I think the both Skyrim and Witcher 3 are different types of games but are very similar where it matters most: Time lost.
Skyrim: Sit down at 9 am.
Ok, think I will work on start work on becoming a Thane so I can buy that plot of land. Ok, need to go here to do that… Hmm, this guy is new maybe I will talk to him. Something to do with the Thieves guild. Maybe I will do another step in their main quest. Ooo, what is that hole in the ground? Is this a Dwemer ruin! I loved those in Morrowind maybe I will check it out… Crap I am encumbered with all this stuff better find a town… What is that? A new Daedric quest? Awesome, let me do that real quick and then I will get back to the thieves guild… Aww, that orphan is so sad. Maybe I can adopt them, how do I do that? It would be cool if I could build a house and then adopt this kid and have them live there. Hmmm, I better start work on becoming a Thane so I can buy that plot of land…
Look up and it is 3 pm.
Witcher 3: Sit down at 9 am.
Ok, I really need to get moving on Novigrad main quest. Whoa! I did not expect that, man that guy has lost his marbles. Have to go here on map to look for a sorceress, maybe I will clear out the question marks on the way. Oh look an inn, I bet they have some cards there! What the hell is Lambert doing there? I should really get back to the main quest, but I think I have contract over in that area maybe I will check it out. Ugg a noonwraith! Maybe I should get some of that cat school gear to use for the fight. Hmm, where is that shipwreck? A few question marks on the way, let me grab those. A scoia’tael camp? I wonder if he plays Gwent. I better get back to look for that sorceress…
Look up and it is 3 pm.
Just started, and love it sofar, allthough I’m routinely getting my ass kicked by packs of wolfs on the second to hardest difficulty. Don’t really want to play it on an easier lvl though, so I’m hoping I’ll figure out the roll/dodge/switch signs etc soon.
One annoying aspect: it takes me forever to switch signs, due largely to the fact that I can’t seem to select the right one because the controls are too sensitive. But again, practice makes perfect I suppose…
In Skyrim you typically meet the ghost of a wronged fellow and right his/her wrong.
In the world if the Witcher you discover the body of a missing village girl abused and murdered. Do you hunt down her killer? No, you stick a silver sword through her incorporeal form until her ghost dissapears. And then collect some money, and life in the muddy, ignorant medieval Polish countryside goes on.
Packs of enemies will always be difficult. You just have to carefully kite them and manage the situation.
In the world if the Witcher you discover the body of a missing village girl abused and murdered. Do you hunt down her killer? No, you stick a silver sword through her incorporeal form until her ghost dissapears. And then collect some money, and life in the muddy, ignorant medieval Polish countryside goes on.
Oh, sure, I didn’t mean to imply the tone of the narrative was the same. Just that the only real design difference between exploring a lighthouse and uncovering a backstory in Skryim and exploring a lighthouse and discovering a backstory in TW3 is that one has an entry in the quest log. I suppose TW3 is more likely to have non-violent NPC interactions as well. You’re still doing the same things, gameplay-wise, to uncover pre-scripted narrative.
I hope they include a pair of high-level Gwent players for me, apart from the new cards! :P
I wonder if I can play again with the players at Passiflora.
Timex
4269
Well, there are a bunch of quests where you actually DO have the option of helping the monster you were hired to kill.
Let’s say that 2 people set out to complete TW3, they will go down different paths when it comes to the main quest and side quests, that’s a given, but when it comes to clearing the maps it’s a question of WHEN they did what, IF is irrelevant because they did exactly the same things. Why? Because it was all right there in the quest log. You got XP for “exploring” every little thing.
So it’s NOT the same as real exploration. Even if you DIDN’T trigger a quest beforehand, it will trigger out of sequence when you step into the quest location.
The tower mentioned is real exploration because you might come upon it but player 2 won’t. It’s a real “secret” ingredient in the game that’s not in the recipe. The spice of life man…
I can’t hear you over the sound of Roach galloping.
I don’t want to belabor this, but this example is a little off. If two people decide to clear the Skyrim map, it will be a question of when not if for the lighthouse too.
$3 million of the marketing budget went to Conan O’Brien.
Exactly. I’m really confused by the assertion that they are polar opposites or something when clearly they are not. The real difference is that the Witcher 3 has an insane amount of great stories for places. Something like Skyrim honestly has very few, but it manages to come across as if it did because it leaves wiggle room for people to fill in the blanks.
Your character in Skyrim is a blank slate waiting for you to fill with purpose, where Geralt is a very well defined character. It may be that makes exploration seem more meaningful from that perspective, but mechanically it’s really not.
I forgot to do my joke about how 4 million is below corporate expectations and the series will be cancelled and rebooted at a later date.
32 million to create this? While that’s a huge amount of coin, it seems extremely cheap considering the overall size/scope and production values of W3. For comparison, I thought I read somewhere that GTA V cost ~$250 million. I think the funders of W3 got more bang for their buck here :).
I can only presume that labour must be cheaper in Poland…
[EDIT:] It appears GTA V cost $266 million when you combine the cost of development AND marketing. Wikipedia suggests it cost $137 million to develop.
This is a really terrible example. It does not say what you think it says.
EDIT: I see others have also made that point.
I’ve also seen that the PS4 is the largest share of platforms for TW3.
So…figure what, about $40 per copy in revenues, accounting for regional differences and if promos with NVidia were considered in with marketing costs and lost sales revenue (which I’m curious–did NVidia pay anything for that?)
That’s, being conservative, $145-160m in revenues for a game that cost about $70m to make and market.
And that’s “so far.”
No it won’t? By the time they “clear the maps” they’ve actually cleared the maps in TW3. There’s nothing to miss. Again, don’t remember skyrim but I remember Morrowind and you could easily miss a ton of stuff and most people did.
Please elaborate, what does it say then?
