So I just read this book on history of games called “Blood, Sweat and Pixels” and was fascinated by the chapter on The Witcher 3 and mostly how the team put in so much thought and care in every single side quest. And seems that there are a lot of moral decision to be made on each adventure. So I finally decided to give it a try. Got any advice for me?
In the first region in the midst of the first small village two neighbors are arguing. They are not giving a quest, they just talk to each other and listening gives such an insight in how war can turn people against each other that have been living peacfully and been friends for years.
Do the side quests and take your time with the dialogue. Some of these stories are impactful, mostly sad and worth your time. If you are told that you should talk to people to find out more about your contract, do it. Some of these quests can be done with only talking to one person but you want to get the information from everyone and especially their side of the story.
Do not look up the outcome of decisions. Make your decisions and live with them at least at your first playthrough. Most decisions have impact and seeing the outcome unfold makes this game special and yes often there is no “good choice” - that’s war for you.
Last: Buy every Gwent card you can get your hands on and play with everyone you can. If you can’t win just come back later with better cards and obliterate them - it will feel goooood!
The DLC’s are a must.
Try out difficulty settings - there is a sweet spot for most people somewhere but what it will be for you no one can know, but it would be a shame if you play through the game not having found the difficulty that fits you best because you “always play on <insert difficulty>”.
Have fun, I wish I could play this game for the first time again.
As for mods:
The Witcher 3 HD Reworked Project Arguably one of the best reworks ever.
They just drive home the “cold wilderness” vibe.
Then Better Combat Enhanced Because that’s one of the main critque points of this game.
And some more
And for DLC, i was especially impressed with “Blood and Wine” sidequests.
About helping sane monsters
There will be a point where your actions will be judged.
Take your time with the combat tutorial - Understand the difference between a dodge roll, a sidestep, a parry and blocking.
Other than that, have fun!
Play with a controller. Makes the slippery-ass controls feel way more natural.
If you do every sidequest you will be massively overleveled.
If you go to an area where “you are not supposed to go yet” you’ll be massively under leveled.
I’ve heard there are mods that just even everything out so you can play the game at your own pace.
they actually sorted that out pretty nicely with updates. the pace is quite even since they published the next-Gen rework. the problem with being under-leveled still persists though.
ABC:
Always
Be
Cfancying a round of Gwent
No not use any DLC equipment. While the combat in the game is far from perfect, using the viper gear (I think that’s what it’s called) ruins it further.
beware the botchling (don’t progress to far to fast, level up or things like the botchling will be frustrating)
Tell your friends and family that you love them but you won’t see them for a while
I’m nearly finishing up The Witcher 2. Judging from the discussions, I’m afraid of starting Witcher 3 because I have other backlog of games I have to finish as soon as possible.
you got deadlines or something?
Bought games from years ago I have to finish. Waste of money if I don’t complete them but I keep buying new ones.
We all have a final deadline for finishing our backlog and experiencing as much as we can in this world.
I hope it’s not coming up soon as I haven’t made much progress!
First few hours can seem slow with the early map not being the most exciting, but if you make it through the huge world opens up and things start getting much more exciting.
When I played I printed out a side quest list to try to experience as much of the game a possible and checked off ones I completed. Side quests are amazing and better than the main quest as opposed to being the usual fetch quest with a weak or no story.
Good advice. It took me two or three attempts to finally get hooked by the game. But it was totally worth it.
Yeah, the first map area is small and kind of lifeless and I think like 3 hours long? Some don’t give a game longer than that, but the entire game took like 300 hours for me to finish so it was very small portion of a very long dense game.
Don’t chase all the markers on your map, most of them are crap and you’ll burn out.
So much this. If I never see another Smuggler’s Cache again it would still be too soon!
As other folk said, definitely do get the DLCs. There’s a whole other game in there.
It’s been a while since I last played, and this game IS a masterpiece, no doubt about that, but the one of the first sections can be rough. Iirc it’s gloomy af, there’s some hard monsters in some quests that can be demotivating and the combat/mechanics takes some getting used to which makes the previous point worse. Just know that the game opens up and there’s a whole world out there.
There are tons of side quests which are great, so you should do those but also don’t feel like you need to do all of them. It can be easy to get side tracked and then lose steam and quit on the main story.
Especially because like I said the DLCs are amazing. They are also quite self contained so it’s like a breath of fresh air
Enjoy this amazing game. I’m jealous of you
Don’t try to go for both main romance options, the outcome isn’t worth it. Better to do two playthroughs if you really want to know.
I mean it’s definitely an ending worth seeing. So 3 playthroughs. And then all the other variable ending stuff. Let’s face it we all YouTubed the other endings after our second playthrough.
Don’t try to romance Ciri.
/s
Witcher 3 can be played like the puzzle game on max difficulty.
You don’t have to grind level or have good controller skill to beat those boss in max difficulty. In fact, it like puzzle game. If you know how to beat the boss (read in game wiki), or have oil, spell, or do something before, … you can beat a boss easily, without need much skill or overlevel.
A note on brewing potions: You only need the herbs the first time you brew any particular potion, after you’ve brewed it once it will get restocked automatically when you meditate.
How did I not know this
