Cross-gen development means compromise, says Witcher dev

Building cross-generational games means developers must compromise, CD Projekt Red CEO Marcin Iwinski told Edge. The developer explained that these compromises may negatively impact gamers.

"We've clearly said we'll be next-gen only," Iwinski said. "PC is a non-stop next-gen, that's the cool thing about it. So I think a lot of people with big franchises and massive reach plans, they'll have this dilemma, and I think there’ll be a lot of compromises made in the industry that might not necessarily be good for gamers."

Games like Bungie's Destiny and Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag and Watch Dogs are all slated to release on current-gen machines and future platforms, but The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is not. Iwinski explained that CD Projekt Red would never feel comfortable downscaling the game for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, a move that would result in a "so-so" offering.

"We're looking for AAA experiences from the next-gen," Iwinski added. "The Witcher 3 is so large… with a world bigger than Skyrim, and everything that we wanted to put inside it, there's just no way that it would run on current-gen. We'd have to put a couple of years of development into [360 and PS3 versions], and then the experience would be so-so… we'd never do that."

Ubisoft has not commented on the differences between the current-gen and next-gen versions of Watch Dogs or Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag. Bungie, on the other hand, has promised all versions of Destiny will feature the "full vision" of the game universe, though it is not clear exactly what that means.