The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

[Merad]

The one I found the most annoying, to avoid spoilers I'll describe as the one where you'll hear "Yrden, trap it with Yrden!" a whole lot.

God, don't remind me. The very first time I played the game I think it took almost 30 tries to beat that fight. I think they nerfed it a bit with the enhanced edition, because my most recent playthrough was nowhere near that bad.

I'll be here to eat my words but it won't come to that. May 19 2015 will mark the launch of the best RPG ever.

Honestly I'm right there with you. I've been burned before and I'm a little afraid to get my hopes this high for any game, but I probably have more faith in CDPR than any other game studio at the moment.

 

[StinkyPinky]

This is why people get disappointed and rage about it on metacritic. "Best RPG Ever"?? Tone down your expectations guys. It possibly could be but considering there are thousands of RPG's, many of them quality, it probably won't be. Let's just hope it will be a great game without going all Watch Dogs on it.

 

[Merad]

This is why people get disappointed and rage about it on metacritic. "Best RPG Ever"?? Tone down your expectations guys. It possibly could be but considering there are thousands of RPG's, many of them quality, it probably won't be. Let's just hope it will be a great game without going all Watch Dogs on it.

Sorry, I can't hear you from on board the hype train.

If it's not as good as I hope then I'll be a bit disappointed, but I'll get over it. It will be a good game regardless.

 

[Fire&Blood]

This is why people get disappointed and rage about it on metacritic. "Best RPG Ever"?? Tone down your expectations guys. It possibly could be but considering there are thousands of RPG's, many of them quality, it probably won't be. Let's just hope it will be a great game without going all Watch Dogs on it.

That's sound logic right there, normally I'm the one advising caution and warning people about preordering. I haven't preordered anything for a few years now, still haven't preordered W3 either but the hype is real with this one.

I feel I've seen enough to say that the bold claim I'm making are justified and I elaborated why as well. It's a RPG equivalent of Game of Thrones and the reviews will reflect that.

I've taken a seat at the hype train's locomotive and I still feel I could sit a little further up. Should the hype train exceed limitations, I'll take the most damage.

More than once, I caught myself placing my fingers on WASD keys while watching longer gameplay videos.

Once I heard that Skylake tops out at 4 cores, W3 was my excuse to move the PC upgrade to happen before the game rather than few months down the road. I'm just bracing myself for time between the launch and Memorial Day holiday since work will be cutting into my playing time. I'm even considering reviving a habit from my early 20's to help enhance the experience. I've already recruited two of my most game appreciative friends to enjoy the game with. No gamers by any stretch but I got them intrigued enough to come over and watch the spectacle.

 

[escrow4]

Witcher 2 was consolized and cut back, I'm not holding my breath for 3. I'll still be buying it but I'll be pleasantly surprised if it really is that good.

 

[Fire&Blood]

Witcher 2 was consolized and cut back, I'm not holding my breath for 3. I'll still be buying it but I'll be pleasantly surprised if it really is that good.

I would argue that the console version was more like an afterthought like PC ports tend to be, it was a year late on 360 despite the platform having already been widely adopted and 360 a target platform for most other games as well, then a PS3 game was cancelled during development after it drained CDPR out of quite a bit of money. That's far from the typical scenario in the AAA domain.

Yes, W2 is flawed, the first one was too. The flaws had little to do with console hindrance though. More with CDPR's growing pains and those are about to pay off big time.

 

[you2]

Well the interface for witcher 2 was clearly designed aruond a console/controller even if the 360 version came out after the pc version. While I prefer 2's gameplay to 1; 1 had the better pc interface by a wide margin.

I would argue that the console version was more like an afterthought like PC ports tend to be, it was a year late on 360 despite the platform having already been widely adopted and 360 a target platform for most other games as well, then a PS3 game was cancelled during development after it drained CDPR out of quite a bit of money. That's far from the typical scenario in the AAA domain.

Yes, W2 is flawed, the first one was too. The flaws had little to do with console hindrance though. More with CDPR's growing pains and those are about to pay off big time.

 

[Carfax83]

Here's a video showing Hairworks enabled.

Looks pretty damn good I must say, a massive step up over the default hair so it will definitely be worth it to turn on if your hardware can handle it. CDPR and NVidia have been optimizing the hell out of it, and a single GTX 980 is supposed to have no issues with it turned on along with ultra settings @ 1080p.

 

[Merad]

Here's a video showing Hairworks enabled.

Looks pretty damn good I must say, a massive step up over the default hair so it will definitely be worth it to turn on if your hardware can handle it. CDPR and NVidia have been optimizing the hell out of it, and a single GTX 980 is supposed to have no issues with it turned on along with ultra settings @ 1080p.

Looks pretty cool. Here's hoping that a 980 can handle it and ultra settings at 1440p.

 

[StinkyPinky]

By the way, the reviews for this game will be out this week. The review embargo is a week before release. That makes me think the developer is confident of a good product.

 

[Carfax83]

Looks pretty cool. Here's hoping that a 980 can handle it and ultra settings at 1440p.

Here's another cool video.

Witcher 3 Official Monster trailer.

That antlered beast with the red fur has some nice hairworks effects

 

[Fire&Blood]

I speak some German, the 1st video Carfax posted on this page showcased a side quest that easily would have been a main quest in a content starved game.

The last minute of the 2nd video has some remarkable statements.

3 hype inducing GIF's from the video:

 

[smackababy]

So, last night I redownloaded the Witcher and the Witcher 2. I think I am going to replay these again prior to playing the 3rd. I guess it is a little late for that, but whatever.

 

[Rhezuss]

Wow those GIFs are awesome!

 

[zinfamous]

So, last night I redownloaded the Witcher and the Witcher 2. I think I am going to replay these again prior to playing the 3rd. I guess it is a little late for that, but whatever.

I started replaying Witcher 2 last weekend, and actually got further than I did last time! There is hope yet that I will actually finish a Witcher game.

Tried this with Witcher 1 about a month ago...barely got halfway into the first chapter. lol. (that's now 3 attempts to do anything with that one)

 

[Rhezuss]

I started replaying Witcher 2 last weekend, and actually got further than I did last time! There is hope yet that I will actually finish a Witcher game.

Tried this with Witcher 1 about a month ago...barely got halfway into the first chapter. lol. (that's now 3 attempts to do anything with that one)

Same here. I can't get into TW1, dunno why...I always stop playing at the same point, in the first large city after the village...

I finished TW2 a few months ago when I restarted the game again for the 4th time. I was in the mood for this during my last attempt and I only played this game. It's not that long and the story get a bit more interesting by the hour past a certain point.

You should keep on it, it's worth the playthrough.

 

[Mem]

Same here. I can't get into TW1, dunno why...I always stop playing at the same point, in the first large city after the village...

I finished TW2 a few months ago when I restarted the game again for the 4th time. I was in the mood for this during my last attempt and I only played this game. It's not that long and the story get a bit more interesting by the hour past a certain point.

You should keep on it, it's worth the playthrough.

I played TW1 three times lol right through,does pick up but you have to stick with it.

TW2 is best played twice ie from both sides when you have to make a choice,the second time I played the other side and had new quests open up and map areas so well worth it.

 

[BlitzPuppet]

I played TW1 and had a hard time completing it because of the gameplay being difficult and dull....but man that Bride's death in the fields memory will stick with me forever. I eventually got my dad to read the books because I heard the game followed it VERY closely, and since he's a huge fantasy book guy...he liked it. I hope they follow up on the kid that the story was centered around in the first game.

TW2 was a lot of fun to play, I throughly enjoyed it and will be using my Elf sided play through as the import since it had a much better story than the other selection.

Preordered for 38.99

 

[Merad]

So, last night I redownloaded the Witcher and the Witcher 2. I think I am going to replay these again prior to playing the 3rd. I guess it is a little late for that, but whatever.

You're looking about about 60-70 hours to replay them depending on how much of a completionist you are. Doable in a couple of weeks.

 

[smackababy]

You're looking about about 60-70 hours to replay them depending on how much of a completionist you are. Doable in a couple of weeks.

Ha! couple of weeks? More like a couple of days! I don't need to complete much of the side quests. Just want to refresh the main story, as it's been awhile since I've played them. =)

 

[Stuka87]

Here's a video showing Hairworks enabled.

Looks pretty damn good I must say, a massive step up over the default hair so it will definitely be worth it to turn on if your hardware can handle it. CDPR and NVidia have been optimizing the hell out of it, and a single GTX 980 is supposed to have no issues with it turned on along with ultra settings @ 1080p.

Shame its proprietary BS that screws over half the gamers out there. Unlike something like TressFX which has source code available to all and runs equally well on both nVidia and AMD cards currently. Gameworks is entirely proprietary and does nothing but hurt gamers.

Still looking forward to the game, just also prepared for the game to run horribly on AMD cards because CDPR decided to sell out.

 

[chimaxi83]

Shame its proprietary BS that screws over half the gamers out there. Unlike something like TressFX which has source code available to all and runs equally well on both nVidia and AMD cards currently. Gameworks is entirely proprietary and does nothing but hurt gamers.

Still looking forward to the game, just also prepared for the game to run horribly on AMD cards because CDPR decided to sell out.

Hairworks looks just as stupid, floaty, and "weightless" as TressFX. Better than plastic helmet hair, but still just as stupid. Meh. I fully expect this to run like crap on AMD too, just like every other Gameworks game, until of course the devs fix it. Such is the gaming world we live in today, unfortunately. Unexpected from CDPR, but I'll still play their game.

Gameworks/Nvidia defender coming in 3, 2, 1...

 

[Rhezuss]

Do you need to keep TW2 installed in your PC for some story stuff/content bonus when starting TW3?

 

[escrow4]

Do you need to keep TW2 installed in your PC for some story stuff/content bonus when starting TW3?

You need the saves. 1 -> 2 transferred some gold and a plot choice or 2 was mentioned which was poor. 2 -> 3 could be really good or equally poor. You made some interesting decisions there.

 

[Stuka87]

Do you need to keep TW2 installed in your PC for some story stuff/content bonus when starting TW3?

Chance are you just need your save files in the correct place. Or maybe it will be like Mass Effect and let you choose the save file.