I'm paraphrasing here, don't take these as exact quotes. And I didn't write down everything - either because I didn't care, or because the answers were already wide-spread. The things I did write down here aren't really special either, so don't get excited. Common stuff incoming. It was at least in good humor. And Jose. Never enough Jose.
- XP for killing monsters is in. This is the final nail in that coffin I believe - they said months ago that there's only XP for quests, but after several videos (January, PAX, SHIELD) as well as this stream that tell otherwise, it's clear.
Q: What's the relationship between CDPR and Sapkowski?
A: He's not one of the writers on the team, but he trusts us to do a great job. Our stories are separate.
Damien also made a comment about how you'll always have people picturing the characters differently when they're already existing ones, giving an example of how a Russian fan told them he imagined Yennefer differently. There wasn't a punch to this comment of his, just him showing that they're aware people may have different depictions in their mind than them, and that's fine. And inevitable.
- Jose's eyebrows jump in surprise and he gives the camera a tight-mouthed nod of approval and a thumbs-up to the name "David Rodriguez" (someone who asked a question). If it's a good name for Jose, it's a good name for my future child.
Q: Can newcomers understand the story? [Not this question again...]
A: [-.-]
- They started working on the first bits of DLC.
Q: Will we frequently have companions?
A: It's hard to say without spoiling, but there will be situations where you need to follow someone, or have someone follow you, and they also participate in combat.
[It wasn't clear from their answer how frequent this will be - but it's a question that's hard to answer specifically anyway]
- Jose: Loading screens are actually one of the big reasons we delayed the game the first time around, because programmers had to rewrite the entire system so that it loads things as you go.
Q: How has being a sandbox improved TW formula?
A: Damien: [Regularregular stuff] Monster tracking can take you days... [sounds weird to me, but it caught my ear so I wrote it down]
Jose: Being an open world adds to the feeling that you're not the center of the world. Things happen around you. As in, actually things happening around you, not in the figurative sense of story events.
- [About the beard] Damien: You won't be Gandalfing away. There are 4-5 stages. It's kinda small, but people seem excited anyway, so... cool.
[Seems it got much more attention than they thought it would]
Q: How do I get hints about the weak spots of monsters?
A: You have to investigate. It's not easy. You won't find out by just staring at monsters. As you speak to people and read books, your information about the monster in the bestiary will be updated. Take the example of a noonwraith - Yrden changes them from ethereal to tangible, so you can attack them. You'll know that by talking to people, or reading, or just because Damien just told you.
[So like in TW2, besides the option to update your bestiary by fighting creatures over and over - it's either out, or they just forgot to mention it]
- Jose told that many people who played had positive impressions about the intimate scenes, saying that they were actually believable.
Q: Now that we're near the end of the trilogy, how would you like the games to be remembered?
A: Damien: Game of Thrones changed a lot of things in the TV medium. It showed that there's an audience mature enough to enjoy things including a lot of violence, a lot of sex - not in a forced way [I kinda disagree about sex not being forced in GoT]. There's a new audience now that wants more mature products, and I think TW will do the same. Games that don't hold your hand, with mature writing; hopefully this will become a new trend.
Jose: I hate to use words like "ground-breaking" because they're very risky, but I certainly hope that future RPGs will use TW as inspiration for great integration between story and gameplay. That TW will set a new level in this regard.
[I'm not sure about the lack of hand holding - my impression so far is that it has a lot of hand holding, and it's not clear right now if it offers you tools to handle yourself if you toggle off the hand-holding elements in the HUD and don't use Witcher Senses, such as descriptive journal entries to go by as an example, but we'll see]
Tomorrow they have a crowded schedule it seems with more interviews. But, y'know, at this point interviews aren't renewing much to those who have been following in this forum.
Edit: A few things I missed are here -
http://forums.cdprojektred.com/thre...rticles-2015?p=1578688&viewfull=1#post1578688
Thanks
@Crivilnite !