Must read before buying. (A brutally honest review)

[Ronin Ghost]

I"ll make this as Short and Sweet as possible. Or as Long and Sour....as necessary

Right off the bat any gamers who has played gems like "Shadow of Mordor" or the "Arkam Knight" series are going to recognize similar elements this game shares.
Such as "Witch Vision" which highlights items and areas of interest in the game to be investigated.

Blocking and parrying mechanics which are reminiscent of the previously named games.
However this title does not share in any way the fluid and nearly blinding polish the other games have in terms of mechanics and gameplay.
Shadow of Mordor plays like an experience. You block, parry, counterattack and perform killing blows in a manner that allows you to literally take on dozens and dozens of enemies at once. And these enemies are of varying difficulty levels, bosses included.

The Witcher III, well, not so much. Granted the games designed to simulate better games. But in practice its just not fun and fails to emulate the polished combat of other titles.

The first hour in game felt like work. Real work.
While trying to follow after one of the NPC's in the opening movement tutorial, I could not stop myself from falling off ledges, overstepping doorways, and bumping into walls.
Dozens of times I had to retrace my steps because the controls didn't allow a smooth approach to a door, or ledge.
The controls were just simply horrendous.

The same goes for combat. The combat tutorial was a chore. There is zero intuition in terms of parrying or blocking, and any enemy with a modicum of skill will have you backing up and cornered quickly.
Once out in the world and fighting actual monsters, your basically just locking on to them and swinging away with next to zero planning or technique.
Unlike games such as Dark Souls, Shadow of Mordor, Arkam Knight, where you feel like every ounce of combat is a carefully orchestrated chess match and balet combination, The Witcher III is soul less and empty combat.
Unlike games such Assassins Creed, where your movement through the world is amazing and fun, this game feels choppy, annoying and tiring.

Overall, this game is so far a big disappointment.
I've gotten over an hour into and without even mentioning how boring the cinematic scenes are, or how mediocre the Graphics actually are, I would recommend a big fat pass on this title.
Sadly, I'm not sure I can even mount the courage to continue playing past my first hour or so to see if it gets better. Because the flaws I've mentioned are not storytelling flaws, or commentary about the game not being fun due to nothing exciting.
They are issues with game mechanics, and handling which in essence are the cause for the game not being fun, or almost unplayable in my opinion.
Things like poor fighting and movement mechanics don't get better deeper into a game. And about an hour is all I needed. In comparison, Games like Shadow of Mordor, Arkam Knight, Dark Souls, etc... All had me fully entrenched and enjoying every second of combat within the first 10 minutes.

My Breakdown: 1-10 with 10 being best, and 1 worst.

Graphics: 6 (Sometimes the graphics inch up to be amazing, but mostly they're just ok)
Gameplay: 2 (Horrendous controls and combat mechanics)
Sound: 7
Cinematics cutscenes: 4 (They have you looking for the "Skip" icon every time)
Story: 4

Overall Rating: 3 (Because sound doesn't weigh as heavily as gameplay)
Unless your dead set on buying and playing this game I'd say STAY AWAY....

[danielcutthroat]

i find it hard to pick holes in such a good game.thay hvant stufed us with a broken release or game braking bugs and the game looks and is awesome.people need to back off and look at the game and play it.

[danielcutthroat]

Originally posted by Ronin Ghost:

I"ll make this as Short and Sweet as possible. Or as Long and Sour....as necessary

Right off the bat any gamers who has played gems like "Shadow of Mordor" or the "Arkam Knight" series are going to recognize similar elements this game shares.
Such as "Witch Vision" which highlights items and areas of interest in the game to be investigated.

Blocking and parrying mechanics which are reminiscent of the previously named games.
However this title does not share in any way the fluid and nearly blinding polish the other games have in terms of mechanics and gameplay.
Shadow of Mordor plays like an experience. You block, parry, counterattack and perform killing blows in a manner that allows you to literally take on dozens and dozens of enemies at once. And these enemies are of varying difficulty levels, bosses included.

The Witcher III, well, not so much. Granted the games designed to simulate better games. But in practice its just not fun and fails to emulate the polished combat of other titles.

The first hour in game felt like work. Real work.
While trying to follow after one of the NPC's in the opening movement tutorial, I could not stop myself from falling off ledges, overstepping doorways, and bumping into walls.
Dozens of times I had to retrace my steps because the controls didn't allow a smooth approach to a door, or ledge.
The controls were just simply horrendous.

The same goes for combat. The combat tutorial was a chore. There is zero intuition in terms of parrying or blocking, and any enemy with a modicum of skill will have you backing up and cornered quickly.
Once out in the world and fighting actual monsters, your basically just locking on to them and swinging away with next to zero planning or technique.
Unlike games such as Dark Souls, Shadow of Mordor, Arkam Knight, where you feel like every ounce of combat is a carefully orchestrated chess match and balet combination, The Witcher III is soul less and empty combat.
Unlike games such Assassins Creed, where your movement through the world is amazing and fun, this game feels choppy, annoying and tiring.

Overall, this game is so far a big disappointment.
I've gotten over an hour into and without even mentioning how boring the cinematic scenes are, or how mediocre the Graphics actually are, I would recommend a big fat pass on this title.
Sadly, I'm not sure I can even mount the courage to continue playing past my first hour or so to see if it gets better. Because the flaws I've mentioned are not storytelling flaws, or commentary about the game not being fun due to nothing exciting.
They are issues with game mechanics, and handling which in essence are the cause for the game not being fun, or almost unplayable in my opinion.
Things like poor fighting and movement mechanics don't get better deeper into a game. And about an hour is all I needed. In comparison, Games like Shadow of Mordor, Arkam Knight, Dark Souls, etc... All had me fully entrenched and enjoying every second of combat within the first 10 minutes.

My Breakdown: 1-10 with 10 being best, and 1 worst.

Graphics: 6 (Sometimes the graphics inch up to be amazing, but mostly they're just ok)
Gameplay: 2 (Horrendous controls and combat mechanics)
Sound: 7
Cinematics cutscenes: 4 (They have you looking for the "Skip" icon every time)
Story: 4

Overall Rating: 3 (Because sound doesn't weigh as heavily as gameplay)
Unless your dead set on buying and playing this game I'd say STAY AWAY....

000000000000 NOOOB

[Ronin Ghost]

Originally posted by dbgager:

lol at this troll.

Doesn't own the game.

[<SLTZ> ChiefBeefKwef]

MUST READ: I disagree

[Ronin Ghost]

Originally posted by joejccva71:

Quick question OP. Did you like Dragon Age Inquisition? Skyrim?

Loved them.

[amerika*]

So, instead of an action RPG you thought this would be just an action game that copied Batman? You also seem to forget this is an RPG first which means you wouldn't be skipping cutscenes if you bought the game knowing what you were getting. The game plays a lot like The Witcher 2. You also start out very weak and without many options...like most RPG's. Then you work your way up.

Basically, you didn't understand what you were buying and you expected them to copy other games while also not giving the game enough time to open up a ton of abilities for you. You might not like the game but that doesn't mean it's bad. I knew what I was buying and I am pretty happy with it.

[Witches and Beed]

Originally posted by Ronin Ghost:

Originally posted by joejccva71:

Quick question OP. Did you like Dragon Age Inquisition? Skyrim?

Loved them.

I think the story of Witcher is bad, yet you love Skyrim for some reason. LOL, gr8 b8 m8

[Serzius]

Haven't had trouble walking off ledges or controlling movement but you know there's a toggle walk key if that's any help. Were you sprinting throughout the movement control tutorial? Cause I'm pretty sure you're just supposed to walk through it with all the tight corners, drops and such.

I don't get how you've found monster fighting to be just "swinging away" I'm on the hardest difficulty and if I just starting swinging wildly the monsters and humans will both counterattack stopping me and dealing quite abit of damage.

When you say shadow of mordor and batman arkham games are "carefully orchestrated chess match and balet combination" I lol'd. I mean they're good games but they're just keep mashing attack until you see a counter prompt, press counter key then continue tapping attack and occasionally activating abilities when you're hit multiplier reaches a certain amount.

I think maybe the combat is just not for you there's alot of thought and quick reactions involved in this game especially on the harder difficulties but it can't appeal to everyone I suppose.

[Ronin Ghost]

Originally posted by Amerika:

So, instead of an action RPG you thought this would be just an action game that copied Batman? You also seem to forget this is an RPG first which means you wouldn't be skipping cutscenes if you bought the game knowing what you were getting. The game plays a lot like The Witcher 2. You also start out very weak and without many options...like most RPG's. Then you work your way up.

Basically, you didn't understand what you were buying and you expected them to copy other games while also not giving the game enough time to open up a ton of abilities for you. You might not like the game but that doesn't mean it's bad. I knew what I was buying and I am pretty happy with it.

I didn't expect this game to be anything other than fun.
Its flaws are mechanical.
I compare it to games that have gotten movement and combat correct in a way that is similar to what the Witcher is attempting to do.

[Vilor]

You played for over an hour and you posted a negative review already???? How could you??? You must be a plant from another company destined to bring down the glorious Witcher Series!! /SARCASM for those of you that don't recognize it.

[Bertie]

Are you people serious? So what if major sites give the game good scores? Major sites gave Dragon Age 2 good reviews, they give CoD games an 8/10 at the very least every single year. What matters is the consumer. The one who paid for the product, not the one who was paid to present the product. When Witcher 3 gets a 95/100 on PCGamer after it carried ads for the game for months, I hope none of you are going to take it seriously.
Besides, just how badly the game runs is enough for it to go down from a 10/10 to a 6/10. It's DYSFUNCTIONAL unless you have the specific hardware Nvidia wanted you to have.
Not to mention the subpar voice acting. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, everyone's either a ponce or a chav or a frenchman.
Geralt is pretty hot though.

[Koala.. Not a threat]

How the hell can you compare this game to shadow of mordor and batman. They are vastly different games

[Von Pink]

"locking on and swinging away with 0 plan or technique"

yeah right, maybe on whatever difficulty you play on, try that on the hardest difficulty and see how far you get.

[Colen Bardbarian]

Originally posted by John-Nyan:

Trolling op. A ton of review sites vote 9-10 (using good specs). Then this roll rolls in with a 3.

He can give it a 3 if he wants, it's called having an opinion.

god you people are defensive, if you love the game and want to give it a ten, then great.

[Hutch]

Originally posted by Von Pink:

"locking on and swinging away with 0 plan or technique"

yeah right, maybe on whatever difficulty you play on, try that on the hardest difficulty and see how far you get.

^^ This ^^