Witcher author wants more money? Does he deserve it legally?

[MacDuffle]

He wrote the Witcher novels as erotica, then complains the video game did nothing to elevate the source material

 

[Mga223]

Apparently the other author called him 'an arrogant mother fucker' . He hates that younger fans come up to him with the notion that his books are derived from the games and not the other way around . Lol if not for the games I'm sure most people wouldn't know about the series . In that way the games would have actually boosted sales of his books

Exactly this, my mate read the books after the games came out.

So really the game booted his sales.

 

[empsim]

thats like CDPR saying give us some of that money from the millions of book sales you made thanks to our game....

 

[Madmick]

'The Witcher' Author Is An "Ungrateful Schmuck" Says Metro 2033 Creator

In 1993, Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski created a fantasy book series by the name of The Witcher with the release of "The Last Wish." The series went on to spawn numerous other entries, and quickly became not only beloved by the Polish people, but eventually a popular global series.

Years after the first book, Sapkowski famously sold the gaming rights to the series to polish developer CD Projekt Red for less than $10,000, thinking that the medium of video games was going nowhere, and thus games based off his series would produce nothing. But he was drastically wrong. Not only did CD Projekt Red grow The Witcher into one of the most popular video game franchises in the world, it brought the book series to a global audience, and helped usher in a TV adaptation by Netflix.

Suffice to say, Sapkowski regrets and isn't happy about selling the gaming rights for so little, and has even made a recent -- and likely fruitless -- effort to get more money out of CD Projekt Red.

And then you have Russian author Dmitry Glukhovsky, the creator of the Metro 2033 series, which has spawned its own -- albeit less popular -- video game series, Metro. Unlike Sapkowski with The Witcher, the Metro series from 4A Games has been quite profitable for Glukhovsky, who clearly took a much different approach to dealing out the game rights.

That said, speaking to Russian outlet DTF, Glukhovksy revealed his opinion on Sapkowksi, and let's just say, he doesn't like him very much.

According to Ostrog and its translation, Glukhovsky revealed, that, as a gamer himself, he looks at Sapkowski as "an old fool." The Russian author notes that his Polish counterpart "f**cked up," and the reason he has filed a lawsuit against CD Projket Red is due to his "wife nagging him about it in the evenings."

Glukhovksy kept on the matter, calling Sapkowski "an ungrateful schmuck," and noting that without the success of the games, he would have never had the Netflix deal.

Glukhovksy continued:

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"He is just an elderly man, he missed his chance, and well, what can you do? I feel sorry for the man.’’

Glukhovsky concluded on the matter by noting that the Polish author shouldn't be pursing the lawsuit, as it may harm the ongoing Netflix project, who, as he points out, isn't very fond of legal issues.

 

[loyalyolayal]

I saw Yongyea's recent video about this. I didn't know the author looks like this guy:

 

[fdswer]

I guess the rumors over the years of this guy being hard to work with and a asshole were true

 

[cabear]

well you don't get to sell something for what you think is worthless then get to come back later (after it's successful) and say "hey i deserve more!". No you don't, you got what you deserved in the original deal. I think some polish law counteracts this though, so the author might be a colossal moron but under their law may be protected. i dunno i really never got into the witcher so i never kept up on it.

 

[Krallang]

Brandon Sanderson actually came out and said he would give CD projekt red the rights to any of his novels for free if they made a badass game.

He said the exposure alone would be worth it.

 

[ssBaldy]

Mr. Sapkowski is a well-known piece of shit. He has a great creative mind, but, as is common with creative people, he is nigh insufferable to work with. He despises the game industry and thought it was for retarded kids. He was quick to change his mind when Witcher series sold millions of copies. He even wrote an addditional (and shitty) Witcher book which sold rather well thanks to game series.
I want to thank mr. Sapkowski for creating the Witcher universe, but also want to advise him to perform an autofellatio for his attitude towards CDPR. They treated his books with great care and developed the characters and universe very well.