While Geralt exhibits some typical heroic traits, such as bravery and the ability to kick ass, he also subverts much of what we've come to expect from our heroes. Geralt eschews politics, conflict, conventional morality, and manners. With wit as keen as his blades, Geralt gets what he wants any way he can. A bit of cruelty can go a long way, but so can just as much kindness or a well-placed sack of coin. Damsels in distress can't distract him from his goal, unless saving and then borking that damsel is his aim. Perhaps most un-hero-like of all, Geralt has no duty to those around him, and he answers to just one man: Geralt, the witcher, of Rivia.

Gabriel Knight is not the first choice anyone would make for a hero. He is a selfish man who drinks, smokes, womanizes, toys with peoples' emotions, dreams about corpses hanging from trees, and is not exactly thoughtful to his grandmother. However, he's a compelling and complex protagonist, exceedingly well-written and very human in his sardonic reluctance to even don the hero's mantle being forced upon him. Even though he's a bastard you probably wouldn't want to meet in real life, you still wind up rooting for him because he's not the poster child do-gooder hero, but an anti-hero whose vices resonate with our darker sides. Who better to be a Schattenjäger (Shadow Hunter) than a dark and twisted man like Gabriel Knight?