LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Fantasy worlds in books are filled to the brim with lore, characters and complex plots that leaves quite a lot to the reader's imagination. So it is always exciting when popular titles lend themselves to adaptations across different media — from TV series to video games to graphic novels and many more mediums besides the 'text-only' book format.
‘The Witcher’ is one such fantasy book series which is perfect to dive into through multiple mediums and perspectives. While the book series is most well-known for its Netflix series adaptation, the text has been adapted into many other forms, including a widely played video game franchise as well. As we wait for Season 3 of the fantasy series to release in a few days, fans and other interested viewers can discover more about the world made up of wild beasts and monsters.
Video Games
The other most popular adaptation besides the series is probably the video game developed by CD Projekt Red back in 2007 of the same name. The game has sold millions of copies over the years as it added a sequel and then made it into a trilogy to the series based on the books. The games are called ‘The Witcher’, ‘The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings’ and ‘The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt’.
Comic book series
The book series by Andrzej Sapowski was first adapted into a comic book series by Maciej Parowski, which was released between the years 1993 and 1995. Another one, given the name ‘Reasons of State’, was made into a two-part book by Michal Galek. Based on the video game series by CD Projekt Red, Dark Horse Comics collaborated with the game creators to serialize comic books following the ‘The Witcher’ storyboards for the gameplay.
Films and shows
The Netflix show is not the first time the fantasy book series was adapted for TV. Before this, the book series got a TV adaptation in its original language, Polish, and was called ‘The Hexer' (Wiedźmin) which was directed by Marek Brodzki.
Netflix has other adaptations of the series as well. This includes the animated film ‘The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf’ and a prequel series ‘The Witcher: Blood Origin’ which are both developed by the showrunner of the original series Lauren Schmidt Hissrich.
Other Games
Clearly easy to adapt into games, the series was re-produced through many other mediums of gaming. This included a Tabletop Role Playing games released by multiple companies. CD Projekt, seemingly the biggest fans of the series, have also made a board game based on the series called ‘The Witcher Adventure Game’ designed by Ignacy Trzewiczek.
The popularity of the book series reached the niche of card games as well. These were based on the CD Projekt’s game and developed by Kuźnia Gier titled ‘Przygodowa Gra Karciana (The Witcher: Adventure Cardgame)’ and ‘Wiedźmin: Promocyjna Gra Karciana (The Witcher Promo Card Game)’.
Season 3 of 'The Wicther' will be available for streaming on Netflix from June 29, 2023.
