With that said i just wanna say that the Witcher is a fantastic game, love that u can change ur sword style depending on ur oponent. and i simply LOVED the first act, at the fourth now.

The bad thing is, that the way they talk, and the movements they make when they talk, are not realistic at all. It looks stupid. It dosnt fit together and that anoys me, this being such a good game and all… but then again, thats the only complaint i have, exept the stupidly long loading and saving time.

And I still hold that very few RPGs are as interesting or fun in the first hour than they are further on. Of my favourite RPGs, Morrowind is the only real exception that I can think of, maybe because I just fell in love with the world at first sight (and it actually offered you a very early sight of it, unlike Oblivion, Planescape and BG 2).

If you can overlook the technical problems – long loads, sometimes awkward dialogue – and you have the uber-machine that is required to play it properly, The Witcher may be the best game of the year.

If you’re going to get hung up on little things, like dialogue hitches, or the minigames (sex, poker, brawling), then you’re going to miss a terrific game.

Good work, Iain.

KG

greetz from Europe, Oldgamer

I’m not saying that Witcher is the better game overall – but it is more immediate, and the combat is a whole lot better.

As for the whole “sex” thing… and the poke-a-mum cards (those whores have got to have a few illegitimate sprogs stashed away somewhere, surely), I think this is really more of an audience problem than a game problem. And by “audience” I mean “sexually-repressed Brits and Yanks”. The attitude to sex on mainland Europe has always been more enlightened (or at least easier-going and less prone to bouts of uncontrolled giggling every time a nipple is shown) than it has in the stiff-upper-lip UK or the puritan US.

Whether it’s a game mechanic is arguable or not (personally, I veer on the side of not), and it’s certainly more “adult” than “mature”, but it should be noted that it is entirely optional, and it does have consequences later on in dialogue (if you sleep with the witch, Abigail, for example, you’ll be talked about as “a sorceroress’s dog”).

Personally, I don’t see the problem with having it in the game. Because otherwise you’re saying “graphically decapitating people is fine, but no nipples, please” – and that’s just a ridiculous position to take.

You just need the slightest intrigue to keep you playing until the next bit of content grabs you, however far away in game time it is.

This is the difference between a mind numbing generic game that borders on the boring (say…. FEAR for a slightly controversial choice – although the combat is phenomenal – same could be said of Halo) to a game that keeps giving you new things to play with and new, different goals/accomplishments as you go on, a la Episode 2, or Portal.