The Witcher 3 almost had a "focus mode" that sounds a lot like Fallout's VATS

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How to dismember your dragon

In a string of Witcher facts posted to Twitter this week, developer CD Projekt Red revealed that it once considered adding a "focus mode" to The Witcher 3 which would allow Geralt "to see [the] insides of any monster, target them and then cut with great precision." The studio also shared the above image, which suggests focus mode would've worked on humans as well. 

This ability was obviously cut from the final game, so we'll never know how it actually would've handled, but at first blush it sounds a lot like the VATS system in the Fallout games. VATS doesn't give you an X-ray view of enemies, but it does allow you to target specific body parts more precisely. This makes me wonder if The Witcher's would-be focus mode slowed time like VATS does, or if it was intended as more of a scanner to identify weak points like the scanners in Metroid Prime or even Batman: Arkham. It being a Witcher game and everything, I'm also picturing a more gruesome targeting mode with finishers akin to Mortal Kombat's grisly execution animations. Damn, the more I think about this, the more I wish it was actually in the game. 

Focus mode's post-mortem was the ninth Witcher fact CD Projekt Red's posted in the past couple of days. The previous fact is also pretty interesting: the soup in the pot near the Spoon Collector in The Witcher 3's Blood and Wine DLC "reflects the amount of soup actually eaten during this scene" according to your dialogue choices. And let's not ignore this gem: 

Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales is, quite unexpectedly, stuffed with interesting tidbits about The Witcher universe. Check out our full review for more.  

Austin Wood
Austin Wood
Senior writer

Austin has been a game journalist for 12 years, having freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree. He's been with GamesRadar+ since 2019. They've yet to realize his position is a cover for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a lot of news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.