robc04
3121
Tempting me to play a 3rd time now.
I knew waiting over a year since I got this in a Steam sale would pay off! As soon as that patch rolls out, I am giving Witcher 2 my first playthrough!
Its in my backlog too probably from the same Steam sale. So for me, this is good news.
It’s not a patch. It’s a mod.
It’s only unofficially official (or officially unofficial?), if you get my meaning, I don’t think it will appear in the launcher/patcher of the game.
I just played with the mod for an hour. (I forgot how great the CGI intro is.)
I feel like I need a manual. I haven’t figured everything out yet. It’s also hard to remember how combat used to be to compare it with this. It’s definitely more spammy now. There are fewer stagger animations, and everything is much quicker. But since enemies don’t stagger as much, they can swing right through some of your attacks. I have to figure out the best way to approach combat now. I still did a lot of rolling. The pirouette seems to be automatic once you get into a certain state. (The patch notes imply it is some sort of danger level.) In some ways it’s more ridiculous looking than rolling, but in other ways it seems much more appropriate. I like it.
The auto-parry is kind of cool. When those kingslayer assassin characters do their dual-wield spin attacks, Geralt can parry every one. It looks great. But the percentage chance based on the situation means you never quite know if you’ll block. I guess it will take some getting used to. Enemies also parry like crazy in Hard difficulty and above. I don’t remember if it was like that before… yeah, I think it was.
I miss the old riposte animations. I appreciate how a lot of skills are unlocked right away at least. Aard has a cone effect immediately, etc. Speaking of which, it might be best to restart to use this mod. The first skill tree is free so you’re wasting those points.
I don’t understand the guard stance. When I press E it looks like he’s shooting Aard out, but sometimes he uses Quen.
I noticed a couple minor bugs. Overall it’s pretty solid. Everything seems faster and tighter. I’m not a videogame melee combat expert so I don’t know if it’s “good” or not. I was one of the people who thought the original combat was charming.
I just have to re-learn how to play now. They still have the damn screwy audio mix in the arena. I can barely hear because of the crowd. I definitely won’t be able to play the campaign again though. I gave up after the first scene. Three times is too many!
So I finally broke the wrap on my Xbox copy of witches 2 and popped it in after finishing up some dragons dogma. After playing for a while… and I know this is going to cost me my gaming cred card… I had to pop it out and do something else. I really like the witcher fiction and I appreciate the more adult theme, but it just wasn’t for me. I felt like the controls were a bit sloppy, they tried to cram too much onto a controller, and while I feel like they do a bioware style storytelling rpg better than bioware, I still really don’t like that style. I guess I’m really curious to see what it means for the witcher and dragon age 3 that they want to go with a more open world, because I think where they need to go for me to jump back in.
Imryll
3128
I recently gave it another try (up to Flotsam), and it seems to be not for me either, although I enjoyed the first game. Fewer QTEs and more open world might help, but but I’m not caring for the “feel” of the combat or the sense that CDProjekt is keeping me on a too-short leash. It’s pretty. It has some amusing dialogue–and I do feel some curiosity about what’s going on, but I’m just not finding it fun.
I can’t talk about the controls in the console version, so don’t worry, I won’t defend that :P.
Th game itself, as you say wisely, it’s an “narrative cinemactic action RPG”, much in the Bioware vein even if the execution is imo much superior. If you don’t like that genre, well, that’s it!
Sorta. It is now possible to wade into enemies a bit, but the increase in lethality (for both friend and foe) happily punishes button-mashing. The abundance of group fights, IME, makes it hard to get in more than a few licks before having to parry, sign, or disengage. Add enemy parry into the mix and you’re having to constantly evaluate, which is a kind of ‘mindful spam’ present in many hack & slashes considered to have deep gameplay.
But the percentage chance based on the situation means you never quite know if you’ll block.
Yeah. I don’t know how I feel about this. I am save-scumming my way through Dark at the moment, so it’s just one of many things that kills me.
I miss the old riposte animations.
They have new ripostes, which, IME, are a little less exposed. The key is having an enemy targeted when they attack and, as before, timing. It’s not mind-blowingly effective, but then again neither was the old riposte. Often Geralt would charge or roll into the fray and get gutted by a different opponent during the counter animation; which still happens, but I find easier to avoid.
I don’t understand the guard stance. When I press E it looks like he’s shooting Aard out, but sometimes he uses Quen.
Guard is the new Quen, and it looks like the Aard animation. Hopefully that makes sense. Basically, I see it as an active way of deflecting large strikes, which seem to get through auto-parry.
I think you’re supposed to hold E for guard stance. I was probably tapping it, which made it hard to tell what was going on.
There seem to be some campaign bugs in the mod right now. I’m not sure it’s a good idea to play through the game with it yet. He’s working on a new version.
Yeah personally I am waiting with third playthrough until all bugs are done away with in the mod, I guess month or two.
I picked this up in the GOG sale and tech support finally got it to work for me.
I liked the first for a while but gave up on it when I was stuck questing at a dinner party.
I certainly don’t remember the mechanic that I can’t use any potions or other buffs in combat. And I keep getting thrown into combat with no time to prep by meditation.
For example, a dragon attacks, I have to run and fight when avoiding the dragon, and I can’t buff and keep dying.
They clearly expect you to know a lot more about how to fight from the first game than I remember. Also, am I missing rollover help or something to remind me what the signs do? There are a couple that I don’t remember from the Tutorial.
Witcher 2 preserves some core concepts (silver sword for monsters, steel for humans, potion use, signs) but really doesn’t play much at all like the first one and trying to remember how you played in that game will get you nowhere in 2.
I just started playing too and this irks me also. How do I know what potions to take if I don’t know if there is a fight coming up or who the enemies will be. Often I’ve found I need to die then load an earlier save to apply buffs. A bit annoying?
I didn’t find potions to be that critical to the experience, personally. I played through on Dark difficulty and pretty much only used the Cat potion for seeing in the dark. I leaned way heavier on the swordsmanship and magic skill trees.
I think you’re suppose to be continuous using potions as they have a long duration if I’m not mistaken. Maybe not. I didn’t like using potions anyways since I felt I would need to save them for when I’m really in a dire situation and like Pogue I do lean more towards swords and magic.
Ok, I figured out something, the prohibition on buffs only includes potions. I seem to be able to buff my armor and swords in the inventory screen, which seems to pause the combat too.That makes things a bit easier.
One weird feature is that some sidequests seem timed, and if you return to the main quest, even accidentally, you fail them. Pretty unusual for most RPGs.
What do the blue dots in the minimap mean? They are not mentioned in the Manual…
They’re quest NPCs or important characters. I remember it wasn’t always precise so don’t freak out if you can’t interact with someone right away.
