CD Projekt Red makes games
Following the waning CD (yes, Compact Discs) distribution markets, CD Projekt ventured into game development. An unlikely attempt at diversification, one that had all the odds stacked against it. Yet, on a shoestring budget and barely making it to the finish line, CD Projekt Red delivered a gem - The Witcher. In 2007, there was no game quite like it. It dropped you into a world where you must make difficult choices - choose the lesser evil. A far cry from the black/white good/evil American RPG games of the time. But the most startling feature of The Witcher was the delayed consequence and dynamic narrative system. Each playthrough resulted in a different story, and your actions won't show results till dozens of hours later. While it's not the first game to employ such a system, it was the first one to use it as a storytelling tool.
Excruciatingly long loading times, frequent bugs and broken dialogue aside, The Witcher was a revelation. Of course, The Witcher: Enhanced Edition fixed most major issues.
The Witcher was a modest success, by all means, but enough for CD Projekt Red to continue development. The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings released in 2011, improving on the original in nearly every way. Yet, it was a rushed development schedule meant a game that never quite lived up to its very lofty ambitions.
From this point on, there will be spoilers. This post is only for those who have played The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and its expansions. You have been warned! This will just be a self-indulgent rant about some of my observations re-playing the game.
Making The Witcher accessible
While still a medium budget project, Wild Hunt (henceforth WH) this was the first game to release cross-platform on consoles with a fair amount of hype. It is by all means regarded as one of the finest games of the generation.
I revisit games I like often. Revisiting WH nearly a couple of years on, it struck me - it's a very memorable game. I remembered much of my playthrough two years ago.
Yet, in some ways, WH did drop some of the best bits of the previous The Witcher games. While the narrative still offered a lot of choice, and the consequences were aptly delayed, the narrative system isn't quite as dynamic as The Witcher 2. The main storyline remains pretty much the same, only with different endings. In The Witcher 2, you could end up in a completely different place for much of the game depending on your choices.
Indeed, much of the dynamic narrative was used for sub-plots rather than the main plot.
The main plot itself is much more formulaic. The first two entries were a breath of fresh air in a world of endless unlikely-hero-save-the-world-from-doom tales. Instead, they chose to tell a more personal, eclectic story. There's a lot of that in WH as well, of course, but much of that is once again sidelined to the sub-plots.
It's hard not to think of these changes as anything but dumbing down The Witcher.
Velen is beautiful
I remember being awed by Novigrad and the obviously picturesque scenery of Skellige, but a revisit made me appreciate Velen greatly. It's the overall effect - the somber music, the dark and dingy visual treatment (those sunsets!), the downer West Midlands accents, and of course, the quite incredible Bloody Baron story.
Velen evokes a truly unique feeling. One would argue evoking a feeling is the purpose of any piece of art, and Velen does something truly remarkably - one that I can't quite place. It's not really sad, it's not really melancholy, it's not really miserable. It's just, kind of... strangely beautiful in the most unpleasant way. Hereby, I coin a new word - "velenesque".
60 frames per second is the real deal /Pcmasterrace
I played WH originally on a console. It was a fabulous experience, and I never complained about the frame rate being pegged at 30 fps. Yet, once you experience the glory of high-resolution, maxed out, 60 frames per second, the console version is nigh unplayable. It makes a noticeable difference to the overall experience, particularly combat.
Gwent is still addictive
I doubt anyone at CDPR ever expected Gwent to become so popular. This should be its own game. Indeed, it has evolved into its own standalone game, one that is currently in beta testing.
Gwent is surprisingly deep, with each faction and card offering an endless permutation of tactics and strategy. Yet, it's very fast paced and accessible. This is a great card game, one that feels like it has been around as long as poker.
Bluffing is surprisingly effective against NPCs, though I can't wait to go head to head with humans in the standalone Gwent game and see how well my bluffing skills stack up.
Ciri isn't compelling
Ciri is the closest The Witcher world gets to a stereotypical superhero type character. It just doesn't work for me. In a world where everyone's fucked, one person saving the whole world just doesn't work.
In a game with some excellent voice acting covering a whole cornucopia of accents, Ciri's dialogue and acting both seem like standard Hollywood material.
While playing with Ciri is a welcome change from Geralt, there's something uncomfortable when the game switches to Ciri.
I feel for Ciri, but this just isn't a well written or performed character.
Getting that bad ending
Much has been talked about the horrible "bad ending" of WH. I deliberately went around trying to get just that. The key to getting the bad ending is not being a jerk, but being selfish. You can be a jerk and still end up amusing Ciri, but be a "bad father", and Ciri is doomed to fail.
To that, I succeeded admirably. Well, they are right, it truly is a miserable ending. I'm going to delete this save and pretend it never existed.
Equality
Let's face it, most games - or indeed other works of popular culture - are inherently discriminating in some way or the other. There's nothing of the sort here. Every class of humans and non-humans alike will be bashed at some point or the other. Granted, many characters in the world are fairly misogynist and racist - hey, like anywhere in our world - but every character will get their due comeuppance. Bravo, CD Projekt Red!
(Yes, I'm aware of the "race controversy", and no, I don't think that has any merit.)
A lot of filler
WH is a vast game, there's no question about it. The world is massive - quests, characters, monsters are a plenty. Yet, there's also a lot of repetitiveness to it.
Be it the world - there's large areas of open space where little's happening. Or the quests - there's very little variety in most side quests. There's an impressive array of monsters and gear, but the basic combat can get repetitive very quickly. The upgrades are useful, but not enough to keep up.
Of course, this is true of most games of this genre. Most of WH is very high quality, but there's not enough variety to justify so much quantity.
In the end, WH feels like a game that could use gratuitous doses of editing. I would take a masterful 50 hour game any day over a great 100 hour one.
Expansions get it right
The real story, though, is how wonderful Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine are. Hearts of Stone brings you some of the best storytelling of the series, where every quest is unique and colourful. There's no filler to be seen here at all.
Blood and Wine, though, is not just an expansion. It is in its own right one of the finest games ever made. Were it a big studio like EA or Activision or Ubisoft, be rest assured this would be branded as The Witcher 4: Blood and Wine and sold at full price.
Not CD Projekt Red. This is a masterclass to every major corporation in doing business in a consumer friendly manner.
.png)
Blood and Wine addresses every major criticism I have for WH.
- Hero-saves-the-world-from-doom story? Nope, this is something unique and compelling, diving deep into European fantasy
- Filler material? None at all - each quest has it's own quirk. Might I mention the brilliant Kafkaesque quest Paperchase
- Toussaint may be smaller, but exudes much more character.
- The music is some of the best I've heard this century, in any genre. Simply sublime.
- The monsters are more varied and require much more strategy than WH. Even the gear is more exotic.
- Finally, the mutations open up a whole new way to vary playstyles.
- Doesn't quite fix Roach though :)
Indeed, Blood and Wine is CD Projekt Red's masterpiece.
It's still very funny
You have heard it before - The Witcher is a dark, dreary world. As a matter of fact, this game is also hilarious. It might even be the funniest game ever made. It's the type of humour that American games simply don't seem to get. Nothing is as uproarious as sheer human failure. Success is boring and morbid.
There's of course a whole lot more to this game, but I feel my rant has already outstayed its welcome. Needless to say, this has been an experience to remember.
Can't ploughin' wait for Cyberpunk 2077! (Notice how that's the same year as the Fallout universe's apocalypse?)
PS: Some of the screenshots are from an older review I wrote for a gaming blog.
PPS: My favourite quote from The Witcher 3:
Ahhh, nothing hurts as much as life
- random NPC