Hi dudes :)

Could anybody who has read the books and have played the game make small comparison?
I liked the saga very much and not being exactly fan of games with fantasy setting made in 3D - I think 3D is for shooting while isometric is for roleplay/hacknslash - I couldnt resist the 5 buck deal. I know little of the game and Im gonna keep it that way untill installed so that I could enjoy it properly. Just curious about the atmosphere of the witcher-goes-to-videogame thing.

How witcheresque is the game compared to books? Did you like it the same/more/less?


Cheers
OKRB

Only read the first book that was released in English, which was a pretty poor translation IMO. I much preferred the game to THAT book.

Well i read all books, and I liked them more than the game. But still, the game was designed to be accesible to the people that didnt read the books. We have the same world, the same setting, many faces that we know from the books, and references to the past events, but it lack in these specific Sapkowski humour (only Pratchett was better but hes creating whole parody universe) or strong secondary characters (Ciri/Falka? Regis ?) . Still its a good history, so if you will manage to get a grip on 3D GUI and survive tedious beginning you should enjoy this.

I just started reading the books, and have to say I like them so far (approaching the end of the second volume currently). It makes playing the game much more enjoyable for me, encountering places, people and monsters I have read about before.
Fortunately, all titles are available in German translations, and they are supposedly quite good - although I should probably have my wife compare them as a native speaker (^_^)

You can play the game in an isometric camera view point and it plays similarly enough to older 2D games from that camera angle. I read the Last Wish in English and found it fun to read and like another poster was reminded a bit of Pratchettt but like another poster I think the translation may have not been that well done in English. The Witcher may not have the same kind of humor, but it does have a dark atmosphere (if not as dark as the books) to me from what i played so far and the music goes along well to make the game more immersive as well. It

Speaking of which, do the games follow the same story than the books or not? If not, in which order should I play/read them?

games take place after the books.

I have downloaded the game which whet my apetite for the stories again.
Do I get/borrow all the books and read before playing? Thats the question :-)

I see that translation into non-slavic languages (simple ones like English especially) could screw Sapkowskis work a bit. I read it in Czech which is very similar to Polish in most aspects plus both languages and cultures share the middle european space so no problems for me.

Btw how does WITCHER translate into your mother tongue?
The original is Wiedźmin. Czech translators chose to use Zaklínač. Its not direct translation of the word Wiedźmin though we have an exact archaic equivalent for it.

Cool thanks! :)

Ведьмак (Ved'mak) in Russian. Sounds pretty cool to my ear.

I read the books a long long time ago, but even though I don't remember most of it I'm surely glad I did. This made me pick the game in the first place. You don't need the back story to enjoy the game, but it adds much to the experience if you know what they all came through. Also helps to resist Triss' charms (not that difficult anyway in my opinion) knowing who the perfect lady for Geralt really is =D Was that a spoiler? No names were named, so I guess not.

It's a travesty that the publishers are taking so long to get the books into English translation. I read the two that are available, but there has been a long gap.

After a little research, the next two books should be coming in 2012 from Gollancz in the U.K. and Orbit in the U.S.

I wrote to Orbit telling them they were wasting an opportunity by not pushing the books out at the same time as 'Witcher 2'

I enjoyed both books, although I think 'Last Wish' had the edge.

"Blood of the elves"
suffers in its English release, for the simple reason that it's book 3.

Book 2, "The Sword of Destiny" is the second short story collection. it's very important, since it introduces the one major character of the novels, who wasn't in the first DShort story collection.

unfortunately (from what i've heard), one of the stories from "Sword of Destiny" was published in English separately years ago, and now there's a copyright issue preventing them from publishing "Sword of Destiny" in English.

aside from that, being a first of 5 novels, "Blood of the Elves" feels very much like a set-up book. nothing important really happens until the end.

toverer (Dutch) Hexer (German)

In Finnish it would be something like:
Noitaja, doesn't sound good at all.
In Norwegian it would be quite similar to the German.
Hekser

Having read the both books translated to English quite a while ago. Think that those set-up the lore quite nicely. Really sucks though that there is years between the English books.