The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

I started playing The Witcher 3 in 2015 around the time it came out. I've played the previous games, and really enjoyed them as they were releasing. The Witcher 1 had some novelty to it with its bizarre combat system and old-school feeling, European RPG jank. The Witcher 2 improved on everything the first did, throwing the old combat system out the window and replacing it with something challenging and involved with the actual business of being a Witcher. But in both of these games, the narrative elements were the obvious draw. Between W2 and W3 I even read one of the books, and I think fantasy books are for nerds.

When I started The Witcher 3 in 2015, I knew I had a lot of work ahead of me. Many quests, many markers, many things to craft, much world to sop up and marinate in. I didn't think it would take me three years to finish, but here I am now with a save file that attests as much.

Looking back at my experience playing The Witcher 3, I can say that I only barely enjoyed it. In 2015 I was wowed by the scale of it and the astounding feat of presentation that the same people who made W1 had accomplished. I wanted to pat them on the back. But after hitting all the markers in White Orchard over 10 hours, I didn't want to play their game. If I recall correctly, at some point in late 2015 I came back to try out Velen, but after blowing up a few nests and rolling and swinging to death some soldiers, I put it aside until 2016 where I ceased to believe everything in the game was really worth seeing, or every engagement worth having to put up with the combat.

Between 2016 and yesterday, my taste in games changed. I began to recognize how important it was for me that systems act as player expression in meaningful, broad ways; and I came to believe that if a game had to have a story, it better be a story that I influence or take part in through intuitive game mechanics, and not dialogue trees or button prompts. The model of the board game, or the pen-and-paper RPG became the ultimate form which video games ought to emulate, instead of something immersive and unbelievably, but superficially, pretty, i.e. an amazing filmic experience, or OASIS from Ready Player One. By the time I made my way back to Witcher 3 for my last real push to complete it, I had already been sufficiently brainwashed by ludo-games to sort of despise any time I spent with it.

All that really dragged me through The Witcher 3's final quests was its writing and world-building. The combat, progression, the way which the game offered three moods of responses to me as some cheap CYAstory, everything seemed so shallow and unengaging, actualizing a game's ultimate failure. The towns and world-building had the appearance of a dynamic, systems-driven world which a better game would have exploited and made reactive in small but meaningful ways, but by the 60th hour all I wanted to do was connect sign-post to sign-post and get the fuck out. Three games into the series, The Witcher 3 stands as a bitter compromise that has garnered praise which spells spooky things for triple-A games. If no one seems to care that the combat is boring, the world is mostly without mechanics, that progression literally stops having any purpose by a pretty early point, what are these people going to do when writers learn how to merely sound like The Witcher 3, and everyone is too dumb to realize it's just an appearance? This will happen. Eventually.

This isn't a terrible game, but as everyone has launched it so high to hang in the video games cosmos as some shining example of a modern-day RPG (...yuck), criticism against it needs to be harsh and iconoclastic.

Every dumb nerd online LOVES this game and it shoots to the top of the rankings for modern consoles even NOW. And it's really time for that to stop.

The combat is AWFUL. Not poorly made, but literally not thought about. Witcher senses are stupid.

Boss fights have no satisfaction and make no sense. Witcher oils don't add anything. A cool world is fine I guess but to what end? The narrative is ridiculous.

I would've liked:

1) more choice over the women I pursue in the game
2) more choice about endings

I get it, as a movie this is a terrific masterpiece but as a GAME, a GAME mind you, I have to give it this score. As a MOVIE (THE GOLDEN AGE OF GAMING!!!!!!!!!) yeah, Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine (I'm stuck on the last boss fight) are incredible.

However, finding treasure is tedious and the economy system doesn't work very well. It's too hard to find shops, upgrade gear, find cool weapons or another things to kill.

Think though for a second if they made this game WITH this incredible masterpiece narrative AND great gaming insights, like good economic system (currency), more control by players like Grand Theft Auto, better weapons, better combat, and THEN (and only then) turn on the Witcher senses.

Alright then we'd really have something.

Overall, the player is small and has little control against this world and narrative and that sucks. I buy games to game not watch movies, but as a movie letting you game sometimes (whenever it's convenient) yeah, it's fine. For as much savagery you should able to have a lot more.

Biggest problem with this game is Geralt is way underpowered. Let this guy stick someone he's not supposed to--let him be the dark witcher! Let him be occult black magic Geralt!

Until that day comes who cares? I hate goodie-goodie Geralt fixing people's plumbing, let this guy be the superstar and hoist upon his own petard all he wants!

The sexy women: good idea. Ciri? Good idea. Story? Great idea. Now implement an actual combat system. And then let players really choose where to go and give the powerful tools to do it and create their own magical world and OK, we got something here.

I look forward to the days of Dark Geralt's reign.
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Finished the game FINALLY. Detlaf was a huge jerk! Took me this whole game to learn how to roll, apparently. Ending was stunning. Definitely a 5/5 game but didn't come together until the very end. I wouldn't mind a NG+ at some point.

• TW3: only tolerable in Polish or German
• Origins: you absolutely need the Pharaohs DLC (for early game level boosting)
• Unity: only tolerable in French or German
• Brotherhood: does not run well on newer machines
• AC3
• Odyssey: not an AC game, too grindy and only tolerable playing as Kassandra
• Syndicate
• Mirage: basically, an improved version of Revelations and Valhalla

AC2 is a good game with very outdated mechanics. I did not enjoy AC1 or AC4 and I hated Rogue.

Yeah I said it. It is the best ever. I had never heard of all the negativity surrounding this game until I came to this site. The gameplay doesn't have to be Mid Souls roll die roll die mechanics for it to be good. The storyline is virtually unparalleled in videogame history. Stories don't stick with me like this one does. I mean who can forget the Bloody Baron quests and its haunting end? That also leads me to bring up how you can impact the ending of storylines, such as the Bloody Baron or even the main endings. It isn't some gimmick with no real choice. No, there's consequential choice that can give you an ending you are not satisfied with. In addition to the main quests, the side quests are also given as much love. If you have the DLCs, then it somehow is even better because those are the best DLCs ever released for a game. The world is gorgeous and the lore is immensely deep. I went ahead and read the comics after playing this and played the first two games. Skyrim perfects freedom, but Witcher perfects characterization. Geralt is more memorable to me than really any other video game character ever, apart from Mario or Link. He's becoming ubiquitous and popular like those two characters. They made a tv series for the franchise. That is a testament to Andrzej Sapkowski's writing from which the games are based on (Note: he hates videogames and did not write the games). Of course those outside things don't impact the gameplay but it helps reinforce my point that Geralt and his friends are lovable characters, especially here in this game.

The music is phenomenal. The graphics and world design are stunning even today. The game has Gwent that is so encapsulating, you could just spend a whole day playing that. Games often toss this type of stuff in, but it is never worth playing. The potion brewing is solid and monster hunting is impeccable. The monster designs are impeccable too. Again, the combat is solid and can allow for varied approaches in enemies.

Overall, this is flawless.

The RPG elements here are truly incredible, however the combat is just so bad I don't even want to finish it :/

want a compelling story with beautiful graphics and badass weapons? here you go.
prefer playing solitaire on your computer? become a professional gwent player.
like something less dead-serious? play hide and seek with kids while wearing ass ears.
the only thing I might change is trading some of the fetch-quests and redundant environmental tasks that might slow you down for more high-quality side quests.