11:32 Sep 21 2017
Times Read: 449
I've been playing The Witcher 3 for the last few weeks and I'm not... feeling it. I play it but it hasn't clicked into one of those "Oh my god I LOVE this game" things for me. I'm essentially playing it to finish it right now, and that's about it. Normally I don't bother playing games that don't click for me, but Dylan gave me a lovely gift- Stardew Valley, and I am 99% sure I'll love it... and I know if I start Stardew, I'll stop Witcher and never pick it up again - so I'm slogging through it as fast as possible while being thorough.
Pros:
• It's graphically pretty.
• The moral/ethical choices are intriguing, but not well explained- so I end up constantly googling implications/effects of in-game decisions, as they're not explained at all in game, at times. Some of them are truly reprehensible, and it's a battle between what is evil and what is slightly less evil, but still evil in itself (like the fact that I fed orphaned children to some disgusting witches).
• There's a few side-quests/secondary and game-enhancement (clothing, armour, minor weapons and haircuts) that you can download for free- free DLC is nice, even if it is minor.
• Sometimes you can turn down payment for bringing bad news to people, which is nice. It's a small amount of kindness that the game allows you to show.
• There's a lot of puns, easter eggs and obscure music lyrics, game, movie and book references.
Cons:
• I found the initial tutorial and controls extremely clunky, and not explained well enough. It was all within 10 minutes, and half of the controls I forgot, but then needed obscurely for 1-2 quests later in the game. I then had to google what the controls were. That frustrated me. You use literally every button on the controller, but can't remember what half of them do, or what half of the combinations of buttons do, so flounder in some battles which require specific things/combinations/spells/potions, which require multiple buttons to access even after quick-selecting it on the menu.
• The contracts are repetitive and offer no great amount of XP... which is hugely disappointing as they're the entire point of being a Witcher - doing contracts.
• It's not that big of a game in a sense. You're given quests to do, and you're given Witcher contracts. The main quest is 5-10 levels above the recommended last levels for the last main quest. So you have to level up 5-10 times (highly recommended by the game) before attempting the next quest. ... when there's not many side quests, that's difficult to do. I've taken to liberating villages and settlements to get XP.
• Some of the context is awful.
• It's graphically pretty but... it's not made for you to go "Oh wow, this game is gorgeous", given it's just heightened graphics of a very, very miserable world.
• There's very little back-story on the previous games and I understand why they do that but at the same time... there should be an optional history lesson about your 'carry-on choices' - so you know what you're signing up for/against, which impacts the world/characters you'll encounter. I had to google a guide to decide on what my "backstory" would be, so it was morally/ethically in favour of my way of gameplay.
• The constant slurs that literally every character spits at you is extremely irritating. Save a village from an awful beast that was going to kill all of them? Everyone calls you a "fucking freak/mutant/asshole/whatever", any time you go near them.
• There's some truly horrible factions/sects in the game and you cannot outright kill every one of them that you meet. You kill one variably-important person and his surrounding lackies, but that's it. It feels like there's no justice/vengeance for many of them, even though you witness people ordering awful crimes- nothing happens to them.
• At times it's an outright gore/rape festival. There's little you can do to stop it, and there's very little "nice" endings or stories. All of the "missing person"/"lost lover"/"lost child" quests I've done so far have ended very negatively and brutally, with no possibility of saving whoever it is (as you already find them grotesquely dead).
• Other than literally ONE, every cat in the game hisses at you. Which hurts my feelings. Also, there's gratuitous animal death and slaughter that's constant through the entire game.
COMMENTS
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Slain
12:29 Sep 21 2017
Yeah I like the game and found it pretty fun to play, but you are right about the repetitive violence solving everything. which makes sense for the era and time it is based in, but not being given alternative ways of bringing about solutions is extensively railroadish and limited. The controls are unnecessarily complicated for hacking and slashing. lol One cute note on the graphic aspect of the game is... that your hair grows with your character... hoo-fucking-ray. Innovation at its finest.
Slain
12:41 Sep 21 2017
I would fanboy at you over how much I enjoyed and would play the game over and over and how it is a Graphics GIFT FROM GOD, because it is taking use of the current available graphics capability of the platform generation... But the acknowledging the realistic drawbacks to "this or that brand new game" is not something I have a hard time admitting, even if I like the damned game.
Also like every other armor-up-but-screw-style game... you look like a clown whilst brandishing the best gear you are provided and sets are a pain to gather. Meh. Hell even some of the dialogue leaves you scratching your head wondering if it should have been titled Mass Effect: Medieval, because... WUT. lol
I suppose I better...
"O EM GEE, how dare you speak badly of such an awesomely designed game!? It introduces new things that its predecessor didn't. It is the best of its kind and nothing is wrong with it!! I will forever enjoy this game regardless of what you say and don't bother pointing out realities about it. I will claim they are still better, superior in every way, no matter what. Shame on you for being such a discerning gamer towards the products we are spoon-fed by a shit ton of sellout 'gamers' Such shame!"
Owlish
14:02 Sep 21 2017
Honest to god the hair growing/waving in the wind was my main graphic "ooooh". XD
I agree it's appropriate to the time and the situation- war is tearing apart the nations, and god knows what else... but I still feel it's incredibly dark lol.
Owlish
14:06 Sep 21 2017
And... xD
It's not awful. I enjoy parts of it, I just can't think *what* parts right now lol. I've read and seen much worse, and it's keeping me entertained while I am stuck in bed. :P I borrowed it off of my brother and honestly, it'd be worth buying if I HAD bought it.
I am still too deeply, madly in love with Dragon Age Inquisition to be unbiased. Heh.
BestFriendsII
15:01 Sep 21 2017
what kind of game is it?
Slain
17:54 Sep 21 2017
I still need to play Dragon Age. Experience is a must.
Owlish
06:46 Sep 26 2017
DA is one of my favourites ever. I still haven't finished Inquisition. It's glorious.
And it's an RPG fantasy series based on some books. I figured the "RPG fantasy" part would be obvious, given I mentioned things like monsters eating whole towns and monster slaying.