Community Review: The Witcher 3

It would have been funny to fake a Community Review that was something other than Witcher 3 this week, but too cruel. There’s one game we should be talking about this week. What did you think of it?

Even some of the stuff towards the end would be really cool to talk about, let’s keep this a spoiler free zone. There’s plenty to talk about without spoiling anything, anyway.

This year was all about Bloodborne and The Witcher 3 for me. Both of them have lived up to the hype. Both of them are vying for my Game of the Year, in very different ways. Bloodborne is a lot more polished, less broken, has much better combat, and typically Miyazaki-style understated storytelling. In short, it’s my kind of game.

But The Witcher 3 is still the way I’m leaning, because of its characters, story, dialogue, and world. Those things make up for its failings, because games just aren’t doing what The Witcher 3 is. They aren’t capable of it. Storytelling is usually the bottleneck in games — when was the last time you saw storytelling actually carry its other elements?

I certainly have my issues with it. The weird acceleration and braking in movement that makes looting a chore. Geralt’s style of combat that unnecessarily twirls his sword around like a helicopter when trying to cover distance (despite criticising Ciri of the same thing). And I’m not a big fan of scaling loot. It takes the meaning out of receiving a hyped up sword when it’s no better than the junk you looted from a henchman.

I’m a little wary of some of my games criticism being a bit too “this game needs to be more like Dark Souls”, but there are actually other games that do what The Witcher 3’s combat system is trying to do, but better. There’s no way to meet a forward-rushing enemy with a timed attack, because Geralt’s ballet moves don’t communicate with the enemy’s lunge. Shadow of Mordor did that well. The player needs that power. If you’re not going to have a reliable attack animation for each button, then you need to somehow make this grizzled Witcher capable of taking on a rushing enemy. Something that isn’t yet another problem solved by Axii.

But I kept those complaints to a minimum in my Game Informer review, because I wanted the overall tone to be positive. It really does make up for all of that, and becomes a unique and memorable adventure. I think I could easily spend about 150 hours in it, if I didn’t have things I wanted to do with my life.

How about you? Anyone think I’m being harsh about the combat? What tips would you give your fellow Kotakuers? I noticed a tips post went up a while back, but some I felt were of the “wrong” persuasion, so I might put up another.

How did you like Tywin Lannister? What interesting things have you seen in the world? How has your hunting been?


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