A kind of bittersweet yet positive look at the romance additions
Now that the patch 1.10 is finally out and the « Triss fix » has finally happened, I’d like to give my opinion about the changes that occurred but I’d also want to put some things back in their original context.
It’s no news that there is a massive fight going on for a few months now about Triss and Yen and all that stuff. I believe it started, partially at least, in the thread I made back then. What saddens me is that the point of this thread was absolutely not that start this fight. But first things first.
First of all, my point is not that start another war, to make more people angry or to blame one side or the other. Not at all. So please, keep this in mind. My point is to thanks CDProjekt for the changes they made and to make people remember what it was all about. In short, am I happy with the « Triss fix » ? Yes. Could it have been better ? Yes. Could it realistically been better ? Maybe not. I can’t answer this and probably no one can besides the REDs themselves. Now, I’ll give some explanation but it might be wise to start by reading the OP of this thread.
To sum things up, here’s a quick reminder of what was asked :
I, and many others, felt that there was an inconsistency in the way the Triss romance was done. But this is not only about Triss. Why ? Because the very core of the problem lies within the fact that we had a romance choice that had minimum consequences if we decided to choose one of the possible options. This option being Triss. It was like the world around us never really acknowledged the fact that we choose her. Moreover, once the choice was done, we could barely talk to her. However, it was not asked to make Triss more important than Yen, or to push Yen aside. In fact, it was asked to add some stuff to Yen too. It was asked to make the choice we do as a romance matter, no matter what choice we made. And as I already said, I, for one, loves Yen at least as much as I love Triss. What we asked was not about making one person more important than the other, or to erase what was done in the books (but that's another problem I'll talk about later), it was to make our choice have consequences. And to make it even more clear, let me add the answer we got from the REDs :
And I hope this can clear things up a bit about what was asked and what the REDs meant to do.
Now comes another point that is also important because that is something that came back a lot lately. The games are non-canon. It was stated by Sapkowski himself. Of course, it is very close to what the original witcher saga is and CDProjekt made what most people consider being a follow-up to the books. But given what the creator of the witcher itself said, you can’t possibly blame CDProjekt to add something that is non-canon to the books. I choose to consider the games a follow-up as well, but that’s up to everyone to decide how they want to consider them. Why I am saying this ? Because there was a lot of comment about Triss not being the one she should be given what happens in the books and about the lines between her and Geralt not fitting either. My personal point of view is that the lines between them fit pretty well. Geralt might be a badass monster hunter, he’s stupid and cheesy when it comes to love. Even with Yen he often says things a bit ridiculous. That’s also what is funny about him. The other issue showing up often is the "fact" that Yen should be the love of Geralt. In the books, yes. No discussion about it. In the game, there's a choice between her and Triss. That's CDProjekt choice and I believe it should be respected. Anyway, the thing is I don’t think there’s any need to fight over the fact that the changes are or are not canon to the books because the answer is already there and goes far beyond some dialogs between a couple of characters.
I said all this because I don’t mean to argue about the fact that what REDs did is a valid addition to the whole of the witcher saga. What I want to do, however, is to explain why I am overall satisfied with what was added.
First, the new dialogs between Geralt and Triss/Yen. It’s overall very much welcome. At least, we can now interact with both of them when we have a chance to and we get to talk with them before important events occurring in the second part of the game. No more “well ?” coming from your lover, that’s a relief ! In my opinion, the added lines were nice. Maybe not perfect, but definitely pleasant and even funny at some point. In short, Triss doesn’t look like a total stranger to us anymore if we choose her, and Yen gets a couple new lines too. In the end, you also get some kind of closure with the woman you did not chose, which is a small but important thing too. Basically, these additions are one of the things that was asked and REDs did it well.
Then comes the dialogs between Geralt and Ciri. Those are important, maybe even more than the ones between Geralt and the woman he chose. Why ? Because it somewhat resolve the fact that no one around us seemed to be aware of our romance choice. And that is very much what CDProjekt wanted to resolve in the first place. In an ideal world, it could have been nice to see more NPCs talk about it. I’m thinking of Cerys when, at some point, she talks about the romance between Yen and Geralt, or Philippa, or Dandelion,… We only get Ciri. I believe part of this choice comes from resources restriction. I mean, each NPC would not only mean some new lines but also some new recordings for a huge amount of voice-over. Ciri was not only a realistic choice but also a logical one. After all, Wild hunt is centered on the Geralt/Ciri relationship. So it makes perfect sense for her to be the one to acknowledge the choice of Geralt and to talk about it. This is why I’m happy with the sequences added between them. I would have loved more, a lot more with a lot of other NPCs, but it doesn’t change the fact that I feel satisfied. It’s also important not to forget the fact that CDProjekt had to work on the expansion but also had to resolve a big amount of issues they probably did not plan at first. So maybe if the game released without any bugs and no patches were needed we could have got more. But given what happened, I’m satisfied with what we got.
Another thing that, I think, made some people a bit angry is the reveal of the romance scene between Geralt and Shani a couple of days ago. Long story short: I believe that is exactly the kind of “sex scene” people would have wanted for Triss and/or Yen. By that I mean it’s not just a couple of quick sequence that let us barely see anything. It’s more visual, more intimate, yet not perverse in a bad way. I want to believe that the REDs took into account what was said back when the game was released and made this scene with those critics in mind. Of course, It would have been really cool to see the existing romance/sex scenes enhanced in a similar way, and I can’t say that I did not feel any bitterness watching the Shani/Geralt stuff, but I want to take this in a positive way and think that CDProjekt listened to what was said when they worked on the expansion. (I could talk about the proposition to add Triss and Yen to the expansion, but I believe that for HoS this debate is pointless. The story was more than likely already written when Wild Hunt was released and integrate both girls in a decent way would have required way to much changes. We’ll see, however, for Blood and Wine how things go.)
So, I wanted to thanks CDProjekt for the changes they made. It’s simple as that. I’m bleak about how things went sour and how the forums became, at some point, a warzone between Triss and Yen fans. I hope this can help people understand what the changes were about and, maybe, open a positive debate about it.
And well, in the meantime, let us all enjoy Hearts of Stone. :cheers3:
@GingerEffect @REDDorigen (adding you here since you participated actively in the previous thread =) ).
Now that the patch 1.10 is finally out and the « Triss fix » has finally happened, I’d like to give my opinion about the changes that occurred but I’d also want to put some things back in their original context.
It’s no news that there is a massive fight going on for a few months now about Triss and Yen and all that stuff. I believe it started, partially at least, in the thread I made back then. What saddens me is that the point of this thread was absolutely not that start this fight. But first things first.
First of all, my point is not that start another war, to make more people angry or to blame one side or the other. Not at all. So please, keep this in mind. My point is to thanks CDProjekt for the changes they made and to make people remember what it was all about. In short, am I happy with the « Triss fix » ? Yes. Could it have been better ? Yes. Could it realistically been better ? Maybe not. I can’t answer this and probably no one can besides the REDs themselves. Now, I’ll give some explanation but it might be wise to start by reading the OP of this thread.
To sum things up, here’s a quick reminder of what was asked :
I, and many others, felt that there was an inconsistency in the way the Triss romance was done. But this is not only about Triss. Why ? Because the very core of the problem lies within the fact that we had a romance choice that had minimum consequences if we decided to choose one of the possible options. This option being Triss. It was like the world around us never really acknowledged the fact that we choose her. Moreover, once the choice was done, we could barely talk to her. However, it was not asked to make Triss more important than Yen, or to push Yen aside. In fact, it was asked to add some stuff to Yen too. It was asked to make the choice we do as a romance matter, no matter what choice we made. And as I already said, I, for one, loves Yen at least as much as I love Triss. What we asked was not about making one person more important than the other, or to erase what was done in the books (but that's another problem I'll talk about later), it was to make our choice have consequences. And to make it even more clear, let me add the answer we got from the REDs :
GingerEffect said:
And I hope this can clear things up a bit about what was asked and what the REDs meant to do.
Now comes another point that is also important because that is something that came back a lot lately. The games are non-canon. It was stated by Sapkowski himself. Of course, it is very close to what the original witcher saga is and CDProjekt made what most people consider being a follow-up to the books. But given what the creator of the witcher itself said, you can’t possibly blame CDProjekt to add something that is non-canon to the books. I choose to consider the games a follow-up as well, but that’s up to everyone to decide how they want to consider them. Why I am saying this ? Because there was a lot of comment about Triss not being the one she should be given what happens in the books and about the lines between her and Geralt not fitting either. My personal point of view is that the lines between them fit pretty well. Geralt might be a badass monster hunter, he’s stupid and cheesy when it comes to love. Even with Yen he often says things a bit ridiculous. That’s also what is funny about him. The other issue showing up often is the "fact" that Yen should be the love of Geralt. In the books, yes. No discussion about it. In the game, there's a choice between her and Triss. That's CDProjekt choice and I believe it should be respected. Anyway, the thing is I don’t think there’s any need to fight over the fact that the changes are or are not canon to the books because the answer is already there and goes far beyond some dialogs between a couple of characters.
I said all this because I don’t mean to argue about the fact that what REDs did is a valid addition to the whole of the witcher saga. What I want to do, however, is to explain why I am overall satisfied with what was added.
First, the new dialogs between Geralt and Triss/Yen. It’s overall very much welcome. At least, we can now interact with both of them when we have a chance to and we get to talk with them before important events occurring in the second part of the game. No more “well ?” coming from your lover, that’s a relief ! In my opinion, the added lines were nice. Maybe not perfect, but definitely pleasant and even funny at some point. In short, Triss doesn’t look like a total stranger to us anymore if we choose her, and Yen gets a couple new lines too. In the end, you also get some kind of closure with the woman you did not chose, which is a small but important thing too. Basically, these additions are one of the things that was asked and REDs did it well.
Then comes the dialogs between Geralt and Ciri. Those are important, maybe even more than the ones between Geralt and the woman he chose. Why ? Because it somewhat resolve the fact that no one around us seemed to be aware of our romance choice. And that is very much what CDProjekt wanted to resolve in the first place. In an ideal world, it could have been nice to see more NPCs talk about it. I’m thinking of Cerys when, at some point, she talks about the romance between Yen and Geralt, or Philippa, or Dandelion,… We only get Ciri. I believe part of this choice comes from resources restriction. I mean, each NPC would not only mean some new lines but also some new recordings for a huge amount of voice-over. Ciri was not only a realistic choice but also a logical one. After all, Wild hunt is centered on the Geralt/Ciri relationship. So it makes perfect sense for her to be the one to acknowledge the choice of Geralt and to talk about it. This is why I’m happy with the sequences added between them. I would have loved more, a lot more with a lot of other NPCs, but it doesn’t change the fact that I feel satisfied. It’s also important not to forget the fact that CDProjekt had to work on the expansion but also had to resolve a big amount of issues they probably did not plan at first. So maybe if the game released without any bugs and no patches were needed we could have got more. But given what happened, I’m satisfied with what we got.
Another thing that, I think, made some people a bit angry is the reveal of the romance scene between Geralt and Shani a couple of days ago. Long story short: I believe that is exactly the kind of “sex scene” people would have wanted for Triss and/or Yen. By that I mean it’s not just a couple of quick sequence that let us barely see anything. It’s more visual, more intimate, yet not perverse in a bad way. I want to believe that the REDs took into account what was said back when the game was released and made this scene with those critics in mind. Of course, It would have been really cool to see the existing romance/sex scenes enhanced in a similar way, and I can’t say that I did not feel any bitterness watching the Shani/Geralt stuff, but I want to take this in a positive way and think that CDProjekt listened to what was said when they worked on the expansion. (I could talk about the proposition to add Triss and Yen to the expansion, but I believe that for HoS this debate is pointless. The story was more than likely already written when Wild Hunt was released and integrate both girls in a decent way would have required way to much changes. We’ll see, however, for Blood and Wine how things go.)
So, I wanted to thanks CDProjekt for the changes they made. It’s simple as that. I’m bleak about how things went sour and how the forums became, at some point, a warzone between Triss and Yen fans. I hope this can help people understand what the changes were about and, maybe, open a positive debate about it.
And well, in the meantime, let us all enjoy Hearts of Stone. :cheers3:
@GingerEffect @REDDorigen (adding you here since you participated actively in the previous thread =) ).
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