Da ist er aber schon mehrmals zurückgerudert und hat etwas diplomatischer gesagt, dass die Spiele, für das, was sie sind, sicherlich gut gemacht sind, aber er kann dem halt nichts abgewinnen. Auch will er nicht einsehen, dass er von den Spielen profitiert, weil es ohne ihn die Spiele ja nicht geben könnte.
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. “Somebody,” they’ll say. I get the impression it is his greatest fear.
“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.”
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.”
Ein paar Ausschnitte aus einem recht interessanten Interview: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-03-24-meeting-andrzej-sapkowski-the-writer-who-created-the-witcher
Das kann man aber definitiv lesen.
Auch die Anmerkung mit Zeit des Sturms ist korrekt. Das passiert vor der Cirilla-Kiste. Aber trotzdem kann man den am Ende lesen. Wurde ja auch zuletzt veröffentlich und beeinflusst inhaltlich nicht die anderen Romane.