I finally started playing this. I bought it over a year ago and bounced off hard after the first two hours. I have spent quite a bit more time with it over the last two days.
Visually the game is stunning, especially the lighting and the voice acting is well done. I do not hear much music so it must be okay but not memorable. The game world is massive. I have gotten to the second area - Velen - and that area is so much larger than the first one. It is actually somewhat intimidating that there are other massive areas to go see when just Velen could be an entire game.
It is interesting and well crafted but I have not had that moment that really endears me to the game. I have always had a bit of an off relationship with this series because I have never really “grasped” the world itself. I could never bring myself to complete the first one and I only had one run-through of the second - and do not remember much about it at all. Whereas I can remember much of Dragon Age Origins - a game that came out 2 years before Witcher 2 - fairly well. So I find myself exploring and doing quests but I am chasing after my daughter (why?) after chasing Yennifer (why?) and finding her but letting her go (why?). I never really grasped the plot of this series and I feel that way yet again.
Then there are the problems. Combat is something I detest in this game. It was the bane of Witcher 2 for me and it is not much different in 3. I find the controls difficult and turned it down to “story only” mode just so I do not have to struggle dying time after time. Even at this level boss fights wreck me and I may be forced to DL a trainer to get by some ones in the future. After 15 hours and research online I still cannot get quick-slots to work correctly. Whatever is in the first slot always triggers and there seems to be no way to switch between those slots (holding down the pad does NOT work on an XBox controller, end of story). Crafting is still maddeningly difficult with bizarre rules. I can create two bombs of one type but then have to sleep to replenish them? Huh? I cannot even figure out how to play that maddening card game. Finally I had to download a mod just to get a decent 3rd person camera angle as the normal one blocks half the screen. So many of the things that bugged the hell out of me in 2 are also in 3.
But it might have sunk its hooks into me. I will know more in the next couple of days but it is somewhat fun to just wander and see what is out there. So either I have 100+ hours more of this world or it gets uninstalled for the last time but which it is remains to be seen.
It’s notable that you mention the world and the plot since I’ve always said it’s the characters that are the memorable part of this game. Maybe that’s not as much of a draw for you.
So far I have run into one one character that I have spent any substantial amount of time with. The Bloody Baron is a well written, multifaceted character whose story is quite good. It is the one that has entertained me the most thus far. I have traveled quite a bit to work just on that story since it is so engaging.
Other than that there has not really been any other character that I have spent a substantial amount of time with. I am looking forward to reading more characters like the Baron.
I was where you were. Had all the same issues. I think that, overall, the game is written for those that know the backstories and world. And if you don’t, it’s a lot harder to get into. I think I was a little further than you were before I quite the first time (something new and shiny came along, and at the time I’d have rather played that). But stick with it. In terms of story, it’s probably about the best thing ever written, and once you get over the ‘hump’ of not knowing the universe all that well (save for your experience w/ the first two games), it does suck you in. And with the two expansions (well worth it), you’re looking at 200+ hours invested in the game, and not an hour of it time-filler (IMO).
The game was good enough that it retroactively made the first two games better. Because you learn enough of the backstory that it makes getting into the first two games easier, since this time, you know who a lot of the characters are. Seriously - even if you need to trainer it up, the storyline and characters are worth it.
How about the part where someone gets Geralt’s face bashed in on Story mode, to the point that he has to use trainers to salvage the whole thing? I’d pay good money to see that live.
Yeah mostly those, but in a non-hostile and instead helpful way. I would just like to see you play and advise what to do differently and advise lore-wise.
Try reading the Witcher story wikis - they give you a good idea of who is who and how they figure into the story. If you spend a bit of extra time in the first area you level enough that combat should be fairly easy.
I’ve just been reading through the Witcher books - Im on the second to last, The Swallows Tower. Meeting all the characters from the game for the first time has made me want to play again.
I have not had to do it just yet but at least one of the boss battles was down to my last sliver of health (at level) and I have died numerous times. I have always struggled mightily with the combat in this series.
I’m not sure what to say on the combat. I find it borderline too easy even on the hardest difficulty, and I am not someone who plays games on higher difficulty. Granted, I’ve played a lot of Dark Souls, so maybe that helps. I use a lot of blocking and parrying, and on tough fights, Quen. My first time through, I used a combat-heavy build with Ursine everything and Quen as my lone Sign.
On the store and lore, I didn’t really get it until I was knee-deep in Skellige (80+ hours in). As someone who hadn’t read the books, I knew I was missing stuff, but didn’t know why. I was confusing Novigrad with Nilfgaard., that sort of thing. YMMW, but it didn’t bother me because the world was so big, I had time to learn enough to enjoy it. And my point is, the lore can be learned, as can the love for the main characters you play and meet. In addition to the Wiki, you can find youtube videos that recap a lot of the history (mainly of the first two games).
Without going into details one thing to consider is that I have a bit o’ a disability that makes action games more difficult. I could never play DS because of this issue. My twitch skills are long since past so I gravitate to games that do not require complex combat schemes. I can muster Diablo or WoW but then again I play as melee (Diablo) or a healer (WoW) to get around my lack of abilities.
The books certainly inform the game story heavily. Like you I want to play Witcher 3 again after reading the books.
Overall I think the Witcher games are telling a pretty strong story. They assume you’ve played the previous games and retained the details of characters and plot. We don’t see this in games much (Mass Effect maybe?) but it is pretty standard for long Sci-Fi or Fantasy series.
I found the combat a bit clunky at first. Some of the updates to Witcher 3 added some additional control styles, which may help. Using a controller vs. KBM may also help.
I will add that I bumped the difficulty down to easy, there’s just so damned much combat I just wanted it to be over. I like pretty much all the rest of it though. Maybe Telltale can get the Witcher license and give me a Witcher point and click, that would be more my speed. Hell, Bigby Wolf is practically Geralt already.
Once I finish up Horizon Zero Dawn I’m heading back to this. I’m on Skellige, having spent a ton of time there already, but am ready to start advancing more of the main plot. Can’t wait to get to the DLC also, after reading all the glowing reviews about it. Just need a weekend to lose myself in this again.
Then certainly give magic build a shot (using Griffin school armor). One of the skills (the name eludes me at the moment) greatly slows down enemies once you build up your magic skill power, to the point that it looks like you’re playing a game in slow motion. It’s very powerful and a very fun way to play the game.
This is a mod out there called Ghost Mode. While most people use it to make the combat harder, it is pretty flexible in how it can be used - I think you can make the combat completely trivial if you wanted to. This may be more effort than you want to really put in, but it isn’t too hard to set up and use.
Finished off the Bloody Baron quest last night. I really, really liked this one. It had engaging but flawed characters, a couple of good plot twists and a somewhat emotional ending. It felt almost like a Bioware quest (and that is a compliment).
My solution ended up with the Baron taking his wife off to be healed. I wonder if I will see them again in the story. Probably not but I would not mind having a pint with them at a later date.
Yeah the bloody baron quest line had a strange long tail in my playthrough, I found his wife and his daughter and then met up with all of them at the crones’ place, but those individual quests were kind of scattered among other things I was doing so that every so often I was seeing the baron’s family pop up. I may not have played that “correctly” but I kind of liked that the quest was sort of woven into other things I was doing, felt a little more real that way.
I did a lot the BB quest line, but then shelved it after I found his daughter and couldn’t find his wife. I came back to it 20 hours later and the time away from it didn’t hurt the story - if anything, it was an ‘aha’ moment that I can remember well.
The ending of it that I had was very powerful as well. I played it a different way my second time through and it wasn’t as powerful.
