1941

Problem is it feels like it fits together but there were several pages missing from the middle of the chapter. The author knew what was on them, but you suddenly turn up to a bunch of reveals wondering where you got all this knowledge from.

1942

Finally finished Witcher 1. I have to say that I didn’t much enjoy the game at the end. I just wanted to see how it finishes so that I can start Witcher 2.

Quick summary:

  • Combat is fun and easy to get
  • Dice poker
  • Alternative take on a classical fantasy setting. Has shades of gray, instead of just black / white
  • Even though the game makes fun of old fantasy tropes, it still ends up just doing the very same thing it mocks: Fedex -missions, killing monsters in dungeons and looting treasure. Yes, I’ve seen all that before.
  • Story didn’t make much sense at all times. And cinematics and voiceovers had quite a few facepalm moments.
  • Missions were inconsistently designed and pacing was … lacking (like how the Raven armor quest was handled…)
  • Many times the game was just flat-out boring. I spent tons of time just running around either wondering what to do (so that I don’t break the mission flow) or just fedexing stuff back and forth.

Summary: Thumbs down

1943

Too bad about liking the dice poker in the first game (I did too) because it complately sucks in the second one.

1944

I had similar complaints. It was still a thumbs up for me, probably because of my personal tilt for RPGs. And if you’re like me, the annoyance of the FedEx quests and other crap might slowly fade from your memory. You might appreciate the game more in the future.

Fortunately they’ve improved on those issues in The Witcher 2. The game’s not perfect but the good parts should outweigh it for most people.

1945

Fedex quests aren’t so bad if you do them logically, that is take all of them and move to another location and do everything you can there, than come back only when you have done everything so there is as little running around as possible.

But yeah they cut down fetch quests by pretty much 100% in TW2 and improved everything else (except dice poker, they frakked up that one).Basically go to gog.com and get it.

1946

I played through about eight hours a while back and am trying again. This game would greatly benefit from a fast travel system, or even a horse, because there is a considerable amount of jogging from Point A to Point B. And combat becomes quite a chore when you’re just trying to get somewhere.

The game also looks a bit nicer with a texture pack.

There’s also a separate but compatible character clothing texture pack, but I haven’t tried that yet.

1947

You do get a fast travel starting in Act 3, but it’s still kind of a pain. Weird how so many people are just now finally finishing the game. I just started Act 4 for the first time, and I’ve had the game since it was first released. Then I bought it again on Steam a couple of years later. And now I’m finally actually playing past Act 2.

I have zero complaints about the look of the game or anything else, really. Act 2 is just a baffling morass of quests until you start to dig into it. Once I got over the hump, I was loving it.

Zero complaints except for the goddamn Archespores, anyway.

1948

I actually think the first 3 chapters were all right. It was the 4th and 5th where it started to wear me down. Especially at the start of fourth I started to really wonder whether I have the will to finish the game.

Though I have to say that the very last fight scene was pretty cool.

1949

Quick tip for long hikes… pull out either sword and use the Group Style stance, you run fastest in that stance. He does tend to put his sword away when you stop to do something (like shift+click herbs to quickly loot them), but with a little micromanagement of putting your sword away manually before you pick the herbs you can get into a flow of running quickly around areas.

1950

Just started playing W2, and I have to say I’m completely floored by the difference of quality compared to the first game. Maybe the effect is pronounced because I started immediately after finishing W1.

They’ve pretty much addressed everything I complained about, especially in storytelling. Now they almost became industry leaders in how to handle cinematics and voiceovers.

I hope they can keep it up throughout the entire game.

1951

on my box its ctrl-click for quickloot. great tips however! thanks a bunch. for such an old title W1 looks nice enough. the art and stling is really well done imo. Looking forward to finishing it and getting onto W2. Can i import my savegame in there?

1952

Yeah you can import your savegame, although it doesn’t seem to make much of a difference.

1953

So I’ve recently decided to pick this up and really delve into it after a few aborted attempts in the distant past. I own the boxed retail version of Enhanced Edition, and have patched to 1.5 (removes DRM, I love these guys!).

I’m not sure if it was the funky combat styles thing or the leveling system or what that turned me off in the past, but whatever it was I seem to have overcome it. I am really having a good time with this game. I’ve got the hang of the combat styles now, and I’ve beefed up my abilities with them via the leveling system. I’ve advanced a lot farther in the story than before (I’m in Vizima running down clues about the Salamandra now) and it’s really started to come together well. The story/quests in the Outskirts felt disjointed and a little forced, but the stuff in Vizima is a lot tighter and more interesting, drawing me further into the game. It’s obvious that a ton of effort went into plotting out the locations, plot and flow of this game, and it’s something I wish more RPGs would take the time to do right.

My only real complaints are small. I dislike that you can only carry one extra sword and one extra dagger/axe/misc at a time. They are useless, and only serve as decent priced loot to sell, so why can’t I loot multiple weapons? Also, the “romance” thing, which has been discussed to death, seems pointless. I admit that I’m collecting as many encounter cards as I can just to experience the stilted dialog in those scenes and out of a perverse sense of Quest OCD (I also expect to find a recipe for a potion to cure VD at some point), but the game really would be just as fantastic without that element and I’d feel less like a skeevy dork while playing it.

1954

You don’t get VD, one of the perks of being a Witcher is immunity to disease and sickness (though not poison or alcohol, obviously).

1955

It took me a second try to get into the Witcher but once I did I loved it. And I have to agree there was a lot of skeevy dorkitude in Witcher 1.

1956

I just went with magic; It was far simpler than all the sword combos. One thing that annoyed me about that was the fact that you had to buy a combo with a normal sword and then all over again for a silver sword. It was stupid. With magic it doesn’t matter. Fire is fire. If you shoot fire at something, who cares if it is a monster or not. It all burns.

I have not played The Witcher 2, but when I do, Ill again be doing magic all the way.

1957

Immune to disease and sterile. Kinda the whole point to screwing everything on two legs.

1958

I hated that also, the buying of two different combo’s for swords.

I have tried playing The Witcher three times now and quit by chapter two each time always playing as a melee type though.
But your take on playing a magic user instead has me intrigued enough to fire it up once again and go that route, heading to Steam now lol.

1959

I wanted the ability to collect the stupid swords and sell them. For the most part, I found the meteorite steel sword + the silver sword + buffs to be more than adequate, especially since I also maxed out Aard and Igni. I wanted the inventory space to pick up and sell more swords. Also, there are a boatload of torches in the game, and selling torches is a good way to get some gold.

I mixed sword + signs, and used alchemy. I didn’t use a lot of bombs, mostly because my Aard was pretty good, even early into the game, and my Igni was also strong. I put points into fast and group styles.

For Witcher 2, I’ve not decided my tree yet. I’m just into Chapter One, and have only just progressed past the tutorial tree.

1960

Wasn’t going all magic kind of boring? There’s only, what, five signs, and only one of them is really a damage-dealer. Geralt’s not a mage.