Jack Brickman
Hall-of-Famer
- Joined
- Aug 12, 2012
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I've played this game a ton the past few days (although I suspect I'm still not that far into the main plot), so here are some updated impressions...
Pros:
Pros:
- There is a ton of stuff to do in this game. That said, it manages to avoid the problem that many open world games have by actually making a lot of the side quests interesting. Yeah, they'll all pretty much conform to a couple of basic templates like interrogating people, using your witcher senses to explore areas and track monsters/people, killing things, or retrieving an item. However, the characters giving you the quests and the people involved in each one tend to actually be interesting and well-written. You get a real sense of the world and each person's place in it.
- The writing has improved substantially since the second game. I thought much of the dialogue in the second game was awkward and clunky. That's mostly fixed this time around.
- Visually, obviously, it's phenomenal. There are some issues, such as people or objects occasionally popping in while I'm moving, but I assume a lot of them will be addressed over the next month or so.
- The world is vast, but it's also interesting. There are always new and interesting things to see.
- The world feels lived in. There's dirt and mud. Only very nice manors are clean and tidy. Peasants look suitably dirty. There's just a sense of authenticity here that, for example, Oblivion lacked.
- The characters aren't just cardboard cut-out quest givers. They have backstories and loved ones. You talk to them and then almost feel bad about taking their money after killing a beast that killed one of the family members. This is something Bethesda could really learn from.
- The quests can be long and complex, and a lot of them don't involve a ton of combat. I'm currently working for a mob boss who had his vault broken into and robbed. Before that, I had a multi-part quest where I was looking for Dandelion and had to interview all the women he was known to have been sleeping with the past few months, which included posing as a fencing instructor for a lord's daughter.
- Buildings aren't just for show. You can enter them, or at least most of them.
- There's no loading time when you enter a building. Also, in general, loading times during fast travel are very quick (five to ten seconds, on average). Loading after dying takes a little bit longer, as does loading a save game, but even then it's nothing ridiculous and only frustrating during a couple of particularly difficult fights.
- They've streamlined the potions/bombs system considerably from the second game. Now, when you make a potion or bomb, you never have to make it again. They will be automatically replenished (provided you have a certain, relatively easy-to-find item in your inventory) each time you meditate. You can also mix potions any time, not just when meditating. It just makes the game more fun and user-friendly. Less time spent micromanaging and more time spent exploring is always a good thing.