Roundtable: Michal Madej Answers
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The Witcher has definitely already introduced a few new or uncommon features to the computer RPG genre. First of all we introduced a fresh approach to classical fantasy, with a much more mature theme, deeply developed NPC personalities and even some contemporary problems, instead of the tiresome Good vs. Evil cliché. Another element was redesigning the idea of (choice," which in my opinion is the most crucial element in the genre. I think people play RPGs because they want to feel that they have freedom of choice; they love making all kinds of decisions and observing how they affect story and gameplay. That's why we came up with the idea of offering choices with delayed results that are hard to cheat with the save/load trick. Additionally we employed lots of cutscenes that tell the story in a cinematic way, especially flashback cutscenes that remind the player of their decisions and the outcomes. As for everything else, we tried to use what is most appropriate for that part of the story, and we try to stay away from any kind of dogma.As a bonus, Iron Tower's Vince D. Weller answered the setting question himself.
Summarizing, I'm sure The Witcher introduced several RPG trademark elements a mature fantasy world, contemporary elements, morally ambiguous decisions, delayed results, flashback cutscenes and cinematic storytelling.
We started with the main quest. It required a "fall of an empire" setting where the past is more advanced (technologically and magically) than the present. The fall of the Roman Empire was the first thing that came to mind. It fit what we needed perfectly, including even the Dark Ages period (which is where AoD takes place, basically) between the fall of the Roman Empire - which was also the fall of the Western civilization (frequent wars, population decline, limited written history, exodus from urban centers, loss of knowledge, technological and cultural), and 1000 AD when mankind decided to crawl out of the gutter and start playing civilization again.
While our game has very few things in common with the actual Roman Empire and the post-fall history, it's very helpful to have such a great reference material allowing you to trace and understand the fall and the period that followed. Not for realism as that was never our goal, but for the in-game logic.
We've also decided to go without the traditional RPG selection of monsters and give this important job to humans. We do have few non-human characters, but while they can be killed, they are not monsters to be slaughtered for loot and xp. These characters fit the setting and have reasonable explanations.
So, the low magic, mostly human, roman-inspired, "dark ages". That was the overall concept. Then we started fleshing it out and setting up conflicts. Once again, it was dictated by the main quest. As I mentioned before, we wanted to provide different motivations for the player, give the player different reasons to seek the temple. So, we've created 3 main factions: an underdog badly needing an ace up its sleeve, a king-of-the-hill protecting the hill and keeping others at bay, and a religious zealot seeking the divine. To spice things up we've also added "professional" factions: traders, guards, thieves, and assassins, and tweaked them to keep things less vanilla and more interesting. So, the merchant guild became a mix of a ruthless Star Wars Trade Federation-like organization and Venetian-style bankers; the guards became a nazi-like "the end justify the means" army remnant trying to restore the Empire; the assassins became an honest business helping people handle disputes and disagreements, to keep small conflicts from growing into wars and large-scale confrontations, etc.
This setup already creates great conflicts and unlikely alliances, but it won't be complete without people with different personalities, strengths and weaknesses, and of course, agendas. We usually introduce our characters with descriptions:
"Dellar looked like a tired, old scribe, proving that appearances are often misleading. At seventeen he signed up as a caravan guard. It took him three years to realize that his father was wrong about honest work. Dellar switched sides and started raiding the same caravans he guarded yesterday. Four years later the Merchants Guild recognized Dellar's efforts by paying the Imperial Guards a king's ransom, which quickly solved the "raiders problem". Hundreds of dead raiders were nailed to Maadoran walls and a few lucky survivors were sent to the mines to work off their debt to the guild. For almost a decade Dellar mined iron ore, fighting for food scraps and his life, until he managed to escape to Teron where Antidas took him under his wing."
Throw in dialogues and reactions to different things and you have a well defined character with the past, enemies, and personality. Not a quest giver, but an actual character. You may hate his guts and take every opportunity to get rid of him (I doubt you can best him in combat, but there are other ways and the pen, as they say, is sometimes mightier than the sword), but in another playthrough where things may develop differently, you'll like him and be happy that he's watching your back.
The final setting-defining element is quests, but that's a long story.
