka," he said back then, "but killing Martians is stupid. And my standpoint stands: it is stupid."

So he left CD Projekt Red to it. Didn't visit, wasn't consulted, didn't care. He was Andrzej Sapkowski, who were they? "People ask me, they say, 'The games helped you?' I say, 'Yes, to the same extent I helped the games.' It was not so that the games promote me: I promoted the games with my name and characters."


When The Witcher 1 came out in 2007, things began to change. Book publishers saw it as a way of reaching a new audience and so republished the series with game-related images and blurbs. It muddied the waters, making the distinction between game and author less clear. Not a problem in Poland, where Sapkowski was a household name, but to English audiences, where he wasn't published until 2008... "It was f***ing bad for me," he says.

As CD Projekt Red's star rose with each game released, the problem worsened. Take a look at the covers of the English books now and see for yourself. You can imagine why someone would mistakenly ask Sapkowski if he was the guy writing books about the games. "It happened," he says. "It happened. I can remember my reaction: I know many bad words and I used all of them, in many languages.

"In 20 years," he says, "somebody will ask, 'Witcher, the game - and who's the author?" No one will know, he says. "Somebody," they'll say. I get the impression it is his greatest fear.

You can understand his frustration and you can understand the confusion. But isn't it all water under the bridge compared to the money he has made from Witcher game sales? Well no, because - and herein lies his constant source of aggravation - he gets nothing.

"I was stupid enough to sell them rights to the whole bunch," he says. "They offered me a percentage of their profits. I said, 'No, there will be no profit at all - give me all my money right now! The whole amount.' It was stupid. I was stupid enough to leave everything in their hands because I didn't believe in their success. But who could foresee their success? I couldn't."

He doesn't begrudge CD Projekt Red's accomplishments all the same. In many ways he couldn't have asked for a better studio. Credit where credit is due. "The game is made very well," he says, "and they merit all of the beneficiaries they get from it. They merit it. The game is very good, well done, well done."

He is not above signing a Witcher game too, should you present it, and people have. "I do it," he says. "Because first of all, when people come to sign, I consider them fans, so if they come and present me the game to sign, I cannot say no to that because it would be very impolite. Stand in a long queue, bring the game, what can I say? 'Please go away, I will not sign it'? It will be very impolite."

Who knows? In the hungry silence following The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, many new fans may discover Sapkowski's work, and his name may muscle its way back to being head of the table. But the irony of Sapkowski being in Waterstones in Birmingham on a Friday evening, playing to a crowd of a couple dozen, launching an English translation of a book he wrote 18 years ago - all while The Witcher world he invented has never been globally more popular - is not lost on me.

In many ways he lives up to his reputation then, but in other ways he surprises me too. Contrary to popular belief he claims actually not to hate video games at all. "It is not that I don't like them, that I despise them," he says. Hang on, didn't you just call games "stupid"? "I just don't play them! But I have nothing against games, I have nothing against gamers. Nothing."

[...]

 

[Santander02]

"I was stupid enough to sell them rights to the whole bunch," he says. "They offered me a percentage of their profits. I said, 'No, there will be no profit at all - give me all my money right now! The whole amount.' It was stupid. I was stupid enough to leave everything in their hands because I didn't believe in their success. But who could foresee their success? I couldn't."

At least he admits he was the idiot there

 

[Rahdulan]

At least it explains the butthurt.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://www.pcgamesn.com/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt/the-witcher-games-andrzej-sapkowski-profits

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
|Posted 1 hour ago
“It was stupid” - The Witcher book writer on turning down a share of CD Projekt’s profits

The creator of The Witcher, Andrzej Sapkowski, doesn’t have much love for videogames. When CD Projekt Red came knocking at his door with an offer of money in exchange for licensing, he took it, but it wasn’t out of a passion for the medium.





"Well they brought a big bag of money,” Sapkowski told Eurogamer in an interview. “What I expect from an adaptation: a big bag of money. That is all.

"I agreed they would write a completely new story using my characters, my ontology of this crazy world. But they would create completely new stories. I said, 'Why not? Please, please, show how good you are.'"

Sapkowski viewed videogames as “stupid” and he didn’t think CD Projekt’s adaptation would amount to much. He was even offered a share of the profits, which would have netted him a lot of money over the years, but he turned the offer down.

"I was stupid enough to sell them rights to the whole bunch," he said. "They offered me a percentage of their profits. I said, 'No, there will be no profit at all - give me all my money right now! The whole amount.' It was stupid. I was stupid enough to leave everything in their hands because I didn't believe in their success. But who could foresee their success? I couldn't."

And what a success it was. In fact, it got to the point where, outside of Poland, The Witcher was more well-known as a series of games. Additionally, English publishers altered book blurbs and art to match the games. "It was f***ing bad for me," commented Sapkowski.

 

[WhiskeyWolf]

Doesn't he get a lot of cash from the books right now?

 

[Average Manatee]

Sounds like he didn't consult with anyone about selling the rights. Even if he thought CD Projekt was going to crash and burn there's no reason to give them a blank check to do as many games as they want. Sell the rights for Witcher 1 and if it turns out to be a success you'll have huge negotiating power when they come back for Witcher 2.

He is not above signing a Witcher game too, should you present it, and people have. "I do it," he says. "Because first of all, when people come to sign, I consider them fans, so if they come and present me the game to sign, I cannot say no to that because it would be very impolite. Stand in a long queue, bring the game, what can I say? 'Please go away, I will not sign it'? It will be very impolite."

That's interesting. The Witcher as an IP for games is basically open to anyone rather than exclusively in CD Projekt's domain?

 

[Taluntain]

Should get a retarded peasant cameo in one of the games, really.

 

[pippin]

Given the usual fate of sci fi and fantasy writers, I can't blame him. Not everyone gets to be Neil Gaiman.

If you really want and old butthurt fucker, go read Michael Moorcock's opinions on many things. He believes GRRM and Sapkowski ripped his shtick off, and to be honest, he's kinda right when it comes to GRRM. But (coming from his own words) the thing that makes him rage like an idiot is that Sapkowksi had the gall to nickname his character "white wolf". He might be right but it's not like it's a super weird nickname for a fantasy character.