Support NeoGAF

[Seanspeed]

Did you like the combat in W2?

It was serviceable. Super tight combat isn't really a top priority for me in RPG's.

 

[jesu]

I urge you all to go read the books, the relationship between Geralt and Ciri seems to be emphasized in this game. The books will help you appreciate it even more.

I've just ordered The Last Wish and Blood Of Elves
I'll start with whatever one turns u first.

 

[Teeth]

Next time create your instruction on how to write proper impressions. Then try to include it in GAF rules. Then try to ban poeple not obeying the "impressions rules".

Instructions:

1) Don't sound like viral marketer

Done.

Damn, the OP is famous. Already has a site that picked up his impressions for the hits: http://buddhagaming.it/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-dettagli-di-gioco-da-un-provato-di-3-ore/

 

[Seanspeed]

I don't work for any press or game companies. I know a person who was part of organizing this event in San Francisco and was invited. Take my impressions however you want. You've seen enough gameplay videos to give you an idea of how it plays and how the missions are structured. It plays and feels exactly like how it looks or how you expect based on those videos. My impression of the game is that this game is just fucking sick! This is all I'll be playing and easily will put 200 hours into this game. And I'm pretty confident most of you guys will agree with me. Time will tell of course but I'll be happy to say I told you so.

Please stop being excited man. And don't try and make us excited. We are just fine sitting here miserable and cynical of everything, thank you very much.

 

[FACE]

I don't work for any press or game companies. I know a person who was part of organizing this event in San Francisco and was invited. Take my impressions however you want. You've seen enough gameplay videos to give you an idea of how it plays and how the missions are structured. It plays and feels exactly like how it looks or how you expect based on those videos. My impression of the game is that this game is just fucking sick! This is all I'll be playing and easily will put 200 hours into this game. And I'm pretty confident most of you guys will agree with me. Time will tell of course but I'll be happy to say I told you so.

They've only released one gameplay video(stage demos not withstanding) and it looked pretty boring.

 

[_Clash_]

Witcher 3 should be something special.

Dat 200hrs claim though...

I think it's clear Witcher 3 is ambitious. And I'm gonna buy hardware for it.

Bring on Witcher 3

 

[lordfuzzybutt]

I've just ordered The Last Wish and Blood Of Elves
I'll start with whatever one turns u first.

I recommend you read The Last Wish first, as it introduces the characters.
Then find and read the fan translated Sword of Destiny to understand more about Ciri.
And then read the rest.

 

[OmegaTreeFish]

200 hours... God I really hope its not full of fluff and filler like dragon age. If its that long on average just doing main stuff and some side stuff I doubt I will ever complete it.

I love the world of the witcher more than anything else in the game. I liked the characters and stuff in the first game but never quite finished it. Got near the end but kinda bored at about 35 hours mark.

The second game was a really good length. Completed it in a bit under 30 hours. Same great main characters and lore. Good story, good side content but the combat was a bit crappy. Never felt like the combat flowed or played well but luckily there is tons of stuff with no combat in both the first and second games.

I am almost finished with the 4 translated books and have enjoyed then a lot. Better than the games but that's because its all story , lore and characters which are what's good in the games.

I really really hope this game doesn't suffer from being open world. I hope the combat has been improved a lot since 2. I hope the quest system is meaningful. Give me proper witcher work in each town you visit so you can afford to keep going on your journey. Actual monster threats you have the option to deal with. Add in the political side of things and hopefully it will be a great game.

If some one asks me, as a witcher, to play mail man or other such crap a witcher wouldn't do then that will be a disappointment.

I'm not worried about it graphically at all. I'm sure I will continue to love the main characters.

Already got it preordered as I got it cheap so I'll find out either way when its released.

God I really hope its not 200 hours for those of us with less time

Edit: for me a single player experience tends to have to be between 8-40 hours depending on genre. Very few games hold my interest beyond that these days. Mainly because most long games these days are full of filler to make it that length. I get why big companies do this but I don't personally like it.

 

[NotUS]

For those questioning the OP, there are multiple tweets about how awesome the game is without going into more detail. Some links I grabbed from the official forum.

Apparently new gameplay material will be shown when the embargo lifts on the 26th, good times!

https://twitter.com/NKuillAndInk/status/557081458796658689
SO GOOD. I've just been aimlessly running around the environments because holy wow.

Geekbomb interview and short impressions
http://www.geekbomb.net/games-2/witcher-3-wild-hunt-interview-philipp-weber/

 

[Phat Michael]

That "200 hours" thing is not a positive. Do you think will be another shitty Dragon Age: Inquisition of Quantity > Quality and a huge amount of meaningless fetch quests and side quests throughout the whole game? Or do you think it is going to have a more focused story.

more does not always equal better when it comes to hours played.

 

[Crossing Eden]

Instructions:

1) Don't sound like viral marketer

Done.

Damn, the OP is famous. Already has a site that picked up his impressions for the hits: http://buddhagaming.it/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-dettagli-di-gioco-da-un-provato-di-3-ore/

So don't express any kind of enthusiasm whatsoever? Got it.

Please stop being excited man. And don't try and make us excited. We are just fine sitting here miserable and cynical of everything, thank you very much.

Yea the contempt for the OP and the mindset that excitement without a super detailed analysis as to why=bad is frustrating to read.

 

[Vulcano's assistant]

who is ready to spend 40 hours in a swamp ?

 

[Uthred]

I'm really excited for Witcher 3, but I can't help noticing how many juniors are all up in here keeping the thread positive.


Hmmmmmmmm

Holy fuck this thread is hilarious, I thought the "He liked it too much so he must be lying posts!" were good but this easily beats them. Yeah, people couldnt possibly be excited for a sequel to one of the most criticually acclaimed WRPG in recent years from a fan favourite developer could they? Has to be astro-turfing. Honestly, I have to imagine posts liks this are just poorly delivered jokes because the alternative is mind boggling.

 

[MaxVarEmreis]

But

Spoiler

she was teaching her magic in Ellander, and was a huge influence factor in her life.

Spoiler

Yes, I known She is her adoptive mother. I refer only to her presence in Kaer Morhen. I understand why they might change this, but I think they should stick to books if they can.

 

[Koriandrr]

That "200 hours" thing is not a positive. Do you think will be another shitty Dragon Age: Inquisition of Quantity > Quality and a huge amount of meaningless fetch quests and side quests throughout the whole game? Or do you think it is going to have a more focused story.

more does not always equal better when it comes to hours played.

It is bothering me a little as well, but if there's one developer I have faith in, it's CDPR. I don't think they would do that.

 

[Koriandrr]

That "200 hours" thing is not a positive. Do you think will be another shitty Dragon Age: Inquisition of Quantity > Quality and a huge amount of meaningless fetch quests and side quests throughout the whole game? Or do you think it is going to have a more focused story.

more does not always equal better when it comes to hours played.

Spoiler

Yes, I known She is her adoptive mother. I refer only to her presence in Kaer Morhen. I understand why they might change this, but I think they should stick to books if they can.

We need a thread for this. Would like to discuss how they plan on taking the events from the books into the game.

Spoiler

Ciri is definitely one of my favourite characters too, can't wait to see her in the game.

 

[jesu]

I recommend you read The Last Wish first, as it introduces the characters.
Then find and read the fan translated Sword of Destiny to understand more about Ciri.
And then read the rest.

Well the official Sword Of Destiny is out in May, I can get that then.
I'll start on The Last Wish though.

 

[Teeth]

So don't express any kind of enthusiasm whatsoever? Got it.


Yea the contempt for the OP and the mindset that excitement without a super detailed analysis as to why=bad is frustrating to read.

Express enthusiasm. Do it by being mildly analytical about what you played. Say something of value. Think about the mechanics in play and how they interact. Tell your personal player story based on the things you encountered. Experiment. Think about the play space, what it offers, what it lacks; express that to people reading.

Or just tell me that it's the Game of the Year.

Holy fuck this thread is hilarious, I thought the "He liked it too much so he must be lying posts!" were good but this easily beats them. Yeah, people couldnt possibly be excited for a sequel to one of the most criticually acclaimed WRPG in recent years from a fan favourite developer could they? Has to be astro-turfing. Honestly, I have to imagine posts liks this are just poorly delivered jokes because the alternative is mind boggling.

It has nothing to do with liking it too much.

Think: What has he actually said in the two paragraphs he's written?

 

[Seanspeed]

100 Hours of Playtime

Express enthusiasm. Do it by being mildly analytical about what you played. Say something of value. Think about the mechanics in play and how they interact. Tell your personal player story based on the things you encountered. Experiment. Think about the play space, what it offers, what it lacks; express that to people reading.

Pretty sure that's what he did.

I'm guessing by 'mildly analytical' you mean 'say something bad somewhere'.

 

[Crossing Eden]

Express enthusiasm. Do it by being mildly analytical about what you played. Say something of value. Think about the mechanics in play and how they interact. Tell your personal player story based on the things you encountered. Experiment. Think about the play space, what it offers, what it lacks; express that to people reading.?

Try reading the OP.

The game starts off with the usual tutorial and overview of the mechanics. What's great is even the tutorial, it integrates with the overall story in such a great way. Not surprising from CD Project. Also the adult theme which I want to emphasize is very apparent from the start and has a very Game of Thrones vibe to it to make the most familiar comparison to for those of you who haven't played any of the Witcher titles. The outfits, architecture, dialog, the characters is done perfectly to draw you into the world and lore. The combat is smoother than ever and much more intuitive and fun without making it easy. The horse mechanic is awesome and very similar to Red Dead. I like the fact that you can just hold down "A" and it will automatically steer you to the direction you need to go. Great way to check out the beautiful surroundings and vistas.

the engine has no inky blotches to draw far away vistas. Anywhere you look and no matter how far, your eyes will be treated to beautiful scenery as any digital painting. When I say far, i mean FAR! Like holy shit far. When i brought up my in game map which I thought was the entire map.

This is all good information without spoiling the game, and news flash, you don't decide what makes an impression valid or not based on whether or not it conforms to you standards.

EDIT:Beaten by Seanspeed.

 

[Durante]

I wish it had fewer hours of playtime.

Or at least, if they didn't put so much emphasis on quantity when talking about the game.

 

[OmegaTreeFish]

100 Hours of Playtime


This is insane. Why the fuck should people have to conform to your personal standards of what is 'acceptable' in terms of enthusiastic impressions? My god. lol

Main story is apparently 50 hours. So that's what? 30-40 hours realistically. That's starting to sound more like a length I can do.

 

[Daverid]

That "200 hours" thing is not a positive. Do you think will be another shitty Dragon Age: Inquisition of Quantity > Quality and a huge amount of meaningless fetch quests and side quests throughout the whole game? Or do you think it is going to have a more focused story.

more does not always equal better when it comes to hours played.

I think there's some serious over-exaggeration going on from random people.

CDPR themselves have never stated more than 100 hours. There was one comment about how playtesters were taking ~120 hours to get through everything rather than the ~100 they were estimating... But nobody at CDPR has ever said the game is 200 hours long, it has always been 50 Main Quests, 50 Side-Quests.
I'm sure some people out there will get to 200 hours on their first playthrough, but those will be the exceptions.

I myself am still skeptical like you however, I loathed all the fluff and nonsense shit DA:I heaped upon you, and it would be excruciating to see that in The Witcher 3. Hopefully CDPR have a little more common sense than that (Their quest design in The Witcher 2 was spectacular - who knows if they'll be able to do that in an open world though), but time will tell.

 

[Uthred]

It has nothing to do with liking it too much.

Think: What has he actually said in the two paragraphs he's written?

Ok you convinced me chief, I'll join the dour faced anti-fun police as soon as I strap on my tinfoil helmet to protect me from astro-turfing juniors

 

[Grazzt]

I WANT IT NOW!!!

 

[misho8723]

I wish it had fewer hours of playtime.

Or at least, if they didn't put so much emphasis on quantity when talking about the game.

Did you Durante read this article? http://www.makinggames.biz/features/quest-design-in-the-witcher-3-wild-hunt,6896.html

Yeah, W3 is going to have ton of content, but the priority for them and always was quality - not quantity.. Just like W2, which didn't had even one average or bad quest.. not like most other AAA RPG games

 

[Crossing Eden]

That "200 hours" thing is not a positive. Do you think will be another shitty Dragon Age: Inquisition of Quantity > Quality and a huge amount of meaningless fetch quests and side quests throughout the whole game? Or do you think it is going to have a more focused story.

more does not always equal better when it comes to hours played.

I think there's some serious over-exaggeration going on from random people.

CDPR themselves have never stated more than 100 hours. There was one comment about how playtesters were taking ~120 hours to get through everything rather than the ~100 they were estimating... But nobody at CDPR has ever said the game is 200 hours long, it has always been 50 Main Quests, 50 Side-Quests.
I'm sure some people out there will get to 200 hours on their first playthrough, but those will be the exceptions.

I myself am still skeptical like you however, I loathed all the fluff and nonsense shit DA:I heaped upon you, and it would be excruciating to see that in The Witcher 3. Hopefully CDPR have a little more common sense than that (Their quest design in The Witcher 2 was spectacular - who knows if they'll be able to do that in an open world though), but time will tell.

Their statement on fetch quest design.

According to Tomaszkiewicz, CD Projekt Red has more than tripled the amount of quest designers since creating The Witcher, going from 6 in the original to “about 14, I think.” That has allowed CD Projekt Red to flesh out the quests so they don’t seem like unimportant busywork meant to pad the length of the game. “When we do have [fetch quests], which is rarely, we compensate for it with the narrative,” writer Jakub Szamalek explains. “It’ll definitely be an interesting story in itself – you’ll be intrigued by the NPC’s motives, and where this is all leading. Even when you have a simple structure it’s something we’re compensating for in the story.”

Even then, CD Projekt Red is trying to limit fetch quests to a bare minimum because “we don’t think they’re interesting.”

 

[Gurgelhals]

I'm looking forward to this game very much (in fact, I can't wait!). However, I'm still not sure whether and how the developers will manage to reconcile the open world design with their "deep" approach to questing (i.e. a strong emphasis on choices & consequences, no fillers, no mmorpg-style fetch quests, etc.).

On the one hand, I have faith in cdproject not delivering a single player MMORPG in the vein of Dragon Age: Inquisition, but on the other hand, I can count the rpgs that have successfully managed the balancing act between an open world and meaningful quests on one hand so far (only Fallout: New Vegas comes to my mind as a recent example). After all, Witcher 2 strongly emphasised deep and complex quests as well as choices and consequences and it resulted in a game world that felt quite small and enclosed (also compared to its predecessor).

 

[lordfuzzybutt]

That 200 hours is playtest, probably they have to do everything slowly, with every situation possible?

 

[Teeth]

Pretty sure that's what he did.

I'm guessing by 'mildly analytical' you mean 'say something bad somewhere'.

I went to a pasta house, it was so amazing. They gave me a menu when I sat down and I ordered a meal, which is an incredibly smooth experience. There was pasta on my plate when it came and the waiter was in white and black, a very formal experience if I do say! One might point to a little Italian house as a source of inspiration. The pasta was great! The sauce was better than you could cook at home, no doubt. I will definitely be going back!

 

[prudislav]

It starts like this..

Spoiler

first you get this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQEJwz5xy5w then https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcogCjLymeI. You start before Witcher one in the bath tub where you have you eyes closed. Then a little crab like creature enters the tub between your legs and into the water. You wake up and say something like "very funny.. there's better ways to get my attention" and toss the crab creature and vaporize it with his igni sign. Camera pans to Yennefer who is sitting at her vanity table naked. Conversation about training and well being of Ciri happens. You start the tutorial by using your witcher senses to find the key to Ciri's room where you go down and find Vesemir asleep and young Ciri practicing blindfolded on top of tall wooden stumps. The animation of her jumping and acrobatics is amazing btw. Then you race Ciri down where the rest of the witcher are to get go through the jumping and ladder mechanics. After some dialog, you have an option to go through the combat tutorial with Vesemir. Meantime, Ciri is practicing on a dummy where she knocks the dummy's helmet to the other side of the wall. Gerald makes her go get it where she goes missing. Gerald tries to call to her to hurry back when shit goes down and the Wild Hunt appears. Gerald see's Ciri frozen where the Wild Hunt holds her and takes her. Gerald suddenly wakes up from a dream at a camp fire with Vesemir now at current time setting. You start by tracking Yennefer's track and start the game.

i am starting to feel they will dumb her story from the book a lot for game-only people to understand her

 

[i-Lo]

So they're in polish mode and we've barely seen the xbone version (which OP supposedly played and claims is nothing to complain about) and not one peek from the PS4 version.

Makes me feel inane for pre-ordering this game for PS4.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Not believing in hype and waiting to see how a game turns put.

"Everything is awesome" might turn out to be true. But especially with modern games, you are not going to know much from a small slice in controlled conditions.

Or, you know, you could already know this without reading IGN. Because it's common sense.

Like I can preorder know something from CDProjeckt, becuase they yet have to fail me, when they do, if they do, that benefit will be lost.
Thats how this works, now I trust them, I like a lot what they do, I pay in full, because for me, they deserve it. Of course PC version here, I dont give a rat ass about the console ones.

 

[Mifec]

i am starting to feel they will dumb her story from the book a lot for game-only people to understand her

They were never gonna use the books for anything other than limited backstory, setting and character sources anyway, no?

 

[Crossing Eden]

So they're in polish mode and we've barely seen the xbone version (which OP supposedly played and claims is nothing to complain about) and not one peek from the PS4 version.

Makes me feel inane for pre-ordering this game for PS4.

IIRC they have a marketing deal with Microsoft so the majority of the footage in marketig like with the WD PS4 marketing deal will be of that version.

The game's content is already finished btw, but they delayed it for the sole purpose of polishing it.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=957490

 

[injurai]

I would believe all that... But ign kind of opened my eyes.

go on...

 

[i-Lo]

IIRC they have a marketing deal with Microsoft so the majority of the footage in marketig like with the WD PS4 marketing deal will be of that version.

The game's content is already finished btw, but they delayed it for the sole purpose of polishing it.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=957490

Well, we haven't seen much of xbone version either. Are playable demos for game "journalistic" impressions also part of marketing deal?

 

[antisoulless]

Anyone not looking forward to this game is a horrible person.

 

[dreamlock]

Their statement on fetch quest design.

According to Tomaszkiewicz, CD Projekt Red has more than tripled the amount of quest designers since creating The Witcher, going from 6 in the original to “about 14, I think.” That has allowed CD Projekt Red to flesh out the quests so they don’t seem like unimportant busywork meant to pad the length of the game. “When we do have [fetch quests], which is rarely, we compensate for it with the narrative,” writer Jakub Szamalek explains. “It’ll definitely be an interesting story in itself – you’ll be intrigued by the NPC’s motives, and where this is all leading. Even when you have a simple structure it’s something we’re compensating for in the story.”

Even then, CD Projekt Red is trying to limit fetch quests to a bare minimum because “we don’t think they’re interesting.”

Hype increasing.

If they can live up to their words from this interview then I think I'll be really happy with the game. I hate fetch quests in story-driven singleplayer RPGs.

 

[Dawg]

I wish developers would stop with the "100+ hours!" bullshit (we all know most games beyond 100 hours will include boring sidequests and collectibles).

I'd like to be wrong though. Maybe The Witcher 3 is truly the exception.

That said, I'll take a tight 50 hours (or less) game over a dragged out 100 hours game any day. Wish more devs would do that.

 

[Crossing Eden]

Well, we haven't seen much of xbone version either. Are playable demos for game impressions also part of marketing deal?

No, the game would likely be demoed anyway, although whichever company is paying for the marketing may have it shown in their console more.

 

[hammertomb]

I wish developers would stop with the "100+ hours!" bullshit (we all know most games beyond 100 hours will include boring sidequests and collectibles).

I'd like to be wrong though. Maybe The Witcher 3 is truly the exception.

That said, I'll take a tight 50 hours (or less) game over a dragged out 100 hours game any day. Wish more devs would do that.

Advertising quantity is never a good sign.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Geralt not Gerald

And

Spoiler

Yennefer in Kaer Morhen is very strange. In books, Yennefer wasn't presence at Ciri training in Kaer Morhen. Triss was.

Mmmm, you are right. They are probably mixing when Ciri was taught by Yennefer in Mother Neneke's abbey and the part where Triss was with Ciri at Kaer Morhen. Doesn't surprise me though, they need to present Yennefer in a meningful way to create a clear connection between her and Ciri for people that didnt read the books.
I don't see it that bad, you don't lose too much giving more importance there to Yennefer than to Triss.

 

[Daverid]

Their statement on fetch quest design.

Oh don't worry I've been following TW3 since it was announced, I know that quote very well. However it's one thing to state that, and another to actually pull it off, especially in a huge open world.
My skepticism is very mild however, CDPR's track record in the quest design department is stellar, I just have that minor fear that such a huge open world will lead to some very typical lame quests. However those typical fetch/kill style quests might be reserved for just "Witcher Tasks", and if so then it's actually kind of valid, just as long as it's still somewhat interesting (Like Nekker Nests, Gargoyles or Endregas in TW2).

Well, we haven't seen much of xbone version either. Are playable demos for game "journalistic" impressions also part of marketing deal?

Well at this "hands-on event" they've got X1/PS4/PC all there to be played. So I'm not sure the exact marketing going on, but every version is supposedly there to try, so it doesn't seem like there's any weird marketing happening. Just seems like OP played it on the Xbone and that was it.

 

[thuGG_pl]

I wish developers would stop with the "100+ hours!" bullshit (we all know most games beyond 100 hours will include boring sidequests and collectibles).

I'd like to be wrong though. Maybe The Witcher 3 is truly the exception.

That said, I'll take a tight 50 hours (or less) game over a dragged out 100 hours game any day. Wish more devs would do that.

I wish guys like you would stop assuming and guessing and wait for the final product.

 

[Dawg]

I wish guys like you would stop assuming and guessing and wait for the final product.

Did you miss the part where I said I'd love to be wrong? I said I hope TW3 would be the exception.

I'm just saying almost every RPG (and games in general) that advertised itself with more than 100 hours of gameplay always had boring sidecontent to reach that number.

 

[mnz]

I need someone to compare it to both of the first two games, because there are things that I like and don't like about both of them.

The open world setting makes me worry, especially after DA:I.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Google fan translated ones, they are very good.

Better than the officials, from what Ive heard.

If anyone is fluent in spanish, that commercial version is the best after the original polish one, and its also complete. Highly recommended.

 

[Links_fantasy]

I'm glad this got delayed, I've recently spent 120 hours with Dragon Age Inquisition and need a break between massive open rpgs. Then later in the year there's Xenoblade Chronicles X plus anything else that pops up perhaps Fallout 4 or if Final Fantasy XV makes it out in 2015.

 

[Pie and Beans]

Only reports I'm interested in are in depth analysis of whether the combat is still "absolute janky shit", or radically changed from Witcher 2, a game I found to be essentially unplayable.