Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsThis is what fans of Dragon Age Inquisition and Fans of Skyrim have been waiting for!!!
Reviewed in the United States on May 22, 2015
Welcome to one of the most complete role-playing open worlds you have ever entered. In "The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt," even the most seemingly insignificant characters have the most personal of stories, and every character in the Northern Kingdoms seems to come to life.
Developer CD Projekt Red crafts one of the finest open-world role-playing games of this console generation in Wild Hunt, and it's all about the way the world comes to life. Few role-players have this much personality and this many truly 3-D characters, all of whom help weave the tapestry that is these Northern Kingdoms. This is a game that will exact emotion from the gamer, a title that will make you feel and doubt and wonder the longer and deeper you play.
You reprise the role of Geralt of Rivia, the star of the previous Witcher games and a grizzled, 3-D hero in his own right. Early on, he's chasing a long lost love, working to find the young child he once nurtured (the titular Ciri), and trying to move on from the events of "The Witcher 2," all at once.
He's also a witcher, a member of a rare, genetically enhanced race capable of monster-slaying in this wild world. With that come tinges of mistrust and fear from some you meet. CD Projekt Red never overdoes this effect, though, leaving only slight hints of public fear, never reaching comic-book extremes.
There is a great deal of gray in "Wild Hunt," and Geralt often gets to make the call. The decisions are both large and small (Call out the general's motives? Let that woman die?), and you feel as if your moves do shape the future of this world.
The Witcher 3 gets this art of subtlety, something that video games are gradually becoming more proficient in in 2015, and it's evident throughout the game, particularly in the women that Geralt pursues.
Few games carefully straddle the line between female sexuality and the outcry for feminine toughness in 2015 better than "The Witcher 3."
Ciri is as powerful as anyone, and when you take control of her during the game you swiftly discover that. Yennefer, Geralt's romantic love interest and the pursuit that drives the earliest portions of this game, is a powerful sorceress, well capable of holding her own in battle, and no, an early nude scene, tastefully done, takes nothing away from that.
Yes, there is occasional nudity in "The Witcher 3," but it rarely feels intrusive. Like much of "Wild Hunt," it comes in a "Game of Thrones" sort of way, just enough to remind you you're playing a mature title, never enough to overshadow the overall experience.
CD Projekt Red does everything possible to further enhance its world with beautiful art design and smart technical decisions.
Saying "The Witcher 3" simply "looks good" is a near insult to the effort that's gone into this game, the day-night cycles, the way the wind blows against the trees and the grass, the detail on Geralt's garb.
Play "Wild Hunt" long enough, and you'll find yourself stopping randomly to take in the beautiful scenery, to appreciate the detail that's gone into the grass, or to stare out into the distance after scaling a mountain. And despite so many characters, nearly everyone you meet has visual personality as well, great care put into scars and wrinkles and moles and body types to generate a vastly unique populace. Even the cut scenes exhibit great care, with shifting camera angles and closeups that emphasize certain characters and expressions.
Gameplay, meanwhile, does its best to stay out of the way, functional without any flourishes that take your focus off the story. It's the little things that are the most terrific. Multi-step boss battles let you feel the enormity of massive beasts but never feel frustration. One-button horseback riding without thumbstick navigation along paths lets you ponder the story as you travel a vast kingdom, much as you might do on a car trip.
There are crafting and alchemy to delve into as well, each deep but never overdone. The alchemy itself will have you collecting items and leaves, much as many other games you've played, but it never feels rote, not with such a vast array of items and potions to be crafted.
Only the combat slips. A sore spot in "The Witcher 2," it's been revamped and made more console-friendly in "Wild Hunt." CD Projekt Red manages to bring combat more in line with today's action games, with parries and a variety of strikes, but the controls can occasionally feel sluggish. Geralt also doesn't move and turn with the fluidity you'd find in, say, "Batman: Arkham City," and the imprecision can feel annoying.
So too can the all-too-frequent bugs. As beautiful as "The Witcher 3" may look, graphical errors still abound, with disappearing trees or the occasional moment when Geralt walks through an object. There are unpolished moments, too, especially when Geralt clambers onto a craggy rock face yet appears to be standing on perfectly level ground. You can't fault CD Projekt Red too much because these moments are common in all massive open-worlders, but they're more noticeable here, in large part because of the elegance and detail that permeats so much of the rest of this game. The end result is a terrific role-playing game that any fan of "Elder Scrolls: Skyrim" will love. "The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt" falls just short of perfection because of those nagging little issues. But if you've been looking for your next-generation "Skyrim," you've found it right here.
