Zero Punctuation: The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings

[bob1052]

I actually defend this attitude to reviewing games (not finishing the whole thing) because it perhaps shows better what sort of game you're playing.

A good game will keep you playing to the end.

A bad game will not.

If someone criticised say Friends or Chuck or My Little Pony or some tv series they'd be allowed to after watching only a few episodes. The whole point of watching those few episodes is to give you an idea of whether you will like the series and if it is engaging enough to keep your attention until the end, but suddenly when it comes to videogames for some reason you have to play the whole thing to have a valid opinion? Sounds like more than a few people are just butthurt because their pet franchise just got insulted.

I don't mind it either, as long as the reviewer is capable of providing adequate information with his shorter experience. Yahtzee only had a few points from playing such a small portion of the game and most of them were completely incorrect.

 

[Fluffis]

Pretty good episode, Yahtzee. A bit too much "Let's slam the PC elitists", but fun.

(Before anyone gets any ideas: I'm an avid PC gamer - I own a PS2, but that was only for Guitar Hero and FFVII. But(!): I never got into The Witcher; too much like a single player MUMORPUGER, and the combat was boring as hell.)

 

[iniudan]

I remember another series of games with pain in the ass magic and steep as hell learning curve; Phantasy Star. PS1 in particular had you grinding for two hours before you could make the trek to the next town, and it's a trip the main character supposedly made on a regular basis.
It's certainly not good to see RPGs going back to THOSE roots.

There is 5 spell in the game (the are the same one then in the first game with the same effect), the hardest part about them is not knowing what they do until you use them 1 time (you get a pop up telling you what they do on first use) or that you read the manual or tutorial journal (yes there is a tutorial journal available in game, it one of the tab in the quest journal).

There is also no grind in the game, except if you decide to do it of your own will, like by deciding to do some of the fetch quest, which you will most likely be completed on the side while doing other thing.

Has for learning curve, the game is actually easy to learn, the thing is that it is unforgiving for mistake, which you will most likely make a lot when you start the game and when you first encounter a situation. And outside of the prologue, you can prepare yourself in advance to by buying in-game book and taking time to read them. For example book relating to a kind of monster will tell you of thing like weak point, habitat, behavioral pattern and ability of the monster the book is relating to.

 

[Mangue Surfer]

Your opnion is wrong!



.
Now seriously, isn?t really a game for everybody. Not trying to use the euphemism ?is not a game for everybody = is a game for higher beings?. The game has a foot on nostalgia, but the combat is not what you expect from a traditional RPG, but is also too far from the God of War/Assassins Creed standard. It is a mixture more like Demon's Souls. Is more like a cult product.

 

[Hristo Tzonkov]

Snip

You are deep in hindsight bias assuming you would easily figure it out. I disagree. My reaction would NOT be to start spraying because this is a gametype that has limited ammo, especailly at the start. So that bunk. I'm supposed to use up my 12 plasma cutter shots on one guy and hope I hit its leg in the process? Thats what you should base you game mechanics around? Hoping they player accidently figures them out is stupid.

The mechanic seems logical to you because youve already played it. There is nothing in previous gaming experiance that would hqave led me to try that, and I most assuradly would not start "spraying" in a fucking survival horror game. That is the stupidest thing yet.

The mechanism are logical to anyone that do not really on his previous experience on a game... And in any case, it's not so hard to cripple the leg, on DS2 the necro are much more faster then the first, and don't give you the time to think that much. I know you probably did not start with it, but on it the necro was simply to fast to even think to not spraying after that your head shoot didn't kill them. This is not l4d game, you do not have to care about your team mate.

Actually, on DS2 the only thing that really may have need a tutorial popup is stomping necro and gathering resource, that was actually left to the player to discover. I could link to a pair of let's play of newbie that don't explore or pick up ammo because no one teach them to read the popup. Quoting you... "Hoping they player accidentally figures them out is stupid."

Now if you are going to tell me that this people need a new brain because they could not read a popup [the one you receive by standing over the ammo]... You are actually supporting TW's fanboi point of the press J and read. Or read the manual. Classic and old RTFM, where have you been?

PS: How you can not spray with the PG is a mystery to me, in any given case...

I spent a while shooting the head until I saw that sign saying cut off their limbs.No it was not intuitive.

To the OT:What you don't understand usually does not concern you.All of us already knew what Yahtzee was going to say and while sort of disappointed (some of us) are going to argue the hell out of this topic trying to defend a game we loved.

 

[m72_ar]

Fair criticism though, Combat is absolute bullshit at early level.
Followed with how can you prep for a fight if you don't know when the combat will happen.

This is one of the few games that it gets easier the higher level you are (*ahem* Combat Acumen)

 

[Pinky09]

I'm a PC gamer, i absolutely LOVED The Witcher 2, and i laughed my ass off at this review.
Come on, this isn't to be taken seriously, Yahtzee is a comedian, and he gets off seeing u gu ys get nuts over his opinions... if you want a serious review head over to any other site like RPS or Gamespot. or even to metacritic (where the game has gotten a 89 overall score...)

Chill!!! after seeing so much tits and ass in this game, i'm chilled...

 

[Faux Furry]

Do British critics just not care for Polish dark fantasy games [http://www.destructoid.com/review-the-witcher-2-assassins-of-kings-201752.phtml]? Did someone at CD Projekt Red cast some sort of temporal distortion spell that caused history to repeat itself to such a degree (only in a form more friendly to the illiterate this time)?

Does this meant that, in lieu of a thread which denounces the British immigrant game critic/commentator as unworthy of the mighty task of reviewing the splendor of The Witcher 2 which they attempted sorely underprepared, there will be a video rebuttal to all of Yahtzee's negligible niggles with this presumable unimpeachable product of Poland?

I'm more interested in reading the honest answers to those not-so-sincere queries than I am in playing The Witcher 2 at present.

 

[Continuity]

I would actually be pissed if I took these "reviews" seriously, but hey since people with the attention span of a fly can relate with yahtzee its all good
its amazing how spiteful some people are

go back to fable

Yes, amazing. Some people can be so spiteful. When will they realize that the ability to enjoy a video game about an albino dragonslaying gigolo is a direct metric of a person's intelligence, and that that's just how it is?

Intelligence and attention span are two different things you know.

Amazing how console players always get so defensive about their "intelligence" when no one has even brought that up as a factor.

bang on review. Witcher 1 was the same - complex, difficult, dark, adult, sometimes engrossing - but just NOT FUN

Thats odd, because I found it to be one of the most fun games i've played in the last 2 years and i've played about 60 in that time frame.

Its a question of taste. Not everyone wants to sit down and read war and peace, in fact most would rather read comics, that doesnt make them less intelligent but it also doesn't mean that the comics are better than war and peace.

Are you implying that the Witcher 2 is the videogame equivalent of War and Peace?
Because that is just laughable, especially since it is based nearly directly on some mediocre and rather tasteless fantasy novels. Though I guess you have a point in as much as they are both rather clunky in their presentation, if nothing else.

I suggest you expand your horizons a bit when it comes to story in video game if you think the Witcher reaches anything but the middle of the pack.

I was making an analogy purely on the accessibility of the material, I in no way made a value judgement on the content, at least that wasn't my intent. Hope that clears it up. Though I was making that point that an accessible game isn't necessarily a good one and an inaccessible one isn't necessarily a bad one.

And for the record I haven't actually played the witcher 2, I've been either making comments about the wither (original) or just comments in general.

 

[1337mokro]

I agree on 2 points.

The fact you can't drink a potion mid combat is stupid, especially since doing so was a major part in the first game where potions were used as sort of buffing items so you could quickly adapt mid combat to fight the monster you were up against.

Fighting giant bats? Quick drink a potion that kills them if they try and drink your blood! Fighting Poisonous Undead? Quick drink a potion that makes you resistant to poison. That was the whole point of the potion system.

Often I would just be walking along with a questgiver in the Witcher 2 and be dropped in the middle of a group of angry monsters. It got to a point where I would just down a bunch of potions preventively whenever a character asked me to follow them to some place.

Also this is probably the worst tutorial ever made for a game. Rather than easing you into gameplay and the control mechanics it just throws you out there and barely tells you half the information that you need. If you haven't played the first game god help you.

Apologists will say that is part of the challenge but fuck that. A tutorial is supposed to explain everything to you and if it is not going to do that why bother at all. You really should have gone around the army camp you started in and have a go at fencing with a few of the soldiers. That would have been a decent tutorial.

However almost every cutscene can be skipped and having died on the Kayran multiple times myself I know for a fact you could skip it even the first time you see it. So that really was a fault on your part dear critic.

Overall I still enjoyed the game despite really bad controls which have improved since the 1.2 update. Before 1.2 you sometimes couldn't switch swords which meant that fighting humans and monsters at the same time was practically impossible. I would get creamed by a sorcerer and his little monster friends every time because I just couldn't switch swords.

What really sold me on the Witcher 2 was that it was one of the few games in existence where your choices actually greatly impact the story. Heck one choice even affects an entire chapter in the game's story giving you completely different quests and locations to explore. Not perfect but miles ahead of any of it's competitors.

I was absolutely rolling on the floor from laughter from the video. If you hadn't noticed guys about half of it was poking fun at PC elitism which is exactly what your displaying here for not acknowledging that the Witcher 2, whilst being my favourite RPG this year, has/had some serious flaws.

 

[thenamelessloser]

Imagine if someone complained that a Star Wars game had the force, wookies, and lightsabers. That is why this video of Witcher 2 just came across as stupid to me. (haven't played it so the combat may very well suck but almost the rest of the review came across just as dumb to me.)

 

[Kahunaburger]

Are you implying that the Witcher 2 is the videogame equivalent of War and Peace?
Because that is just laughable, especially since it is based nearly directly on some mediocre and rather tasteless fantasy novels. Though I guess you have a point in as much as they are both rather clunky in their presentation, if nothing else.

So you first ask people to trust your taste on writing, then you say War and Peace is "clunky?" Not the first word most would use to describe Tolstoy...

 

[ResonanceSD]

I would've said he could have eased off on the sarcasm involving elitist PC gamers a morsel. But then that would be ignoring all the crap that was wafting off a few of the PC gamers that I have seen since the announcement that The Witcher 2 is going to consoles.

Anyway I was entertained and that is what I go to Yahtzee for.

Exactly! It's entertainment more than an actual review. If you want a proper review, go to a proper review website like IGN or something people ^_^

 

[KillahMate]

I don't get why he's pretending that he's some sort of Consolegaming Man Of The People and not a PC Elitist Asshole. He's so much a PC gamer that he actually *made* a dozen PC games!

http://www.fullyramblomatic.com/games.htm

Don't be ashamed Yahtzee, it doesn't suit you.

 

[elmo360]

How do you get fired from a Dick sucking factory?

 

[antipunt]

The Witcher 2 doesn't cater to everyone. I'm a member of its niche myself, but some people just aren't jumping-for-joy at something this hardcore. That's fine, and Yatzhee's review is fine as well. He makes fun of -everyone-; the reviews are sometimes more interesting that way.

The only problem I can think of is that this opens the flood gates for butthurt trolls to start flinging their poo poo at the fans who -do- enjoy the game. It's nothing new, but let's just say, if Yatzhee ever decides to review the SMT series, THERE WILL BE BLOOD. (in a similar fashion, I love the SMT series, but hoards of people will complain about how it's too hard, etc. etc. etc.). Same thing, same story.

 

[cfehunter]

two comments on the video:

#1 you can skip the boss cutscene.
#2 Yes combat in this game is in need of a serious rebalance. At the start it's punishingly unforgiving and later on it's just laughably easy.
The difficulty curve needs some normalising.