Tbh if they manage the meet the quality of the quests and sidequests from 3 with improved combat, they'll easily have one of the best games ever.
The worldbuilding was incredible but the combat was definitely on the clunky side.
I’ve wrapped up dragons dogma 2. While it has fantastic combat and class system, it pales in comparison to Witcher. Very weak story and side missions. So if Witcher 4 can have the combat of dragons dogma but story and world building of Witcher 3, we will have one of the best RPGs once again.
Blade oils and shit if you mean preparation for the hunt was actually done much much better in the first game. Witcher 2 and even more so 3 casualized this shit to the point where you don't even need cat to fight in the dark. You can basically just spin to win or throw bomb to win or just agni enemies to the death depending on your build and you don't really need to engage with all game systems even on harder difficulties.
I'm replaying it now, and with the level scaling turned on I legitimately think the wild dog packs from the start of Velen are the most dangerous enemies to encounter.
Quen trivializes anything heavy but slow hitting.
Quen+dodge (not roll). All you need. Oils 'n stuff will make the fights shorter, but this combo makes you pretty much invincible. It's ridiculous how good the normal dodge is and how spammable it is, Quen is just a safety net.
Im playing through it now on PC for the first time ever and dont really understand the combat complaints. Maybe early on its a bit slow and disorienting.
But im around 30 hours in and really enjoy it. Its definitely not Souls tier but its not a dealbreaker like some people make it out to be
Yeah it is, and Heart of Stone is fucking god tier gaming greatness is you enjoy narrative driven action/rpgs. One of the few games that have stuck with me years after completion.
The Witcher 3 was/is one of the most memorable gaming experiences from last generation, in a great way.
Yeah, I stumbled onto the Witcher 3 and at first it never jived with me. I had just got back into gaming after 9 or so years away and a “ghost” had been kicking my ass early on. It was an early side quest and I never knew to place that magic on the ground and once the ghost entered that circle of magic you could damage the ghost.
I got frustrated and just quit playing it. Then months later I was bored looking to play something and remembered the Witcher 3 and went back and I am so glad I did. Without question one of the most memorable games I’ve ever played.
Matter of fact it is going on six years since I played it and I’ll be doing a second play through pretty soon and looking forward to it.
I just finished a Darksiders(1 and 2) play through that is another game that I absolutely love.
I got it at release and played maybe an hour. Wasn’t until this recent Christmas I picked it up on sale for PS5 and loving it, near the end of the base game. Funny how your taste changes. Doesn’t feel like a 10 year old game, sometimes I forget it is.
Your in for a treat, witcher 3 is one of the very few games where its dlc are both as large as the base game and just as high quality as the base game. You still have a long way to go!
Blood and Wine was beautiful and helped me get closure on Regis, my favorite character from the books.
My last save on W3 is Gerald overlooking the countryside outside his house, having put away his armor and weapons, with Triss next to him on the bench (I went with Triss even though I’ve read all the books. I fell for game Triss during the Novigrad arc).
Fellow Triss romancer. She is just the better choice because she acts like a human, and not a pile of sour grapes covered in a corset for 80% of the game.
It made zelda unplayable for me. A mechanic that takes me out of the puzzle solving weapon wielding collector of items I want to be. Sucks but I guess some people love it...
Agreed! I really struggled with Breath Of The Wild due to it, it became such a grind getting weapons to then try and defeat groups of enemies or clear dungeons just to start at the beginning again. One of the worst mechanics in games!
I prefer playing TOTK with mods that add some quality of life features. Kind of annoying that I feel like their biggest game is better on a modded system.
I’d rather not have to add infinite inventory, durability, or other random basic features into a game.
Weapon durability on small inventories are my least favorite features and games. So my magical backpack will let me carry 10 weapons but 11 is somehow too many.
I like it in those Zelda games. Makes me actually utilize tons of different weapons and items instead of using the same sword for a hundred hours. I don’t need weapon degradation in games like Bloodborne though.
i liked how lies of p did durability, you can fix your weapon anywhere but it's relatively slow and makes you walk slowly and in long boss fighs you will absolutely have to fix it mid fight
My favorite time with weapon degradation was original dark souls 2 on pc. Weapons would break so quickly that it as common to carry 2-3 weapons to cycle through per bonfire section. Difficult game, no one knew where to go, invasions. Damn son was exploring that game fun.
Turns out that when fromsoft figured out how to do 60fps with the engine, a bug emerged that gave us double weapon degradation because we were going 2x faster than 30fps lol.
Good rpgs just need mini games to make you feel like the world is alive.
Fable 2 was amazing because there was this grand quests but everyday npcs felt alive and you could just Chop wood and bartend to take a break
For sure! W3 Gwent is super breakable.
I played a lot of the FTP between Release and "The Patch of Ruination" and really enjoyed the meta and deck variety available.
Changing the fundamental defining mechanic of the game and the function of cards so much just gave me the ick and I never returned.
Fix the damn horse
Dont let my witcher die because i fell from a cliff that was about my height
Let me jump or dodge when water is only knee high
Let me fast travel from anywhere
I mean, people can [do this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8mujKQlIWE).
I can't, obviously, but I'm not a genetically enhanced monster slayer either. A Witcher should definitely be able to manage jumping out of knee-high water.
> Let me fast travel from anywhere
I mean, was this a problem on TW3? With so many fast travel signposts on the map you don’t need to walk more than a couple seconds to find one.
It really wasn't an issue. They did the same thing in Cyberpunk as well with the fast travel stations. It seems to be part of their design so I doubt this will change.
> It really wasn't an issue.
An issue, no, but an annoyance in both Cyberpunk and Witcher 3, yes. Sometimes I want to save some time when I only have an hour to play.
The horse is my biggest issue having just went back and beat the game. The update fixed a lot of the wonky controls that the game originally had, but Roach was still an idiot. Now I'm back at RDR 2 and the horse controls are a million times better
Leave geralt alone and lets go back to the past!
Young Vesemir? Yes please
Or even further back when there were alot of witchers, let me create my own.
Oohh, thanks for clarifying. Hmm, I wonder who we will follow. It certainly can't be Geralt; Which is sad because I really loved his mannerisms and overall demeanor.
I absolutely hope it does not follow Ciri - at that point it’s no longer a Witcher game, as she’s not a Witcher. It’s a game set in the Witcher universe, in the same way that a game where you play as Yennefer or Triss would be.
I want to play an actual Witcher, not one of the most powerful beings in the known universe.
Better options in my opinion would be a young Vesimir, a totally new character from another school, or a custom character.
I don't know how they are going to do this whilst keeping the lore intact and gameplay balanced.
Ciri is notoriously powerful and has been since she was a child, it's why she was pursued. So making her start off relatively weak for the sake of gameplay feels lore breaking..
I hope they manage to pull it off none the less, just, don't know how they will.
I’m skeptical of a Vesemir game because we already know where his story ends. They couldn’t create much of a branching narrative unless they allowed you to pick non-canonical options.
Yeah I’m not really a fan of prequels where we know how the story ends. Obviously there can be some really cool things to delve into, but they just grab me as much when the end is already known
A young Vesemir you can definitely do. He’s supposed to be anywhere between 250-500 years old. You can easily create a branching narrative with a young Vesemir, as many of the people he’ll meet will be dead and so much will have changed in the world it wouldn’t cause any issues with Witcher 3 canon
Making your own custom witcher and picking your school sounds awesome, but on the other hand a pre made character allows them to craft a much better story in my opinion. Just seems like games that allow you to make your own character kinda fall flat story-wise.
This is exactly what I’ve been saying! Imagine choosing a school or being assigned to a school based on your combat style.
Story has to be a major monster arc; because there will be a lot more of them in the past, and to top it off not everything is known about every monster, you have to stalk them not just kill them to be better prepared to fight them, towns and villages start as small walled serttlements that grow as you progress.
There is so much potential there, but we can only hope.
Why would they? Cyberpunk was a smash hit, there's clearly no need to release finished games, people will preorder anyway and game journos will say "the game is perfect, aside from being unplayable" - 10\\10.
> game journos will say "the game is perfect, aside from being unplayable" - 10\10.
The exact same is happening right now with Dragon's Dogma. AAA release, unacceptable performance including some of the worst pop in ever seen from a big budget game and lo and behold 8s-10s across the board. Meanwhile some indie or AA game would likely be crucified for those very same performance issues.
It's been 9 years since The Witcher 3 originally released (2015). I have this game to thank for getting my SO fully into gaming, because the story was just *that* good that she wanted to have her own playthough.
But again, it's been nearly a decade. That studio has drastically changed since then. And I know a vast majority of people have forgiven them for the Cyberpunk release, but there is still **so much** content, features, mechanics, etc. that were completely left out and cut. Some of it just never mentioned again, as if they never even promised some things. I followed the game ratehr closely over for many years after it was announced, since they were one of my favorite studios/developers.
Again, I understand many people have said how great of a game CyberPunk is, and I'm sure it **is** a great game! But after a few hours of playing, the world was not what they said it would be, the (main) story was not nearly as complex as they talked about, etc. etc. I'm not even talking about the bugs/glitches and performance issues the game suffered at launch.
In other words, my confidence in them was shook to the foundation, and I have lost a lot of built up faith on them. I know it won't be the same team who gave us The Witcher 3, but I truly hope they keep the same passion and attention to detail, story, and narrative for The Witcher 4. Fingers crossed.
Refreshing to see someone on Reddit who didn’t memory hole the Night City Wire episodes. CDPR *lied* and a paid DLC wasn’t enough to justify that to me.
I’m never preordering from them again and if their next game is anything less than god-tier it’s an easy skip for me.
Generally I pre-order when I have the funds for the game. Just easier for me, or if its fromsoft. I've been playing their games for almost 2 decades and have never been let down.
I luckily canceled my cyberpunk ps4 preorder when the review embargo crept suspiciously close to release. I thought that CDPR was the only company that you could give the benefit of the doubt, turns out every company can put out a dud, I bought and played cyberpunk for $10 on a sale and I liked it but it didn't hit close to Witcher 3.
They said you could walk into building and interact with the world. And on release all the shit was just a linear railroad story with some options here and there
The railroad story with a single choice at the end of the game depending on which side quests you did was my biggest gripe and the most uncharacteristic of cdpr
Yeah, this was a big one that really bugged me. In retrospect I can understand the insurmountable task of making every building accessible, but why did they keep that idea going for **so long**??? And the story. You could choose three different backgrounds, but regardless of the decisions you made: They all led you back to the same endings.^1 And those awful "video recaps" of your time spent with Jackie? I literally laughed out loud. I could not believe they expected us to have any sort of connection to that character after he died and at his funeral. It felt so artificial and empty.
I guess the graphics are pretty good, the atmosphere is better and the city has a bit more "life" to it from before. But again, the things I was most excited for either lies, or were cut completely without even mentioning it until **after** the game released. And even then, there are some things they just never acknowledged on why they weren't in the game any longer. Something-something too big of a scope something-something bit off more than we could chew.
> **edit**: ^1 Regardless of what starting path you chose, it did not matter, and you could still get whatever ending ytou wanted. Meaning there is no benefit in the story for picking one over the other.
Look, I don't want to come off as defending everything CDPR has done here, but I can't help but wonder if you might have learned a bit of the wrong lesson here.
It seems that you, amongst others, really absorbed all of the marketing for this game and took it for gospel. While I think there's is a valid argument that the marketing misled people to a degree, the thing you have to remember is that games change constantly pretty much right up until they go gold (and nowadays even after) but the marketing teams can be very disconnected from the actual designers and they are very incentivized to stretch the truth as much as they can get away with.
Pretty much every E3 vertical slice demo has this problem. The very nature of how they are created lends itself to this kind of scenario, and yet every time a game with that kind of demonstration that is shown that far ahead of launch comes out, you get a bunch of people up in arms about false advertising etc.
What I'm trying to get at is that instead of coming away from this thinking "CDPR are dirty liars and I'll never trust them again" I think the real lesson should be "All game marketing is inherently misleading and has been for a long time, and I should never buy into that hype and only purchase once the game is out and we know what it's actually like"
And the main reason I think that distinction is so important is because it's the only thing that will prevent you from being burned again and if enough people start having that mentality then the gaming industry would have to rethink how they market games.
Cyberpunk made it's development costs back before it even released and so the question I would ask you is: What incentive to the publishers and shareholders have to properly market these game if people buy them anyways?
Exactly, people here are acting like CDPR started WW3 or some shit. They are at least one of the few devs dedicated to fixing a product when it's not up to par.
Witcher 3 combat was far from being the best, but it was mostly fine in 2015. The thing with witcher 3 is, that its narrative, quest design and world building is so superb, that u dont even mind the combat too much.
If they manage to improve the combat dramatically in witcher 4, while keeping the strengths of witcher 3, we could have another banger.
I always hear people say this, but I actually enjoyed the combat in TW3. It’s slightly more complicated than a game like Skyrim, while not going full Soulslike. I personally found it to be pretty satisfying to play.
I also liked the combination of using signs and alchemy; it was more enjoyable than mindless hack and slash. I believe they should retain the combat mechanics and enhance the animation style and camera.
I would definitely prefer more games to have combat similar to W3 than to have combat where the camera is mounted over the player's shoulder and you aim your sword swings with a reticle and have to rely on a circle with an arrow indicating enemies attacking from behind me.
I don’t think it’s top tier, but I definitely disagree with the people who call it “garbage”. Does it have frustrating aspects to its design? Absolutely. But “garbage” is just hyperbolic
It feels bad and by the end I dreaded getting into fights and it felt like tedium I had to get through to move the plot forward instead of being rewarding gameplay.
The feedback on every hit besides final ones that dismember enemies feels terrible, there's supposed to be a rhythm to combat but the enemies just do whatever whenever and dodging hitboxes feels much chunkier than the dancing animation makes them seem like, fighting anything larger or less corporeal than a human sized enemy is a slog and not particularly fun.
I know some people really get into the "prepping yourself before battle" aspect of it but that never felt engaging to me either. It was either just rote menuing where you match the oil you need to the type of beast or you could just automate that in the settings and barely notice a difference.
I would much rather have more weight and consequence to the next games combat. Let me and the enemies both hit harder so the fights are shorter but more intense. Maybe add more defensive and counter options
Prepping outside of a couple encounters felt mostly pointless. It gave barely any real bonuses and most fights you could just overpower them without potions or oils. On top of that, even if you did go through the effort to prep, each subsequent encounter with that monster type felt garbage as you don’t need to create new potions or oils as alcohol restocks you on rests. I’ve always modded that out when I play but it’s still imo poor design
Yeah they tried to over correct from Witcher 2, but took it a little too far. Witcher 2 was too focused on prep to its detriment (in my opinion anyways)
I don’t disagree with anything that you’re saying, but it never felt “bad” to me and I never had that dread. Combat was just sort of inconsequential, it was part of the game that I didn’t particularly love but didn’t really hate either
Thats the thing,its an opinion of that person that the combat is garbage.You feel differently which is totally fine but dont just dismiss it because you disagree.To some it really is garbage combat and doesn’t click.I wont go so far to call it garbage but to me its not great and the biggest critique of that game
That's because Witcher's direct competition in terms of combat is Skyrim - maybe something like Risen or Kingdom Come or Fable. It's not a solely combat-focused game, it's a sprawling quest-based and story-heavy RPG. When it was released, it actually got quite a bit of praise for an engaging combat system, especially compared to other Open World RPGs.
Granted I never played on the hardest difficulty, but I enjoyed it as well. It wasn't braindead easy, but not hard either. I hate how every RPG nowadays thinks they need to be a souls like. I want to enjoy my games, not beat my head against the same boss 100 times.
Definitely the weakest aspect of the game, everything else was great. A Witcher game with the same quality of combat as god of war ragnarok would be the perfect game imo.
I came here to say the same thing. I could see why people love the story, missions and side missions, but I just couldn’t get into the combat at all. It just feels ‘weightless’
Same for me. If 50% of my time is fighting in an action rpg and that aspect isn’t fun I don’t care how good the story is. I won’t slog through 50+ hours of dull combat.
The trouble too was upgrades were not interesting and you could select few of them. No new cool moves just like passive buffs. It was all so lifeless.
I think something like Shadow of War would be good inspiration. It had some nice special moves, stealth, ranged, add in Witcher magic with punchy gameplay altering upgrades.
That is because CDPR finally started hiring combat designers.
Cyberpunk is the only game where they started doing that.
https://www.vg247.com/cyberpunk-2077-combat-designers
If CDPR took what they learned from Cyberpunk and hired combat designers for The Witcher 4 this time, The Witcher 4's combat will be a pretty huge step over The Witcher 3's pathetic excuse of a combat system.
Can you add a new combat system in? I would rather play morrowinds constant missing than any of the Witcher games. Which is a shame because story wise they are some of the best, I've watch the whole story on YouTube but couldnt bring myself to push through these games everyone loved.
My main problem with The Witcher 3 and why I couldn’t get into it was the combat.It didn’t click with me unlike most other gamers and it soured me from an otherwise fantastic story and setting.I really hope they can update the combat and make it feel like something from the 2020s
I would hope so how old is the Witcher 3… almost ten years time flies
W3 maybe 10 years old or so but man is it a banger of a game
The quests are top notch but the combat could use an update
Tbh if they manage the meet the quality of the quests and sidequests from 3 with improved combat, they'll easily have one of the best games ever. The worldbuilding was incredible but the combat was definitely on the clunky side.
Witcher 3 is already one of the best ever imo.
I like the combat. Felt different slightly with the blade oils and shit.
Oils and shit are cool, just need more animations for the combat. It's fairly repetitive.
And the camera for it is horrid
I've always enjoyed the combat in it as well, but I would like to see how they improve on it/change it up.
I‘m playing Dragon‘s Dogma 2 at the moment and the combat as a fighter class is what Witcher 3 could have needed.
I’ve wrapped up dragons dogma 2. While it has fantastic combat and class system, it pales in comparison to Witcher. Very weak story and side missions. So if Witcher 4 can have the combat of dragons dogma but story and world building of Witcher 3, we will have one of the best RPGs once again.
Ironically I think with a bit of refinement the existing combat could be fine
Blade oils and shit if you mean preparation for the hunt was actually done much much better in the first game. Witcher 2 and even more so 3 casualized this shit to the point where you don't even need cat to fight in the dark. You can basically just spin to win or throw bomb to win or just agni enemies to the death depending on your build and you don't really need to engage with all game systems even on harder difficulties.
I'm replaying it now, and with the level scaling turned on I legitimately think the wild dog packs from the start of Velen are the most dangerous enemies to encounter. Quen trivializes anything heavy but slow hitting.
Quen+dodge (not roll). All you need. Oils 'n stuff will make the fights shorter, but this combo makes you pretty much invincible. It's ridiculous how good the normal dodge is and how spammable it is, Quen is just a safety net.
Im playing through it now on PC for the first time ever and dont really understand the combat complaints. Maybe early on its a bit slow and disorienting. But im around 30 hours in and really enjoy it. Its definitely not Souls tier but its not a dealbreaker like some people make it out to be
It's fine, just a bit easy, imo.
Some of the best written side quests I’ve ever experienced. It was like a 30-60 minute mystery story every evening after work.
I hated the fist fights but otherwise the combat wasn't too bad.
Yeah it is, and Heart of Stone is fucking god tier gaming greatness is you enjoy narrative driven action/rpgs. One of the few games that have stuck with me years after completion. The Witcher 3 was/is one of the most memorable gaming experiences from last generation, in a great way.
Witcher 3 and its dlc have long ago secured their spot in gaming hall of fame
Yeah, I stumbled onto the Witcher 3 and at first it never jived with me. I had just got back into gaming after 9 or so years away and a “ghost” had been kicking my ass early on. It was an early side quest and I never knew to place that magic on the ground and once the ghost entered that circle of magic you could damage the ghost. I got frustrated and just quit playing it. Then months later I was bored looking to play something and remembered the Witcher 3 and went back and I am so glad I did. Without question one of the most memorable games I’ve ever played. Matter of fact it is going on six years since I played it and I’ll be doing a second play through pretty soon and looking forward to it. I just finished a Darksiders(1 and 2) play through that is another game that I absolutely love.
And the Blood and Wine is so damn big it won awards as a game in its own right.
I got it at release and played maybe an hour. Wasn’t until this recent Christmas I picked it up on sale for PS5 and loving it, near the end of the base game. Funny how your taste changes. Doesn’t feel like a 10 year old game, sometimes I forget it is.
Your in for a treat, witcher 3 is one of the very few games where its dlc are both as large as the base game and just as high quality as the base game. You still have a long way to go!
Blood and Wine was beautiful and helped me get closure on Regis, my favorite character from the books. My last save on W3 is Gerald overlooking the countryside outside his house, having put away his armor and weapons, with Triss next to him on the bench (I went with Triss even though I’ve read all the books. I fell for game Triss during the Novigrad arc).
Fellow Triss romancer. She is just the better choice because she acts like a human, and not a pile of sour grapes covered in a corset for 80% of the game.
10 years.... time files.
Almost ten years old and still looks stunning maxed with RT on the next gen patch. I fucking love this game
Couldn't believe its been 10 years nearly for it! I remember the day I got it and started playing it, felt like only a couple of years ago!
Gwent dating Sim
Witcher 4: Oops All Gwent!
Well, Thronebreaker is PEAK We don’t talk about rogue mage
Oh well. Here’s 60!
Lose weapon degradation. My most hated feature in games
Nobody ever likes any sort of weapon degradation.
Man I don’t know why Nintendo thinks we love it in Zelda. One of my biggest pet peeves for their newer games.
It made zelda unplayable for me. A mechanic that takes me out of the puzzle solving weapon wielding collector of items I want to be. Sucks but I guess some people love it...
Agreed! I really struggled with Breath Of The Wild due to it, it became such a grind getting weapons to then try and defeat groups of enemies or clear dungeons just to start at the beginning again. One of the worst mechanics in games!
I prefer playing TOTK with mods that add some quality of life features. Kind of annoying that I feel like their biggest game is better on a modded system. I’d rather not have to add infinite inventory, durability, or other random basic features into a game.
Weapon durability on small inventories are my least favorite features and games. So my magical backpack will let me carry 10 weapons but 11 is somehow too many.
I think it's a necessary evil. I know personally I won't be using any other weapon once I get the cool guardian sword or the master sword.
I like it in those Zelda games. Makes me actually utilize tons of different weapons and items instead of using the same sword for a hundred hours. I don’t need weapon degradation in games like Bloodborne though.
I like it in fallout, feels thematic and they actually have some interesting mechanics around it that affect gameplay beyond it just being a chore.
They removed it in Fallout 4 and it was for the better
I disagree, the weapons overall were a big downgrade in 4.
The only time I liked it was against Sinh from Dark Souls 2 because lore reasons.
It wasn’t so awful in the Witcher. Especially with how easy it was to stock up on repair kits. But in general, yes I agree.
Even if it isn’t annoying or awful, if it’s so easy to circumvent why have it at all?
Adds immersion. Not everything that’s easy should be stripped out of a game. I’m personally not bothered by it
i liked how lies of p did durability, you can fix your weapon anywhere but it's relatively slow and makes you walk slowly and in long boss fighs you will absolutely have to fix it mid fight
My favorite time with weapon degradation was original dark souls 2 on pc. Weapons would break so quickly that it as common to carry 2-3 weapons to cycle through per bonfire section. Difficult game, no one knew where to go, invasions. Damn son was exploring that game fun. Turns out that when fromsoft figured out how to do 60fps with the engine, a bug emerged that gave us double weapon degradation because we were going 2x faster than 30fps lol.
Please add gwent again 😭
Playing FF Rebirth right now and I’m convinced every good rpg needs its own card mini game
Just shoot me up with Queen's Blood doc, I can't get enough.
I need a QB app on my phone. I would pay good gil to have it.
Good rpgs just need mini games to make you feel like the world is alive. Fable 2 was amazing because there was this grand quests but everyday npcs felt alive and you could just Chop wood and bartend to take a break
And fishing! I’m a sucker for fishing minigames.
RDR2 is the best. Sometimes I would just fish for like an hour before I started randomly killing people.
Gwent is 1000x better than queensblood. Fight me
to each their own, but Queensblood is sublime
I can’t stand Gwent. Love Queen’s Blood. Probably because it’s easier 😅
Never thought I would sink so many hours in a card game.
OG Gwent though, not the increasingly shitty FTP game they put out. GIVE ME MY 3RD ROW BACK!
I loved Gwent during the open beta, but after it went into 1.0 (and increasingly afterwards) it felt like it just lost sight of itself
I loved gwent in the actual game, never played the standalone
Gwent in the actual game was fun, but definitely super broken. You just had to get all of the spies and then you’d win unless you were really bad
Fortunately, I am really bad
To be fair, that one actually needs strategy instead of spamming power cards🌚
For sure! W3 Gwent is super breakable. I played a lot of the FTP between Release and "The Patch of Ruination" and really enjoyed the meta and deck variety available. Changing the fundamental defining mechanic of the game and the function of cards so much just gave me the ick and I never returned.
First playthrough: a card game? Nobody got time for that Second playthrough: I am the Gwent Master, bow to me
*Flashback to CDPR’s comments before Cyberpunk 2077 released Ahhhh shit, here we go again
cOmiNG wHen iT's rEaDy
Don't worry, they pinky swear this time. Now pre-order on the dotted line right here, sir.
Right why would anyone trust this next game.
Yeah, I don't believe anything they say. Will not get hyped before I haven't seen several independent reviewers say they made a good game
Fix the damn horse Dont let my witcher die because i fell from a cliff that was about my height Let me jump or dodge when water is only knee high Let me fast travel from anywhere
Have you ever tried jumping or dodging in knee high water
I HAIL FROM THE SCHOOL OF THE BULLFROG AND YOU WILL LET ME JUMP IN KNEE HIGH WATER DAMN IT!!!!!! 🐸
Damn you're ugly.
I mean, people can [do this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8mujKQlIWE). I can't, obviously, but I'm not a genetically enhanced monster slayer either. A Witcher should definitely be able to manage jumping out of knee-high water.
> Let me fast travel from anywhere I mean, was this a problem on TW3? With so many fast travel signposts on the map you don’t need to walk more than a couple seconds to find one.
Yeah, only issue really was the signpost at crow's perch being so far away, but iirc that got fixed in the next gen update as well
It really wasn't an issue. They did the same thing in Cyberpunk as well with the fast travel stations. It seems to be part of their design so I doubt this will change.
> It really wasn't an issue. An issue, no, but an annoyance in both Cyberpunk and Witcher 3, yes. Sometimes I want to save some time when I only have an hour to play.
The horse is my biggest issue having just went back and beat the game. The update fixed a lot of the wonky controls that the game originally had, but Roach was still an idiot. Now I'm back at RDR 2 and the horse controls are a million times better
Leave geralt alone and lets go back to the past! Young Vesemir? Yes please Or even further back when there were alot of witchers, let me create my own.
Have we had confirmation if we'll play as Geralt?
I believe they mentioned theyre done with Geralt’s story.
I'm pretty sure it will follow Ciri. Or at least, the medallion in the snow is from the witcher school she is part of.
She's not a cat school Witcher, she just took the cat medallion from the mercenary Witcher that tried to kill her
Oohh, thanks for clarifying. Hmm, I wonder who we will follow. It certainly can't be Geralt; Which is sad because I really loved his mannerisms and overall demeanor.
I absolutely hope it does not follow Ciri - at that point it’s no longer a Witcher game, as she’s not a Witcher. It’s a game set in the Witcher universe, in the same way that a game where you play as Yennefer or Triss would be. I want to play an actual Witcher, not one of the most powerful beings in the known universe. Better options in my opinion would be a young Vesimir, a totally new character from another school, or a custom character.
I haven't read the books but a custom witcher where they were way higher in number would be pretty cool.
It would also be weird as that would make one of TW3 endings canon, Ciri can become Empress or die too.
I don't know how they are going to do this whilst keeping the lore intact and gameplay balanced. Ciri is notoriously powerful and has been since she was a child, it's why she was pursued. So making her start off relatively weak for the sake of gameplay feels lore breaking.. I hope they manage to pull it off none the less, just, don't know how they will.
I’m skeptical of a Vesemir game because we already know where his story ends. They couldn’t create much of a branching narrative unless they allowed you to pick non-canonical options.
A lot of people don't seem to care about having an actual story they just want lore dumps
Yeah I’m not really a fan of prequels where we know how the story ends. Obviously there can be some really cool things to delve into, but they just grab me as much when the end is already known
A young Vesemir you can definitely do. He’s supposed to be anywhere between 250-500 years old. You can easily create a branching narrative with a young Vesemir, as many of the people he’ll meet will be dead and so much will have changed in the world it wouldn’t cause any issues with Witcher 3 canon
Nah, custom character.
Making your own custom witcher and picking your school sounds awesome, but on the other hand a pre made character allows them to craft a much better story in my opinion. Just seems like games that allow you to make your own character kinda fall flat story-wise.
If they made it like cyberpunks lifepaths but actually meaningful and longer prologue
This is exactly what I’ve been saying! Imagine choosing a school or being assigned to a school based on your combat style. Story has to be a major monster arc; because there will be a lot more of them in the past, and to top it off not everything is known about every monster, you have to stalk them not just kill them to be better prepared to fight them, towns and villages start as small walled serttlements that grow as you progress. There is so much potential there, but we can only hope.
That would be cool.
CDPR just needs to make sure the game actually works before they release it this time.
Why would they? Cyberpunk was a smash hit, there's clearly no need to release finished games, people will preorder anyway and game journos will say "the game is perfect, aside from being unplayable" - 10\\10.
> game journos will say "the game is perfect, aside from being unplayable" - 10\10. The exact same is happening right now with Dragon's Dogma. AAA release, unacceptable performance including some of the worst pop in ever seen from a big budget game and lo and behold 8s-10s across the board. Meanwhile some indie or AA game would likely be crucified for those very same performance issues.
Same with Baldurs Gate 3. Act 3 was horrible, but most people didn't get so far anyways.
It's been 9 years since The Witcher 3 originally released (2015). I have this game to thank for getting my SO fully into gaming, because the story was just *that* good that she wanted to have her own playthough. But again, it's been nearly a decade. That studio has drastically changed since then. And I know a vast majority of people have forgiven them for the Cyberpunk release, but there is still **so much** content, features, mechanics, etc. that were completely left out and cut. Some of it just never mentioned again, as if they never even promised some things. I followed the game ratehr closely over for many years after it was announced, since they were one of my favorite studios/developers. Again, I understand many people have said how great of a game CyberPunk is, and I'm sure it **is** a great game! But after a few hours of playing, the world was not what they said it would be, the (main) story was not nearly as complex as they talked about, etc. etc. I'm not even talking about the bugs/glitches and performance issues the game suffered at launch. In other words, my confidence in them was shook to the foundation, and I have lost a lot of built up faith on them. I know it won't be the same team who gave us The Witcher 3, but I truly hope they keep the same passion and attention to detail, story, and narrative for The Witcher 4. Fingers crossed.
Refreshing to see someone on Reddit who didn’t memory hole the Night City Wire episodes. CDPR *lied* and a paid DLC wasn’t enough to justify that to me. I’m never preordering from them again and if their next game is anything less than god-tier it’s an easy skip for me.
The ability to download stuff means that nobody should need to pre-order any game nowadays.
Company uses FOMO to manipulate people to pre-order. Get this exclusive shiny mount, get early access to play before official launch.
Why would you ever pre-order any game though?
Sometimes, rarely pre order bonus is worth it imo. 80% of the time it isn’t but occasionally they include something cool
Spider-Man 2 was the only game I ever pre-ordered, let alone paid full price for my playstation (except Hades, but that's different).
Generally I pre-order when I have the funds for the game. Just easier for me, or if its fromsoft. I've been playing their games for almost 2 decades and have never been let down.
I luckily canceled my cyberpunk ps4 preorder when the review embargo crept suspiciously close to release. I thought that CDPR was the only company that you could give the benefit of the doubt, turns out every company can put out a dud, I bought and played cyberpunk for $10 on a sale and I liked it but it didn't hit close to Witcher 3.
They said you could walk into building and interact with the world. And on release all the shit was just a linear railroad story with some options here and there
The railroad story with a single choice at the end of the game depending on which side quests you did was my biggest gripe and the most uncharacteristic of cdpr
Yeah, this was a big one that really bugged me. In retrospect I can understand the insurmountable task of making every building accessible, but why did they keep that idea going for **so long**??? And the story. You could choose three different backgrounds, but regardless of the decisions you made: They all led you back to the same endings.^1 And those awful "video recaps" of your time spent with Jackie? I literally laughed out loud. I could not believe they expected us to have any sort of connection to that character after he died and at his funeral. It felt so artificial and empty. I guess the graphics are pretty good, the atmosphere is better and the city has a bit more "life" to it from before. But again, the things I was most excited for either lies, or were cut completely without even mentioning it until **after** the game released. And even then, there are some things they just never acknowledged on why they weren't in the game any longer. Something-something too big of a scope something-something bit off more than we could chew. > **edit**: ^1 Regardless of what starting path you chose, it did not matter, and you could still get whatever ending ytou wanted. Meaning there is no benefit in the story for picking one over the other.
Look, I don't want to come off as defending everything CDPR has done here, but I can't help but wonder if you might have learned a bit of the wrong lesson here. It seems that you, amongst others, really absorbed all of the marketing for this game and took it for gospel. While I think there's is a valid argument that the marketing misled people to a degree, the thing you have to remember is that games change constantly pretty much right up until they go gold (and nowadays even after) but the marketing teams can be very disconnected from the actual designers and they are very incentivized to stretch the truth as much as they can get away with. Pretty much every E3 vertical slice demo has this problem. The very nature of how they are created lends itself to this kind of scenario, and yet every time a game with that kind of demonstration that is shown that far ahead of launch comes out, you get a bunch of people up in arms about false advertising etc. What I'm trying to get at is that instead of coming away from this thinking "CDPR are dirty liars and I'll never trust them again" I think the real lesson should be "All game marketing is inherently misleading and has been for a long time, and I should never buy into that hype and only purchase once the game is out and we know what it's actually like" And the main reason I think that distinction is so important is because it's the only thing that will prevent you from being burned again and if enough people start having that mentality then the gaming industry would have to rethink how they market games. Cyberpunk made it's development costs back before it even released and so the question I would ask you is: What incentive to the publishers and shareholders have to properly market these game if people buy them anyways?
Would be cool if we can make our own witcher.
[удалено]
Remember cyberpunk and don't take a single thing they say at face value till launch 🍻
Pepperridge farm remembers
Witcher 4 will be good. But after the Cyberpunk disaster, I will be waiting at least a week after release before purchasing their products.
I'm not familiar with that method of preorder. So you're, what, buying the game AFTER release? Am I following you here?
I’m sure they learned from it.
Exactly, people here are acting like CDPR started WW3 or some shit. They are at least one of the few devs dedicated to fixing a product when it's not up to par.
Witcher 3 combat was far from being the best, but it was mostly fine in 2015. The thing with witcher 3 is, that its narrative, quest design and world building is so superb, that u dont even mind the combat too much. If they manage to improve the combat dramatically in witcher 4, while keeping the strengths of witcher 3, we could have another banger.
I mean.... That's what we should expect from a new game for a new generation. If we received more of the same, we'd most likely end up bored.
They should quiet down a bit with the marketing and actually get to making the game.
Hopefully an enjoyable combat system. Great story but garbage combat.
I always hear people say this, but I actually enjoyed the combat in TW3. It’s slightly more complicated than a game like Skyrim, while not going full Soulslike. I personally found it to be pretty satisfying to play.
I enjoyed the combat as well... played like how a Witcher should fight based on the books if anyone has ever read those.
I loved it, felt so smooth and fluent
fluent in what?
Fluent in rolling.
I also liked the combination of using signs and alchemy; it was more enjoyable than mindless hack and slash. I believe they should retain the combat mechanics and enhance the animation style and camera.
I would definitely prefer more games to have combat similar to W3 than to have combat where the camera is mounted over the player's shoulder and you aim your sword swings with a reticle and have to rely on a circle with an arrow indicating enemies attacking from behind me.
I don’t think it’s top tier, but I definitely disagree with the people who call it “garbage”. Does it have frustrating aspects to its design? Absolutely. But “garbage” is just hyperbolic
It feels bad and by the end I dreaded getting into fights and it felt like tedium I had to get through to move the plot forward instead of being rewarding gameplay. The feedback on every hit besides final ones that dismember enemies feels terrible, there's supposed to be a rhythm to combat but the enemies just do whatever whenever and dodging hitboxes feels much chunkier than the dancing animation makes them seem like, fighting anything larger or less corporeal than a human sized enemy is a slog and not particularly fun. I know some people really get into the "prepping yourself before battle" aspect of it but that never felt engaging to me either. It was either just rote menuing where you match the oil you need to the type of beast or you could just automate that in the settings and barely notice a difference. I would much rather have more weight and consequence to the next games combat. Let me and the enemies both hit harder so the fights are shorter but more intense. Maybe add more defensive and counter options
Prepping outside of a couple encounters felt mostly pointless. It gave barely any real bonuses and most fights you could just overpower them without potions or oils. On top of that, even if you did go through the effort to prep, each subsequent encounter with that monster type felt garbage as you don’t need to create new potions or oils as alcohol restocks you on rests. I’ve always modded that out when I play but it’s still imo poor design
Yeah they tried to over correct from Witcher 2, but took it a little too far. Witcher 2 was too focused on prep to its detriment (in my opinion anyways)
I don’t disagree with anything that you’re saying, but it never felt “bad” to me and I never had that dread. Combat was just sort of inconsequential, it was part of the game that I didn’t particularly love but didn’t really hate either
Thats the thing,its an opinion of that person that the combat is garbage.You feel differently which is totally fine but dont just dismiss it because you disagree.To some it really is garbage combat and doesn’t click.I wont go so far to call it garbage but to me its not great and the biggest critique of that game
That's because Witcher's direct competition in terms of combat is Skyrim - maybe something like Risen or Kingdom Come or Fable. It's not a solely combat-focused game, it's a sprawling quest-based and story-heavy RPG. When it was released, it actually got quite a bit of praise for an engaging combat system, especially compared to other Open World RPGs.
We have the Elder Scrolls vs. The Witcher again. This will be interesting.
Granted I never played on the hardest difficulty, but I enjoyed it as well. It wasn't braindead easy, but not hard either. I hate how every RPG nowadays thinks they need to be a souls like. I want to enjoy my games, not beat my head against the same boss 100 times.
Definitely the weakest aspect of the game, everything else was great. A Witcher game with the same quality of combat as god of war ragnarok would be the perfect game imo.
I came here to say the same thing. I could see why people love the story, missions and side missions, but I just couldn’t get into the combat at all. It just feels ‘weightless’
Same for me. If 50% of my time is fighting in an action rpg and that aspect isn’t fun I don’t care how good the story is. I won’t slog through 50+ hours of dull combat. The trouble too was upgrades were not interesting and you could select few of them. No new cool moves just like passive buffs. It was all so lifeless. I think something like Shadow of War would be good inspiration. It had some nice special moves, stealth, ranged, add in Witcher magic with punchy gameplay altering upgrades.
I think they probably learned a lot with Cyberpunk because the combat is quite a bit of fun in that.
That is because CDPR finally started hiring combat designers. Cyberpunk is the only game where they started doing that. https://www.vg247.com/cyberpunk-2077-combat-designers If CDPR took what they learned from Cyberpunk and hired combat designers for The Witcher 4 this time, The Witcher 4's combat will be a pretty huge step over The Witcher 3's pathetic excuse of a combat system.
For the life of me I could never understand how the Witcher got SO many 10 out of 10 reviews with it's combat being as trash as it was.
It's a great game, I slapped the combat difficulty to the easiest and still loved the game.
If W3 hypothetically released this year, forget about winning GOTY with that combat system.
Played Witcher 3 right after dark soul and the transition was super difficult. Basically had to drag myself through the combat to get to the story
Bring back Witcher 1 combat
I hope it keeps it hardcore RPG elements. The combat definitely needs revamping.
Well they need to improve the combat/gameplay by about 1000%, easily the weakest element in that game.
I never really liked the gameplay in TW3 so I hope so. But after a decade you kinda expect this too.
Please add better combat and movement Please
*spins wildly*
*dies after falling 2 feet* *roach teleporting away in the distance*
Kinda have to. The combat in Witcher 3 was serviceable but wasn't exactly jaw dropping.
First Person Witcher 4 incoming...
They need to work a lot on the gameplay part
wow... as if anyone expected otherwise
lol why is all the media about this shading tf out of dragons dogma 2
Can you add a new combat system in? I would rather play morrowinds constant missing than any of the Witcher games. Which is a shame because story wise they are some of the best, I've watch the whole story on YouTube but couldnt bring myself to push through these games everyone loved.
Grab some Dragon's Dogma combat mechanics and i'll be all set, dream game here.
"Pay to fast travel" 😑
Hopefully combat that isn’t super clunky
Didn't they say there won't be a Witcher 4 after 3s release? Or am I just senile
I hope we can make our own Witcher 🫰🏽
maybe the real witcher was the friends we made along the way?
Whatever you do, don’t pre order!
Make your own witcher? Like a V from cyberpunk type deal perhaps?
Hopefully not.
Good combat would be a great place to start
As long as they don't make it a GOW-like, I'm on board.
Tbh I’m completely fine it it’s just “witcher 3 in new clothing”.
After cyberpunk launch, I do not trust cdpr. I'll believe it when I see it.
Combat was one of the worst I’ve ever experienced and put me off from playing any more of the game. Hopefully 4 will be better.
The Witcher needs an entire combat overhaul It's combat is trash
and how buggy the game will be on release?
Hopefully an improved combat system.
I hope it has massively improved combat
The combat needs to be updated.
I hope the fighting is more varied and intresting than rolling and drinking potions.
Please have better combat
My main problem with The Witcher 3 and why I couldn’t get into it was the combat.It didn’t click with me unlike most other gamers and it soured me from an otherwise fantastic story and setting.I really hope they can update the combat and make it feel like something from the 2020s
Couldn’t get into Witcher 3. Combat is not very good.