I started playing the Witcher yesterday... I vaguely remembered it as a game with "mature" content - but what I didn't expect was to find what I found, sex scenes shoehorned in the game without any real sense or logic as if they were copypasted in at the last minute. They really are immersion-breaking imho. At the moment I've witnessed three:

- the one with Triss at the beginning which, despite the two having been supposedly together for long now, wasn't especially emotional or romantic and felt more like the last part of the tutorial. "Hey, we showed you how to move around, fight, and brew potions - now let us show you how to f*ck!". It could have been more ridiculous only if there had been a quick time event associated to it where you have to combo your thrusts for maximal pleasure... in addition, Triss has just recovered from a near-fatal wound. She doesn't even have time to get out of her bed before you jump in and bang her. Well, that was some MIRACULOUS potion indeed.

- the second one was with a random peasant girl I saved from a bunch of goons who wanted to rob/rape her. She introduced me to the frightening reality of this being a game with "protect the NPC" quests, and more importantly, that said NPCs have all the wits and the strategic cunning of a sea cucumber. The dumbass kept on charging at the demon beasts with her stiletto to "help" me, despite me being, like, THE monster-killer professional with a two-handed sword longer than his sexy, white and already extremely long hair. Just sayin'. I had to reload multiple times, use a potion and outrun her to save her sorry ass, darwinism be damned. And what do I get for my inconvenience? Gold, items, powers, potions? Nay, a kind of funny cutscene and boobies. Not that I don't appreciate them by hey, hoping for some more concrete reward here.

- the third one was straight up unbelievable. I just saved the kid from the Salamandra bandits. We run into the cave, we find Abigail brewing a potion to defend herself from the lynching torchs-and-pitchfork mob of idiot inbred peasants outside. She tries to seduce me in order to bring me to her defence. SEXYTIEMZ! And then we're back into the cave, same spot in front of the cauldron. Ok, what? What... what did they do exactly? Did they have sex right there on the floor, in front of the kid, with the angry screams of the witch hunters coming from right outside the cave? I suspect that would be kind of a mood killer. Also, how exactly did Geralt survive this long if he's so intent at whipping around his dong even when there's a whole bunch of a-holes who could barge in and murder him with extreme prejudice at any moment?

It's just... silly. The card business (what is this, "Magic: The F*ckening"?) and the fact that most of these sex scenes come completely out of left field, without even so much as an hint of flirting in earlier dialogues between the characters don't improve the situation. They could have put in less sex scenes and more build up to them and it would have made much more sense. I also wonder whether these choices can have consequences on the game/the relationship with Triss, which would be interesting, but I strongly suspect that won't be the case.

My theory on why both of us feel it silly but the devs thought it should be kept as is is this.

With regards to the sex scenes, the devs were aiming for a Conan style character, a real life raging sexual tyrannosaurus. Every guy who has an ounce of testosterone in them should read Robert E Howard's classic stories of the manliest of men, this guy is the predecessor and role model for every hero who isn't a caricature of super moral knight of goodness.

The problem with the Witcher is that he is not Conan, the look of the character, the attitude of the character, the voice actor, etc, the Witcher comes across as too mature, classy and refined to respect a Conan character, sure he's not a super moral knight of goodness either and has his flaws, but he seems way too calm, reserved and intelligent to get up to Conan style shenanigans. I think the devs overstretched themselves and tried to give the Witcher the characteristics of every super cool badass hero they've ever come across rather than build a character. put him into a situation, and think about how he would react. The end result of how badass he is supposed to be came before the character himself was visualised and badassery following his actions.

Read some Conan and you will appreciate how the character itself precedes its deeds rather than the deeds defining the character.

I think the problem is also with the "game" format itself... first, the whole "collecting cards" thing is really, REALLY stupid and makes it like trying to get Steam Achievements. So you're trying to screw every breathing woman just to be a completionist. The second problem is context. In a game you must never be too far from the action or it'd get too boring, so you get crap like the Abigail scene which doesn't make any sense in any possible way, but it's forced there because otherwise they would have had her to promise you her favours, then beat the boss, then go meet her, and that would have been an anticlimactic way of ending Chapter I. In other words, gameplays asks that you never have a moment of relative calm/reservedness, which is EXACTLY what successful erotism requires (and sex without erotism is just sweaty naked people making funny faces). Then of course there's what you mention too, Geralt seems too stoic and also a bit on the dark and mysterious side... not a barbarian type. I would see him more in the role of a stoic, slightly shady kind of dark paladin in fact.

If you read the witcher books, you'll see you're probably right (except that this probably didn't come from the devs, came from the author). Geralt is like Conan in many things: he's invincible in combat, smart men steer out of his way and the foolish end up dead, all women fall for him even in dire situations, and Geralt in return will never turn down sex.

I think the author was probably not aiming for real life raging sexual tyrannosaurus, just mature, but yeah, it can be fun or eye-rolling silly depending on the audience.

It's funny I don't see people complaining about the same sexual situations in James Bond movies, or any 80s action movie. Um, and why can't sex be a steam achievement? Women are collectible in Witcher 1, like clothes or cars in GTA, why not? It's optional and gods know it's better than collecting location checkpoints or superhero outfits (check the latest movie-themed Spiderman game to see what I mean).

Even games that try to be immersive these days have achievements or cards or badges, whatever. It's just so widespread.

An achievement for every woman you shagged? That'd be a great way to play a game, I like it! :P

I'll steer clear of that Spiderman game, thanks... I've fallen for superhero movie tie-ins once or twice in my life. Never again.

Anyway, why can't sex be an achievement? Well, because it completely ruins the mood of the plot imho, in the way it's presented. This is not some cheeky sexy comedy game a la Leisure Suite Larry. It's supposed to be serious and gritty and dark and all that stuff - self-irony is a very scarce resource (by comparison, see Divinity 2, which had equal parts drama and comedy). And that's good because I will enjoy a good story with believable characters and it's been a while since I've had one in games! But then shit like the Abigail scene I described above happens, and it's completely out of place and fundamentally hilarious (except it's not meant to be so). It's not erotic, it's not sexual, the two characters we barely know about, Geralt is basically devoid of any personality besides "being a badass", so there's no believable sexual tension between the two. The context is completely inappropriate (who the hell has sex in the same room with a kid?) and removes any credibility, and whatever's left is shattered when after doing the deed the game goes 'ping!' and rewards me with a porn tarot. It's silly and destroys any suspension of disbelief, is what I mean.

I don't have anything against sex in games. But if you try to have a mature plot and setting, then have mature sex scenes as well. Game of Thrones is a gritty fantasy show with lots, LOTS of sex but there it isn't nearly as much out of place because even when it's sudden and dirty and rushed and absolutely not romantic, it is MEANT to be. It's the whole point. And on the other hand, if you want to have a "serious" sex scene - one which the players will get excited about beyond the simple "LOOK TITTIES!" feeling that works only until you're 15 yo or so - you need to build up this aspect of the story exactly like the 'action' ones. Tease it slowly. Make 'em suffer and wait for it. Build up the relationship between the two characters and then when the moment comes make it be WORTH IT - like slaying the big bad, it needs to be the culmination of its own plot, not an anticlimactic quickie in a cave. And by all means, do NOT ruin all immersion I might have had by flashing a big, card-shaped reminder that I'm playing a game in my face when it happens! It's seriously ugly. It's like having an ad banner pop up at the bottom of the screen during the final scene of a movie in a cinema. Completely incongruous.

(btw what I wrote above might be read as 'sex scenes should be only at the end of the game'. That's not exactly what I mean; they could also be the culmination of a shorter arc. In The Witcher, a Chapter is a story arc. Even a Quest is its own tiny, self-contained story arc. But you can do better than just throw Geralt in the mix with Random Maiden #56, have them only talk business, and then suddenly have them going "wanna shag?" "eh why not". You can give the feeling that Geralt is this kind of one-night-stand sex adventurer without making it feel so damn cheap. Honestly, the man's so stoic I can't even imagine him deriving PLEASURE from these encounters)

And I don't know much about Bond movies, I've never watched any and yeah, always got the feeling they were kinda silly too, so no contradiction there.

Insane... I really like card collect for sex LOL that card are pure art XD.
TW2 has removed ruining much of the fun in trying to respond in the right way to collect those cards.
In fact, he just put 4 cut scenes ...
I do not understand why you do not like, they are funny just like the fact that the witcher can be drunk.
For me it was a challenge throughout the game just like the dice. a really fun challenge.
Take it as a race to conquer more maidens possible XD

Yeah, it's just that it doesn't work well with the story. I dunno, it's like if you're watching this very serious movie and suddenly someone starts clowning around and making derpy faces. Think, say, one of the Dark Knight movies; and then suddenly Batman starts hitting on a girl talking like Austin freakin' Powers. I like The Dark Knight and I like Austin Powers, it's just that you can't switch from one to another at a moment's notice.

I'm scared that you might be taking it a bit too seriously.

+1 for your well-composed rants in this thread (all of 'em :) ). I agree with pretty much all your points. I think they at least dumped the "sex cards" thing for the sequel; however, they added quick-time events (hopefully not for the sex!), so it's kind of a wash.... [sigh] Then welcome to the wonderful world of The Witcher!

QTE for sex, well that sounds fun. Sex cards and QTE for Witcher 3!

"Push <space> to fist... harder... harder... HARDER!"

Why?

I'm just saying that as a story for me it doesn't work. I got into the Witcher with people telling me it was a very good, dark kind of story and I'm a bit disappointed by this. There's not some kind of switch I can turn on my brain to make me like this detail. Not saying it should be the same for everyone. For example, I watch lots of anime, some of it is pretty dumb... I mean, right now I'm following a series about a guy who turns into a super-heroine with twintailed hair to fight against aliens who came to Earth to steal the love for the twintail hairstyle from the human hearts. That's pretty much as dumb and nonsensical as it gets, but I'm freaking loving it because it's so silly. It's not me taking the game too seriously - it's the game that takes itself very seriously. It tries to act all cool but then suddenly it does this kind of goofy thing. Simple as that.

I had no major issue with the sex scenes, even though I do agree they take away some of the immersion and clash a bit with some of the players' perception of who they think Geralt is supposed to be, thus making it hard to maintain the required suspension of disbelief fantasy games ask for.

After a while, I learned to kind of ignore them, and I didn't obsessively try to "collect" all the cards. In fact, I'm pretty sure I missed most of them. I didn't go the "celibacy" route, either, mind you.

It's a bit annoying, to me, how CDPRED and the original author of the books seem to think that "mature=blatant sex". Maybe the Geralt in the books is more in line with the "medieval manly man" approach, but the one in the video games certainly isn't, and having him portrayed as some sort of sexual predator that downright bangs anything with a nice cleavage as long as he has nice flowers to give to them goes way against who I imagine Geralt to be, from his sleek looks down to his mannerisms and voice. It just doesn't make that much sense.

As for the supposed maturity of the sex scenes, it's funny that most of the people who ardently defend them base their arguments on the "but it's fun and I like collecting those HAWT cards, LAWLZ!!!" theory, which, in my book, doesn't sound mature at all. It just makes people sound like 14 year olds, all excited because they have seen a bodacious pair of naked female mammaries.

Some people also tend to say that the world of The Witcher is set in fantasy medieval times, and that people back then didn't think like the way we think now, there were no "feminist movement" and no feminist consciousness, but that's no excuse to make a game that trivializes and objectifies women as mere "sex card trophies" and "achievements" in the 21st century. People didn't have that mentality back in medieval times, but we sure do have that mentality now, and this game is being made for people alive today, not hundreds of years ago.

For all that The Witcher 2 does "worse" than The Witcher (which I don't really think is that much, I actually think Witcher 2 is the better game, out of the two, even if by a small margin), at least it got the sex scenes right. They look mature and well developed, you can feel the sexual tension building up, they disposed of the objectifying sex cards and replaced them with well-choreographed, amazingly-shot cutscenes that are way more erotic than some movies that were made with that specific purpose in mind. There are way less sex scenes, but they make them count, and at least I can feel Geralt is actually enjoying those moments, instead of the imbecile "I gotta score and empty my balls before they rot away and explode" scenes we get in the first game. If they had tackled the "mature sex themes" in The Witcher like they did in the second game, it would have worked a lot better.

We must be looking at the game from very different point of views! :P I always saw the game as a tad tongue in cheek, excluding the main story ofcourse.

Serious does not mean devoid of humor.
It has been seen with TW2 did anything too serious and that beautiful has become boring.
The atmosphere of TW, it remains dark, just think of the night in the countryside Vizima, whenever the zombie dog tick.
I do not know how far you've come, but most go on more you immerse yourself in the story (the first chapter is perhaps the worst since the second will begin to realize that the love stories are part of the atmosphere) ..
TW has a medieval world very well done, full of filthy places, drunken men took to gambling and sex full passenger and hilarious situations, and that is why when something happens that is really dark you think "the hell I would not have never expected. "
Just think how the Joker in Batman is insane, and it is the contrast between the situations in which it is ridiculous situations where it behaves like a criminal monster that makes it so interesting. Imagine if it were suddenly Joker to do what you said, I think there would be nothing wrong with that. TW more than a superhero series like Batman, I think represents a kind of good Joker.