Doug Cockle, the voice of Geralt, has hit back at criticism of The Witcher 4 focusing on Ciri — and told so-called fans of the franchise to “read the damn books.”
“That’s just stupid,” Cockle said of the backlash against CD Projekt’s next The Witcher role-playing game, sparked due to it featuring Ciri as its protagonist for the first time instead.
“It’s not woke,” Cockle continued, speaking during a video published by Fall Damage. “There’s nothing woke about it. [Ciri]’s a cool character from The Witcher, and they’re gonna focus on that character, and that’s awesome.”
Cockle has voiced Geralt throughout CD Projekt’s The Witcher series, and is set to return as the beloved monster slayer once again in The Witcher 4 — though not as its main character.
Still, despite Geralt continuing to have some sort of presence in The Witcher 4, the confirmation last year that his adoptive daughter would be taking centre stage for the next game (and presumably the whole of the next The Witcher game trilogy) sparked an inevitable outcry of the series going “woke” from a minority online.
“We can’t just have Geralt for every single game for The Witcher ad nauseam, out through eternity,” Cockle continued, explaining why his character should be taking a well-earned rest. “We’ve seen the end of Geralt’s journey. Blood and Wine was supposed to wrap up that journey.
“I celebrate Ciri. I celebrate her being the protagonist. So all you people who think it’s woke… [blows raspberry].”
Cockle then went on to suggest that The Witcher 4 features Ciri for a specific reason — one that is tied to the franchise’s original novel series by Polish fantasy writer Andrzej Sapkowski.
“If you read the books, then you understand why CD Projekt went down this avenue,” Cockle said. “There’s a whole rich world of stuff to explore with Ciri, that they didn’t do when they put her into Witcher 3, because the story was about Geralt. But she hints at it.
“If you think it’s woke, read the damn books — they’re good, first of all. And secondly, you won’t think it’s so woke anymore.”
CD Projekt’s games are set loosely after the finale of Sapkowski’s novels, though Sapowski himself has always distanced his work — and the rather definitive finale he wrote for his characters — from The Witcher video games that continue Geralt’s story some time later.
Without spoiling story elements from the final novel that may be explored in The Witcher 4, it’s fair to say that Sapkowski, like CD Projekt, also saw Ciri as a pivotal character — and one that is happy to pick up the action when Geralt needs some downtime.
IGN previously discussed the return of Geralt in The Witcher 4 with CD Projekt franchise and lore designers Cian Maher and Marcin Batylda, who explained how the already established timeline of events all makes sense.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at [email protected] or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
