Name at least 1 that was well known in Poland by ordinary people and was commercially successful.
It was a logical thing to do for him at that time.
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Andrzej Sapkowski sold the rights to Metropolis's Witcher for $4000
- Thread starter boskee
- Start date
Name at least 1 that was well known in Poland by ordinary people and was commercially successful.
It was a logical thing to do for him at that time.
Maybe he took a straight check then too. "These books will never sell, gimme that cash." "These suckers think that foreigners want to read this? Their mistake, I'll take a check." "A 'Netflix' wants to make a TV series? Hahaha, just pay me up front."
I kid, I kid, I can sympathize with making a mistake but CDPR definitely doesn't owe him anything. The books are good, too.
Morrigan Stark
Arrogant Smirk
Hah, dude's so delusional about his book sales. Should have accepted royalties for sure.
lol, can you imagine sex scenes with these graphicsIf anyone's curious, here's how the canceled Witcher game developed by Metropolis looked like, from scans I got off NextGen mag. Keep in mind that this was in 1997.
michaelius
Banned
In Poland? Not really - it was 9 years after we regained independence from big soviet brother and first copyright law was passed in 1994 - game business at that time was very very small here.
Doing it right now 😎
I want to see the Geralt in Bathtub scene with them.
Killer Queen
Banned
Its not really that, its that if it doesn't accurately capture what LOTR is to them then they don't like it. I mean, the films are good movies but I don't like them in the same way that i like the books, because they are different entities in more than just medium and a few minor changes.
Salty Rice
Member
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AbUdQHvPNk
Best Friends talking about it. Love Woolies reaction how much of a idiot Sapkowski is.
Best Friends talking about it. Love Woolies reaction how much of a idiot Sapkowski is.
Melchiah
Member
Both should be the standard for the creator, but unfortunately they always aren't. It's understandable he might be bitter about it, but apparently he got over a year's worth of salary of it at the time, which is far more than some do. For example, uninformed and young musicians are often screwed with publishing and licensing deals.
EDIT:
Not to mention, that games made from licensed IPs weren't usually that good back then. Remember how Arkham Asylum was seen as one of the few good ones, and that was in 2009. Things are very different now though, with The Walking Dead and whatnot.
The breasts and nipples showing through the dress gave me a chuckle.
As they should.
jono51
Banned
Well, he's probably kicking himself but it could be worse: He could've been one of the good ol' 2011 bitcoin doomsayers. Those people are the real losers.
Sapkowski said:
It's a semantics argument. Strictly speaking it's true (with regards to English, anyway) but you have to strip it of all context to see it that way.
The Last Wish was first published in English in June 2007. The game came out in Europe in October 2007. So yes, the book came out first.
However the books were obviously licensed off the back of interest in the game, which was in production and having all sorts of press long before the books were translated. They just got the first book out first. They also only managed to get one other book out (Blood of Elves in 2008) before dropping it completely. I thought they dropped it because sales tanked, but this blog says it was a rights issue, though I can't find any more about that.
Anyway, it's only after they re-released the first book in 2012 that they actually managed to get further books out - Time of Contempt hit in 2013, and they licensed further books in 2015 to complete the series, and licensed Season of Storms earlier this month. I'm sure there's nothing to be read into the fact that all of those announcements reference the games.
The Last Wish is also a NYT bestseller... as of June 2015, and I'm sure that had nothing to do with the fact Witcher 3 had just come out either.
purpleblastoise
Banned
Shitting on creators and praising scummy business deals...
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
it's quite literally Witcher in German.
SpacePirate Ridley
Member
Read everything that is happening in this thread, including the OP, and then come back again.
I love Sapkowski a lot and his books are amazing (and I will defend the original creators most of the time), but he is not in the right now and he needs to stop being salty and start being more amicable with CDP (something that if you know him from all his interviews, is probably impossible becuase he is an inmense hardheaded).
Flzzlsharkop
Neo Member
There's nothing scummy about this, it's completely fair. If the writer gets paid up front and also gets royalties if the games are successful then the game studio will be the only party bearing a risk. He was trying to have his cake and eat it too.
SpacePirate Ridley
Member
And he never asked for a pay upfront and royalties the first meeting. Something tells me that if he had done that (like asking for a small sum of royalties,a nd a smaller up front) CDP would have probably given that.
Coping mechanism. He's likely telling himself that to help deal with the massive missfire not taking royalties turned out to be.
Flzzlsharkop
Neo Member
Yep, i assume he could also have negotiated it this way but it's not what he chose to do. He knew what he was getting into.
Exactly.
Do some folks in this thread really think the market then is similar to the current polarizing AAA homogenous white-centric one we have atm?
The rise of PC gaming where The Witcher has roots in and get good words of mouth by by enthusiastic PC gamers?
The fact that he refused royalties for a bigger pay off leaves no sympathy from me. But I do understand why hes frustrated at the huge amount of money hes missing out on. At least its led to the making of the Netflix series, which I believe he would have added royalties to, unless hes a complete idiot. Let's just say the butterfly effect led to the series, which does benefit him, especially if its successful. So he better be less salty about it from now on.
Does anyone know if the rights to CDPR are forever?
Does anyone know if the rights to CDPR are forever?
Judging by his comments, it wasn't his own work that he had no trust in, it was (and apparently is) the potential of video games.
SpacePirate Ridley
Member
He actually takes very seriously his works when he understands the media or what he is working in (for example the german, russian and spanish translation of his books).
Every other endevour he has taked that didnt understand has fucked him over, like the failed polish tv series, the thought of videogames being a lost cause and found them stupid, and seems he was also left out of the english translation of the books.
Being a harheaded guy doesnt help matters either.
He doesnt think his work is bad, nothing farther from the truth.
D
Deleted member 59090
Unconfirmed Member
"Now they quote me on GAF. When we at Polygamia were the first in the world to report that Xbox One was going to get delayed in many countries they didn't believe"
Yeah, it sucks.
It seems like giving him a bigger slice of the pie would be worthwhile, if only so that you can tell the story of the game's development without a "they took advantage of the author's ignorance of the profitability of the medium" addendum. As far as I'm aware it could be an entirely wholesome story of success if not for that.
It seems like giving him a bigger slice of the pie would be worthwhile, if only so that you can tell the story of the game's development without a "they took advantage of the author's ignorance of the profitability of the medium" addendum. As far as I'm aware it could be an entirely wholesome story of success if not for that.
You didn't read all the books. The games story is an abomination compared to them. Literally nothing but fan fiction.
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Why be pissed at them though? He sold it for pennies. That's on him.
The potential of Polish video games in the '90s, no less. It's hard to blame him for expecting the games to make pennies, if anything at all after the original attempt fell through.
And doubly so as he studied economics and worked as a senior sales representative for a foreign trade company before starting to write. Though with that background he also has twice the reason to be salty and grumpy, he did an obvious mistake (thrice) and can't get over himself to admit it.
He doesn't feel that way cause he's bitter about the game. But they definitely have. And there's no way he'd be getting this Netflix deal if the game didn't exist.
Noisepurge
Member
This might be a suprise to you but CD Projekt is a company that is in the business to make profit. It's not a charity foundation
BronsonLee
Member
He really likes to complain about this a lot, but it makes sense since the first time it happened it worked in his favor since the game didn't come out
He's an adult that apparently studied economics; he's not some rube off the streets they took for a ride. He made a miscalculation and payed for it.
For the original deal maybe, for the new deal with cdpr? There's no reason any sane person would have turned down the royalties, particularly someone with Sapkowski's finance background. He did it to be a curmudgeon that didn't like video games. He's admitted as much. He's a former economist, not a rube. There's no way the games haven't impacted his book sales, and absolutely 0 chance he'd have gotten the netflix deal without them. He's just too proud to accept that he made a really poor (but informed) decision.
Oh, hah, didn't see your post. But you're right. In the CDPR case he rejected the contract offered, and went for a substantially worse one.
That's less about PC RPGs and more about Atari acquiring the D&D license and then sitting on it.
Ouch. I think Alec Guinnes made a good deal. Besides the money, he wasn't really happy with himself later on for being a part of it because of what the franchise turned into.
Going by some of the posts in this thread he's just generally dismissive of video games as a medium, it seems.
SpacePirate Ridley
Member
Overreaction meets overreaction.
Sapkowski writting is better, but he should be happy that CDPR has treated his baby really well and its faithfull in its majority.
And how can it be an abomination story if its basically a retelling of the books from a sequel perspective? Yeah its fanfiction (becuase the author didnt made it), but not an abomination by any means.
The joke is on you, he was a former economist and he is an really intelligent guy, the problem is he is too hardheaded and proud.
Sounds like he didn't respect his own work.
They offered him royalties and he chose a lump some of 4K instead? Sounds like a shallow cash grab and an assumption that any games would crash and burn. Why whore out your IP for chump change to a group you feel won't do it any justice.
That's telling in itself, though. People don't just sit on what they consider to be hot properties. There are titles based on those licenses. There are no D&D games being made because D&D doesn't mean anything to anyone other than a rapidly dwindling collective of grognards.