With the question of cross-generation titles holding back next-gen processing power still very much in the air, The Witcher 3’s CD Projekt Red is moving forward unabated. In a lengthy team interview with Eurogamer, several members of the team talked about what makes The Witcher 3 a next-gen RPG – the game is only coming out for PS4, Xbox One and PC – and it’s not just prettier graphics or a further draw distance.
A few highlights:
– The game will feature everyone’s favorite next-gen feature: physics-based rendering. In layman’s terms, it basically means that CD Projekt will employ time-saving tools similar to Unreal 4’s Kismet system, which basically lets developers create tools that streamline the properties of objects or world elements – one example given is a tool to make a forest by accounting for angle of terrain and likely rainfall, then “grows” a forest to those specifications. (Also, that awesome dynamic weather.)
– Kinect, and second screen features are planning on being implemented (as well as special features for PS4), though it’s still early in development so they haven’t announced anything yet.
– AI will take advantage of next-gen processing power to rendering more characters on-screen at a time, as well as having them behave more realistically (though no examples of how this would work were given). Still, to hear any developer actually talk about artificial intelligence as a goal is exciting, given the potential that it could have for next-gen games. (Conversely, the team also mentioned that the rather steep learning curve from The Witcher 2 would be dialed back to something a little more reasonable.)
Read everything CD Projekt has to say – which is quite a lot – via the link below.
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Via Eurogamer
