Witcher 2

[L233]

Right, Witcher 2.

The game looks great and I love the artwork style, but TW2 suffers from a lack of diversity in locations and those that are there are not even terribly interesting. The new combat system is a competent rip-off of Venetica's combat, which is OK, I guess. Play time is rather short and I suspect that the game was initially supposed to be longer but was cut back - which would also explain the shitty 3rd Act and the unsatisfying ending.

The story is a convoluted mess that deliberately complicates a simplicistic basic storyline by the obnoxious name dropping of kings, places and battles that mean nothing to me, whereas TW1 started with a mystery that had additonal layers of complexity added to it as you went on through the game. It starts with an assassination, it ends with Geralt confronting the assassin in an utterly anti-climactic ending and between that you have a bunch of convenient roadblocks placed in your way (sea monster, cursed battlefield), that add little to the actual storyline. Did I mention that the ending sucks?

All in all, I find the game disappointing compared to it's predecessor. It's still a pretty good game but it's not the instant classic I had hoped for and it's nowhere near as good as TW1.

 

[Sigfried1977]

Sadly I have to agree with this. The game handles choice and consequence better than just about any other, but the story itself isn't very good, poorly paced (with chapter 2 seemingly dragging on forever while the final chapter 3 ends in the blink of an eye without any sort of satisfying conclusion) and poorly told. The game leaves you more or less in the dark all the way to the very last encounter, and so the designers took the easy way out and simply used the boss like a Witcher II Wiki page to fill you in on all the blanks.

Story issues aside, the game has a weird user interface that is equally awkward to use with both mouse and gamepad controls, the combat is a clumsy Batman Arkham Asylum knock-off (the designers said they played Demon's Souls and wanted a similar combat experience. Apparently they haven't played that game for very long or were just talking out of their asses), the tutorial is a load of crap and the game gets easier and easier the longer you play it. Other issues include the poor stealth segments (which I quick-saved my way through), the annoying weight limitation and the ability to go into everybody's houses and steal their possesions right in front of their eyes. Even the visual quality seems to decrease over time: The game never quite reaches the heights of the prologue and Flotsum in the following chapters.

I still had a lot of fun with it, but it kinda felt like half a game.

 

[homerdog]

I've given it about 12 tries with the Kayran before hitting a strategy guide. When he starts throwing rocks I don't know what to do.

 

[smw]

I've given it about 12 tries with the Kayran before hitting a strategy guide. When he starts throwing rocks I don't know what to do.

Spoiler

Avoid them while running on the destroyed bridge. When you reach to the top I think there was a QTE but I'm not sure - might be you just need to hit it.

 

[homerdog]

Just beat it. Not hard at all if you know to run up that bridge.

 

[Lightman]

Just beat it. Not hard at all if you know to run up that bridge.

I was in the same boat as you!
Figured it out after 10-15th time on my own .
After so much practice with cutting tentacles I wasn't even loosing any health to Kryan attacks.

 

[Miksu]

I suppose that the Witcher 2 has sold quite well. The game has never left the Steam's Top-Selling list, even though other new releases like Duke Nukem Forever have been long gone from the list.

And now Witcher 2 is available with 33% discount from the Steam's Summer Sales and it is again topping the list.

 

[Lightman]

I suppose that the Witcher 2 has sold quite well. The game has never left the Steam's Top-Selling list, even though other new releases like Duke Nukem Forever have been long gone from the list.

And now Witcher 2 is available with 33% discount from the Steam's Summer Sales and it is again topping the list.

It is at number 1 right now on Steam Top 10 .
I wonder if CDPR will release any sales numbers for full quarter. That would be interesting for many reasons. How many PC gamers have reasonably modest PC's to play such a game and are not only interested in shooters like Crysis.
This is RPG and first since Oblivion with such hardware requirements to be played comfortably at 720p with med-ultra settings.

On top of that this is DRM free game and this alone is very intriguing from sales point of view. I hope TW2 sells really well!

 

[Frank]

Hm, that asks for a question:

Do you want games where you have to die to learn how to do it?

 

[orangpelupa]

seems really good game to be able to keeping in to 10. Ugh.... but i never able to properly play witcher 2.... it keep stuttering on my laptop. Other game play good even at high or max @ 720p

 

[Lightman]

Hm, that asks for a question:

Do you want games where you have to die to learn how to do it?

Honestly? Yes!
This gives a game more credibility, you can immerse in played character more and makes fight, exploration, etc more intense, because you can die and loose something. Obviously you want to have some clues scattered here and there on how to not die. So if you explore game and before a bigger fight try to research your opponent, you should be rewarded for that. This is one aspect of Witcher 2 I liked a lot.

It brings good old memories of Eye of Beholder and similar games in a way.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Hm, that asks for a question:

Do you want games where you have to die to learn how to do it?

To HAVE to die? Maybe not. To have real consequences to dying, absolutely. I want to fear dying. I want to dread dying. I want dying to be something I avoid at any and all costs. I want situations to arise where I run away screaming for mommy because there's a real chance I might die and thus I need to go hone my skills/level up/whatever before revisiting the encounter.

That's what made something like Diablo II's one death = lost character forever so enthralling and rewarding. THAT is something all games should offer, IMO. No saves, except when you quit for the night. No ability to reload the save except when you start. If you die, you're gone. Or you lose something irretrievably. Make death something to avoid.

That's what drives me absolutely nuts about current MMO's other than Eve Online. Dying isn't even an inconvenience. And in many cases it's used as a fast method of transportation. Bleh.

Regards,
SB

 

[Sigfried1977]

The consequences to dying made Demon's Souls so incredibly tense and ultimately rewarding. Actually made it pretty damn scary even.

 

[Arun]

That's what made something like Diablo II's one death = lost character forever so enthralling and rewarding. THAT is something all games should offer, IMO. No saves, except when you quit for the night. No ability to reload the save except when you start. If you die, you're gone. Or you lose something irretrievably. Make death something to avoid.

There's a trade-off there: if you lose everything by losing, then it must also be harder to lose. You could get away with a significantly higher difficulty level if it was acceptable to die every 30 minutes or so. That's why the Witcher 2's highest difficulty level isn't really noticeably more difficult than Hard from what I played of it. Different players will have different preferences.

That's what drives me absolutely nuts about current MMO's other than Eve Online. Dying isn't even an inconvenience. And in many cases it's used as a fast method of transportation. Bleh.

If you want permadeath in a non-niche MMO, you also need a much shorter level curve and less overpowered gear (e.g. Guild Wars 1 but more extreme) and make it less likely to die as a consequence of a single mistake (e.g. Left for Dead 2 but not as extreme).

It's insane to lose 200 hours of work because of a single mistake (there's a small niche for that but most people including myself will want to stay as far from it as possible) but it's not quite the end of the world to lose 20 hours of work because of several mistakes in a row.

Then again even minor inconveniences for dying in MMOs are unlikely to come back given the mentality of most current MMO players.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

If you want permadeath in a non-niche MMO, you also need a much shorter level curve and less overpowered gear (e.g. Guild Wars 1 but more extreme) and make it less likely to die as a consequence of a single mistake (e.g. Left for Dead 2 but not as extreme).

It's insane to lose 200 hours of work because of a single mistake (there's a small niche for that but most people including myself will want to stay as far from it as possible) but it's not quite the end of the world to lose 20 hours of work because of several mistakes in a row.

Then again even minor inconveniences for dying in MMOs are unlikely to come back given the mentality of most current MMO players.

That last bit wasn't me pining for perma death in an MMO, just the lack of any consequences for dying. Need to cross the zone faster in EQ2? Just find someplace to die or something to kill you. Insta teleport. Teleport down in Rift and you're in a dungeon? Just die, res, and pay to heal. Money you'll make back in about 10 seconds of play. Bleh.

I miss the days in EQ1 during the first 2-3 weeks when death penalty post level 20 was roughly 50% of your XP bar and you could de-level. It encouraged people to play well and avoid death. Unless they were just utterly incapable of controlling their pet, having any sort of situational awareness, etc. And it was entirely possible to permanently lose your stuff if you couldn't get your corpse. Oh yeah, those were the days.

And you're right. In these days of the instant gratification WoW type of MMO, we'll never get back the type of gameplay where you actually felt a sense of accomplishment doing things that were actually hard.

Sloppy play by the vast majority of MMO players these days drives me absolutely nuts. It's NOT hard to avoid adds, it's NOT hard to stay out of ground effect AoEs, etc. And yet people die to them and then complain the game is too hard until all the challenging content is nerfed so that you feel like your hand is being held constantly.

Regards,
SB

 

[Dresden]

Is there a way to adjust the quality of shadows? Even on Ultra, they look like a series of black dots. I've read that tweaking some of the .ini's can adjust the shadow quality.

 

[homerdog]

I think the only thing to be done about that is to enable ubersampling.

 

[Dresden]

I think the only thing to be done about that is to enable ubersampling.

Aww lame. I have read you can tweak the level of Ubersampling through the config, the default variable is 2 and 0 is off. Changing it to 1 lessens the extent of sampling. I wonder if they'll release a DX11 patch, at some point, like Crytek wound up doing with Crysis 2. I don't think TW2 even uses DX10. I'm pretty sure it's DX9. I'd like to play in DX11 and put my new card to use.

 

[homerdog]

It's DX9.

 

[suryad]

They released the changelog for 1.3 patch for the game. I am sure they still have a few weeks to let the patch cook before it gets released. What I do have to wonder though from reading some of the changes is why didn't they do them in the first place? Also I second that it would be awesome if CDPR releases a DX 11 patch with even higher res textures and general DX 11 awesomeness to make an already excellent looking game even more excellent!