The Witcher 3 Dev Says the Key With Sex Is to Not Sell Your Game on It

With The Witcher series, developer CD Projekt Red has not shied away from the matter of sex, and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt will be no exception. As long as developers are "tactful" about their handling of it, level designer Miles Tost says there's nothing wrong with including sex in a game.

"We make mature games for mature players (every Witcher game is for adults only), and sex is, well, a part of adult life," Tost said in an interview with PlayStation Lifestyle. "The key thing is not to overdo it, not to sell your game with sex. As long as you remain tactful in what you do, as long as you have a legitimate reason to put sex in your game, I think it's quite safe to do so."

CD Projekt Red told GameSpot earlier this year that Wild Hunt's sex scenes will not be interactive, unlike those in the God of War games. The non-interactive route is one also taken by games like Mass Effect, which presents sex in the form of a brief cutscene--though that didn't prevent it from proving to be controversial nonetheless.

Tost was also asked about the challenges of developing the console versions of Wild Hunt, which is coming to Xbox One, and PlayStation 4 in addition to PC. This is the Polish developer's second game to be released on consoles, the first being the Xbox 360 version of The Witcher 2. Wild Hunt is, however, its first game on a PlayStation system, and the first on current-gen consoles. Despite the major improvements Xbox One and PS4 offer over last-gen systems in terms of horsepower, Tost said, "A locked performance budget is one [challenge]--PCs, although I'm not saying this is a best practice, allow you to raise the bar in terms of visuals because you can always upgrade the hardware.

"It's different on consoles, as you have a fixed performance budget, you need to stick to. Also, there's a lot of [technical certification requirements] you need to meet to pass the certification process. We had to learn all that."

Following a delay announced earlier this year, Wild Hunt is now scheduled for release next February. CD Projekt Red has promised not to delay it again, and is showing off a 30-minute gameplay demo at San Diego Comic-Con this week. For more on Wild Hunt, check out our latest preview.