The One Problem With The Witcher Franchise...

[The Madman]

Hell yeah! I dislike it, but want to keep playing it for the story. Regardless of how sexist/childish it's been in the first few hours. It must have something good in it eventually based on the praise it has gotten in the past. Even tho they released the game way too early, as in, before it was finished...

I wonder if the elite PC gamer hype helped kill the game here. Take Dragons Dogma, which has been called a sleeper hit already (lol)... So far so good, but I bet if the masses can (and will) be turned off of it, if enough kids rant and rave over entiteled elitist crap, it will ruin the experience for me/others

Over exposure, preconceptions, overt advertisements, make the gaming community suffer me thinks.

I want to like a game, but my exposure to gamer forums taint it. Shame on me I guess. I wish I could be informed without having so damned much negative diatribe forced down my gullet.

/Drunk Rant Over...

Bluntly put I doubt it, but by all means soldier on. Preferably while slightly less drunk mind you.

Personally I dislike the beginning for Witcher 2. I think they'd have been much better off making it a more linear but better explained experience at the start rather than that silly 'interrogation' thing they did. Too many jump cuts, too much information with too little explanation, and the gameplay in those two dragon bits was stupid. But then pacing seems to be a problem with CDProjekt considering how bad it was in the first game. Witcher 2 is much better in that regard but I still find it disjointed at times, the beginning especially.

Regardless I love the game... don't think you will however. If you want to dislike a game you're going to although I'm glad you did end up buying it. Considering that Witcher 2 is still only the developers second shot at a game and how much it's improved in a number of areas over the first game, I can't wait to see what they do next if they keep improving at this rate.

 

[SextusMaximus]

That's why I like it, it paints Geralt as the hero of the age, and portrays how he doesn't give a shit about racism (don't quote me, havent played in a while).

Going to play it again very soon, just need to buy my new video card first!-_-

 

[zefiris]

Can't help but think that's exactly what happened to Dragon Age 2 after all the bad mouthing started to leak out.

No, what happened to Dragon Age 2 was people who loved Dragon Age: origins buying it, then noticing that it was simply a bad game.

@Topic: Yeah, I agree. See, for all the cries of "but it's realistic"...it really isn't. The society it portrays is a faux medieval one, extremely exaggerating parts and ignoring others.

If it was a portrayal of a real medieval society, it would a)not be as dark, b)racism wouldn't be AS common, and c)women would do more things.

Somehow, male gamers seem to have a very strange notion of what medieval europe actually was like, a view that is completely at odds with what science has unearthed.

That's a big part of the Witcher's problem. The sexism is often neither realistic, nor actually in game, a lot of the sexism is in game design and writing. Witcher 1 really showed this blatantly with the girl cards.

 

[TotalerKrieger]

I love the dark, unpleasant themes of the Witcher franchise. It makes the atmosphere actually seem medieval rather than some ridiculous Tolkien wetdream where everyone is perfect and feudal life is just fine. The Medieval Era wasn't only about knights and castles, it was a time of great religious and racial intolerance as well as widespread disease and poverty. Peasants were uneducated, overworked and malnourished, most are not going to be all that attractive or pleasant. Monty Python's Holy Grail provides a more accurate depiction of the medieval era than many similarily themed RPGs. I'd love to see more darker themes in medieval oriented games, something that manages to think beyond the overused undead and demonic cliches.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

I've never given a shit about characters in any game that I can think of. I always choose the "Fuck everyone!" option.

 

[DementedSheep]

Not everyone is a racist asshole, there are just a lot of people who are which is to be expected. The Citizens of lobinden (just outside Floasom) where all fairly nice and got on fine with the elvan citizens. Some of the citizens of Flotsoms itself are decent. When Loredo

Spoiler

locks the elvan women in the burning building

some of them help you save them. You notice the racist assholes the most because they are the ones causing problems whereas everyone else is just minding their own business. There aren?t really any saints, everyone has flaws including Geralt but that?s not a bad thing.

The peasants in Vergen practically worship Saskia and she doesn?t have enemies due to her looks or her intelligence. She has enemies because she is leading a rebellion in a particularly important piece of land and upsetting the balance of how things are ?suppose to work? (she is a nobody and female). It?s the nobility that don?t like her.

The elves aren?t necessarily hated because they are pretty either, they are different, they are a minority race and have been at war with humans. Racism and war go hand in hand, many don?t really separate the squirrels (who they have every reason to hate. They tend to raid villages, kill civilians and fought for Nilfgaard) from the elven civilians who arn't with them.

There wasn?t a particularly large amount of hatred directed at the whores and when Margot(?) got insulted by one of Loredo?s men some of the peasants leapt to her defence.

Scholars and mages are pretty much universally hated yes. Especially mages but they are pretty separate from the rest of society, they tend to have high standing and there is a lot of ignorance and suspicion around what they do. Mages are powerful, people fear them and if somthing happens they don?t understand they are probably going blame on magic which they also don't understand.

Any ruler that?s not a walking penis? What?

They don?t hate the blue stripes because they are ?usefull?, they hate them because of the nature of their job and also because some of them lord their authority around and don?t respect local customs.

It wasn?t the peasantry who hated the Troll. Loredo wanted to get rid of it because he was trying to cut Flotsom off from the rest of the world by getting rid of the bridge.

Dwarves are once again a minority race and are considered different.

 

[demotion1]

There are a lot of good people in The Witcher. A good person doesn't have to be a saint you know.

 

[Racecarlock]

I can't be the only one who finds this whole realism excuse stupid when your world includes but is not limited to magic, dwarfs, elves, trolls, witches, and fucking monsters. Realism is not needed in a fantasy world. I haven't even played the damn game and I know this.

 

[LadyRhian]

I haven't played the games, but I did read the two books released here in the US, and I have to say that this is pretty much what medieval people were like. You didn't trust anyone outside your home village, outsiders were both accepted (traveling merchants, because they brought news from far away and new stuff) and hated/treated with extreme suspicion (anyone else). Even the nobility tended to look down on the peasants and foreigners. Yes, women were a bit more equal in some areas: women could be craftmasters and work jobs, but that tended to be because their father or mother was in a craft, and then they married another person in the same craft and took over when their husband died. Wise women and midwives existed and were more respected... until the church got involved, because they thought all women must be ruled by a male. If not your father, huband or brother (or more distant male relative), then your lord, especially if you were noble and rich.

Let's just say that women were both more and less free, depending on who they were. The closest thing you got to a woman of real power in Medieval times was Eleanor of Aquitaine, who basically owned half of France, was married to King Louis, went on the Crusades with him (and went with her own bodyguard of women in armor, and she wore armor as well), then got fed up with her weak, cowardly husband and divorced him to marry Henry of England. And even she ended up imprisoned by some of her sons as she got older.

The best thing I can recommend to see how medieval life really was is Terry Jones' Medieval Lives. He was a member of Monty Python, yes, but he is also a medieval scholar and really punctures the myths most people take for granted.

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/medieval-lives/

 

[ImmortalDrifter]

Same for Dragon Age 2, but for different reasons. Actually, I liked DA2 a hell of a lot more.

I must be unsophisticated or something, eh?

lol troll/fanboys

You win my friend. You just win.

 

[Norrdicus]

You notice the racist asshole the most because they are ones causing problems.

Yeah, the racists are the loud minority (not a minority by much, but still) essentially, and their existence in Flotsam makes sense as they have Scoia'tael troops right outside their walls.

Plus, Dandelion comments how the city of Flotsam is disturbingly corrupted and desensitized and greedy to the core. If he had just said "this is a town like any other", there'd be more reason to say that the people are no less jerks in Flotsam than anywhere else.

Any ruler that?s not a walking penis? What?

Let's go with this description for a moment, actually.

Spoiler

It does fit King Henselt, that racist warmongerer and rapist prick, but people not in his military really dislike him. Doesn't make him any less intelligent though, just far too confident of his diplomatic immunity

It fits Loredo about half as much, but he's more greedy.

Foltest? Screwed his own sister and a baroness, so I think the insult fits somewhat, but the man has enough good points to redeem himself for the most part. In neither case does it seem like the affection was one-sided and the Nilfgaardian ambassador calls him "a true Northern monarch"

Prince Stennis is a schemer with more bark than bite, not a walking penis.

Cecil Burdon, the head of Vergen, is an all-around decent man, the insult doesn't fit him at all.

King Radovid the Stern? An incredibly young ruler with massive potential and ambition to spare

 

[Thoric485]

I thought the game would get some points for being one of the few where both males and females have a variety of body types outside of "fit 25-year old", or pushing the sex to the beginning, so that your further decisions about a female character don't have the promise of boobies weighing over them.

And yet the talk is still sexist this, misogynist that.

 

[hazabaza1]

Having only played the first game, I can tell you that that isn't the only problem with that game, at least.

 

[Ordinaryundone]

Really the only character I found lacking was Foltest (He kinda did the Ned Stark thing, which as much as I love Sean Bean Ned Stark did get on my nerves the further I got into the book.)

Foltest is like Ned Stark? The same Foltest who screwed his sister, then proceeded to go to war with her over custody rights to the children? The same Foltest who deliberately targeted a single man (a noble, even) with a ballista simply because he didn't like him very much? Foltest is more like Robert, if Robert was actually a competent king (and lost about 80 pounds). John Natalis, there is your Ned Stark character.

Nearly all the characters in the game have their good and bad sides, which is something I really enjoyed about the game. With the exception of the obviously villainous characters and one-off bad guys like

Spoiler

Dethmold! Who would trust a guy named Dethmold anyway?

nearly every character and faction has a good reason for both siding with or against them. The story really encourages you to take a long view of things, and going the standard "heroic" route actually puts the world in a worse position than if you had been more pragmatic, even if Geralt himself may have gotten more satisfaction. It was nice being able to weigh the results of "me vs. some vs. all" without any decision being labeled as the "good" or "correct" one. Dragon Age 2 kind of did this, but it didn't carry nearly the same weight.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Gerald is some sort of Mutated freak with magic by the name of "Witcher", a supposed organization of some sorts. He saved an incest-loving king who, thanks to screwing someone other important person, is currently at war. A possible "Witcher" or someone resembling one with similar abilities has been hired to assassinate the king. That is what I have figured after a good 10 minutes of roaming around the beginning of the game.

Please don't spoil anything, but tell me: Is the game longer than it seems? From the Achievements and how fast things are going now, it seems the game is no longer than 12 to 15 hours with a full playthrough (similar to the original Mass Effect Length).

His name is Geralt. Witchers are professional monster slayers. They kill monsters for money. That's about it. Most people don't like witchers.
King Foltest had an affair with a baroness who gave birth to 2 children. But because he's not married to the baroness those are bastard children with no claim to the throne. But Foltest doesn't care for that. Her son thought that Foltest disrespected and humiliated his mother so he organized a rebellion against Foltest. As for the assassin, if you played the first game you'd have a better idea of what's going since the story is set a couple of weeks after the events of The Witcher 1. Playing The Witcher 1 isn't necessary for understanding why someone is killing off kings, it's important for understanding the deeper plot that Geralt actually cares about. This isn't exactly a spoiler but some might disagree

Spoiler

Geralt hates politics. He's basically forced into those conflicts. He only cares about clearing his name and restoring his memory. Also he wants to learn about The Wild Hunt

I finished the game in 40 hours on normal difficulty. I've done every side quest.

 

[endtherapture]

Really the only character I found lacking was Foltest (He kinda did the Ned Stark thing, which as much as I love Sean Bean Ned Stark did get on my nerves the further I got into the book.)

Foltest is like Ned Stark? The same Foltest who screwed his sister, then proceeded to go to war with her over custody rights to the children? The same Foltest who deliberately targeted a single man (a noble, even) with a ballista simply because he didn't like him very much? Foltest is more like Robert, if Robert was actually a competent king (and lost about 80 pounds). John Natalis, there is your Ned Stark character.

The woman he went to war with wasn't his sister. He ploughed his sister and she gave birth to Adda. The woman he went to war over was the La Valette woman who is completely different.

Foltest was a dick but he was probably the most decent king we met. True to his word and actually loves his family, as shown in the reunion scene. I honestly believe he would've treated her fairly. He seemed more disgusted with the nobles using his children and his ex lover to their advantage as opposed to it just being a war of vengeance.

John Natalis isn't exactly like Ned though, he's VERY politically shrewd and probably has ulterior motivations, like wanting to rule Temeria. He's still a better option than Radovid though.

 

[Shocksplicer]

There are loads of nice people. Iorveth, Roche, Triss, Shani, Dandylion, Zoltan - granted, not all of those are what one would consider friendly, but its 6 people.

Iorveth and Roche are both pretty awful people (Iorveth murders countless Humans because he hates humans and Roche kills and tortures countless Non-Humans because the king told him to.)

Just out of interest, did you complete the game? If not, how far did you get? And if you did complete the game, how much attention did you pay to detail? Because it really does sound like you never got past chapter 1.

I've finished it with both of them, and while I admit they aren't as two-dimensional as I made them out to be, they are still both mass murderers with flimsy justifications.