I understand the idea is that every decision you make is a decision that Geralt would make - because that's what the game allows you to do - so you don't have to worry about whether you are properly behaving like Geralt or not. However if Geralt is not a completely one-dimensional character existing within a completely black and white world then the answer to his dilemmas might be a lot less simple and obvious than what you suggest, and therefore the player's involvement remains crucial.
It changes nothing. The quote expresses the absence of RP possibilities as every behaviour is The Witcher's. Not matter the course of behaviour decided, the man is a Witcher (role) and true to his personality (character), voiding all reasons to speak about RP.
Mere re-interpretation of a role and within this role, a character. Same opera song, different interpretations.
Ok, but in that case it's not the game that's hard it's the dm that's very strict.
I am replaying The Hitman series as I wait for number 5. I noticed, that funnily enough, the game engines include small procedures to assess the RP quality of the characters the hitman can be brought to impersonate. it is more about not breaking role and not act suspiciously but it is there. If the hitman breaks role, he is discovered.
Funnily enough because a game that is not a RPG but allows very shallow RPG sessions by intermediation (the Hitman is the RP player) includes a system to assess whether or not The Hitman does not drift too much off his role. Behaviour and consequences.
Now today RPGs are still lacking procedures to assess the RP quality. It makes most of RPGs easy to play as they send no feed back on the quality of RP. In this regard, there can not be hard RPGs, only tedious RPGs that shift difficulty elsewhere. Hard combat does not mean RP is hard.
So if it is only about exploiting an obvious lack in RPGs and a none progress sector in the genre( still no assessment of the behaviour), why not underline that every RPGs are easy in terms of RP?
……
The first time I played the only time I wished I could leave and return later was when fighting the Beast, but even that was because I wasn't being smart enough… once I realized that the aard works on it, it died with a single hit. After that I had no trouble. (there was the Kikimore Queen too but that was a different deal)
I can't think of any RPG right now that gave me overall less trouble on 'normal' than the Witcher did on 'hard'.
Combat is only RP when it allows the character to characterize itself within its role and personality. A vicious witcher fights first like a witcher and second viciously.
Hard combat tells nothing about how RP is hard or not. If a combat can be easily won by breaking character, by exploiting holes, it underlines that staying on character is hard and then RP is hard.