What The Witcher 2 Taught Me About Writing

and how it informs my own storytelling

I’m going to say straight off the bat that it wouldn’t matter how much time I spent working on this post, I was never going to be happy with it. How can I articulate my feelings on the first full length game I played after a long absence? How do I eloquently tell you about how much this game, this world influenced my relationship with writing and storytelling?

How do I write about my favourite game that isn’t just a review or nonsensical brain mush?

The truth is, I tried my best and that's all any of us can ever hope for lol 😂

Thanks for being here and reading my nonlinear ramblings x

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***Note that this post contains spoilers for The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings***

Released in 2011, The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings is the second game in The Witcher franchise by CD PROJEKT RED, and my very first full length game after a long absence of playing them.

(Source: ABC News)

I first played The Witcher 2 in 2019 and even though I was in the middle of learning how to play the game and figuring out how to stop getting screen tears (I was playing on a HP Pavilion All-in-One PC bought specifically for studying purposes*) I was barely out of the tutorial and already sucked into the story.

*I still play games on the old HP, just not anything made later than 2015 with heavy duty graphics. Sorry BG3 🙁

(Me in 2019 playing The Witcher 2 complete with gaming appropriate prawn posture)

I was new to The Witcher world, although one of my oldest friends had been badgering me to at least read the books (I have now, three times over, but that’s for another post.) If you read my very first post here, you might recall that visual novels were my gateway games which led to me deciding I wanted to give RPG’s a go. The Witcher 2 was sitting unplayed, and largely unconsidered in my husband’s Steam library and so it began.

The opening cutscene alone is utterly compelling. We’re treated to a mini movie of a big burly bloke with golden cat eyes sneaking onto a ship out at sea where he *spoilers* demonstrates some pretty amazing moves and magic use, killing everyone on board including King Foltest of Temeria. The game then opens (after the tutorial if that's your first stop) to a prologue where we meet Geralt who is in prison suspected of killing the king.

I know there’s no point in telling you the plot of this game. I don’t want this to be a review post (it’s a 10) I’m actually just trying to get you interested enough to want to give it a go, especially if you’ve played The Witcher 3, loved it and haven't played the others. The graphics aren't that bad you guys, you should play it!

(Source: Twitter)

Anyway, my point is we’re only a few minutes into this game. We’ve barely touched the controls and already the story is fizzing with intrigue. We, as the player, already know who killed the king and so the game becomes us guiding Geralt to uncover the truth.

The thing is, The Witcher 2 has several different paths Geralt can potentially take, which lead to multiple endings - 16 altogether. Now, I’ve played this game many times and try as I might, I haven't been able to get the same ending twice. I even tried to do identical playthroughs and still got everything to match except for one line of dialogue. I was equal parts furious and awed.

(Geralt & Iorveth, Elven rebel and Commander in the Scoia’tael. Source: Gamerbase.Org)

There’s a huge turning point at the end of chapter 1, where the player has to choose between helping Iorveth, an elven rebel thought to be in cahoots with the kingslayer, or Roche, the head of the Temerian Special Forces. This is an excellent point in the game to save so you can return and try a different choice, but guys… my beloved friends and subscribers.

I have never sided with Roche. Ever.

(Geralt & Vernon Roche, Head of the Temerian Special Forces. Source: CBR.Com)

I know it’s ridiculous and I don’t dislike Roche (although I might hold a grudge that he was in The Witcher 3 while Iorveth was barely mentioned. Please CD Projekt Red, I’m begging you to put him in The Witcher 4! 🙏)

I’ll admit that I’m a Scoia’tael (aka squirrels) sympathiser and could write entire posts about the elven rebels and why I keep siding with them at every opportunity, but for differences sake, you’d think I’d give the other side a crack.

I just can’t do it.

Regardless of the choice made here, even tiny decisions Geralt makes going forward, begin to inform the story in big ways. I can’t even begin to imagine how many branches are on the tree of this story.

So, what did this teach me about writing?

Despite having a degree in creative writing and being an avid reader who loves stories and loves writing, I never thought I’d ever write a novel. I don’t know why. I probably just thought I wouldn't be able to, and yet I have and it’s sitting in the query trenches right now (one of the reasons I started this blog was to distract me from the agony of it.)

I realised that playing games is a lot like writing a story. In fact, playing an RPG where you create a character (like in Dragon Age) is an incredible way to get started. You make a little guy, you give them a personality, and you guide them through the world and see what it makes of them.

(My Rook and Lace Harding in Dragon Age: The Veilguard)

A piece of writing advice you often see is to write for yourself, or write a story you’d like to read, so of course, my novel is about queer monster slayers and elves (something that I’m starting to think is unpublishable, at least traditionally, so if anyone out there has any self-publishing tips, please send them my way!)

When I reached the end of the first draft of my book, I realised something…while I’d started out writing the story from the perspective of a single point of view, by the end, I’d turned the narrative to the views of other characters.

(Source: YouTube)

But Laura, what does this have to do with The Witcher 2?

Okay well…. I obviously couldn't write a “choose your own adventure” situation like a game, but I could show the reader how the choices of one character affect what happens to another, even when they’re not in the same vicinity as each other.

What exactly is a branching narrative, or branching storyline?

Well, it’s nonlinear, much like the organisation in this post (sorry gang!) And as I said before, it creates an enriched experience when it comes to the storytelling aspect and you, the player, move through the game and ultimately, how it ends for you. Now, that brings me to one of my biggest gaming peeves.. People like to use the terms “good and bad endings” which are common in many games, not just those with branching narratives. The problem is that it reminds me of when people say they “beat” a game instead of “completing” it. I’ll be real with you, I hate that term. It harks back to the days of arcade games and how the object was to beat the game, but in RPG’s it makes it sound like you’re not having a good time. That it’s a slog.

When you say you completed a game, I think “heck yeah, you reached the end! You saw the credits and the special cutscene! You did it! Rejoice!” When you say you beat a game, my brain imagines undefeatable bosses, gritted teeth, lots of swearing, possibly a controller being tossed and pixels melting down your screen…

(HP is still going strong)

Ultimately, what I learned from The Witcher 2 is that there's more than one way to tell a story and there’s more than one way for a story to end, which I think is endlessly inspiring and makes me want to return to the game time and time again.

Even if I always end up siding with my beloved squirrels 😘

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