Witcher 3 falls short in gameplay

It's difficult for me to understand how our host gives this game a 10/10. Taking into account the primitive combat mechanics. Witcher 3 fails to be a good game by neglecting gameplay.

Video games should embrace gameplay. Witcher 3 does not embrace gameplay. It forces a cliche batman-like narrative expecting the audience to go along with the same old story.

A video game should focus on being a game. Witcher 3 forgets what it means to be a game by sacrificng combat.

Nobody plays an RPG for good gameplay.

Hence why even a shitty game like Skyrim can get Perfect Scores and GOTY's gallore..... because actuall gameplay is not a factor.

Good one.

OP, I haven't played The Witcher 3, but that's one of the reasons I had zero anticipation for this game. All the previous Witcher games have boring combat. Compared to RPGs with good combat, like Mount & Blade, I pretty much can't stand it.

I just started the game today but I'm enjoying the combat so far, it seems pretty good to me. I like the two different sword idea, parrying attacks is well down, magic seems fine, etc. Really the only problem I heard is that the lock-on can be finnicky at times but so far I haven't had any problems with it myself.

Have you actually played the game? In what difficulty level? The combat is very good, and the narrative is unmatched IMO. Compared with other open world games I feel like this game raises the bar in so many levels.

But we can't all like the same things, it's ok.

@phbz:

I haven't........ but unless a game lets me cling to baddies alla Dragon's Dogma style then how good is it really ?

Actually i dont think i will get this game. For me combat has always been shit balls in the witcher series and i will bet my ass that it is still shit balls.

@ariabed: it is. It has a great narrative. Sure does. But this is a VIDEO GAME, it needs actual gameplay to back it up. Geralts basic movement feels floaty and weird, and the combat feels likewise, it's very imprecise and not at all satisfying. I couldn't play it for more than four hours before I deleted it.

Very dissapointing.

Major downgrade in presentation from what was previously expected as well, in some ways downright ugly. Modern day gaming continues to dissapoint.

Ha witcher 2 i didnt even make it past the tutorial, luckily i had got the game free from xb live so no harm done.

How is the leveling up in Witcher 3?

I play RPG is for their game play. They are some much fun and get better when player control character growth (stats, gear, and abilities) is good. I still waiting for the answer to the game play including the leveling up before I get it.

The game's incredible taken as a whole.

It depresses me to think people restrict themselves from experiencing new things because they are unable to challenge and break free of pre-conceived notions as to what defines something.

It is their ultimate loss. Sorry you wasted your money. Four hours is a laughable attempt of a game of this scope, and so is any opinion based upon it.

@MirkoS77: Ye, it's really depressing how people react so negatively towards any kind of challenge. I get why people get frustrated in the first hours of the game, it happened to me too. The controls take some time to fully master, but after that initial adaptation I had absolutely no problems. Specifically in combat the feel it's superb and super precise. I can fully dominate a crowd of enemies, even in Death Match mode, without struggling with the controls. Problem is, I think, the button mashers. The game can trick you into think that this is a Batman like system, where you can win fights white reading a book, when in fact is nothing like that.

Also, many gamers expect a game to be a copy/paste of other popular games. That's why you get so many comments like "this is nothing like skyrim", "the combat in Batman is better", etc, etc. To me this is a Witcher game. And it improves on every element from previous games of the series.

But we can't all like the same stuff.

Completely disagree, this is why I feel like video games should be called something different.

A lot of The Witcher 3 isn't video gamey, and I'm totally fine with that. I don't always sit down for a game and and expect Devil May Cry or Mario Kart. Sometimes, I sit down and just want an interactive experience.

@wiouds:

Well going by how everyone is dissapointed with the gameplay then I would say the Levelling Up is super awesome...... atleast thats usually how it goes...... Bad Gameplay=Good RPG Elements.... Good Gameplay = Bad RPG Elements. :p

Ofcourse I'm only basing this off the Mass Effect series since thats the game people cried about when the gameplay actually improved..... however I've noticed a similar reaction to The Souls Games.... namely Blood Borne.

There nothing wrong with calling a video game a game. If they want something not to be judge as a game then do not call it a game.

I hate this stupid ideal that video games should change what they mean. Worse is the ideal that video game should mean interactive experience or a digital game.

@wiouds:

A Non Interactive Game is a Paradox.......

The Interactivity is what makes a game..... ya know...... a game. Its not an "Ideal" its an Axiom.

As for non digital games.... one seems to have caught me eye.

@soulsuppressor:

How can I have the syndrome to a game I haven't played ?

If you didn't like the combat in TW2 you won't like it in TW3. It's very similar. It's more polished and works better with move varying elements, but it's still pretty close to what TW2 had.

As for the topic, I think it has excellent gameplay. The combat is better than most RPGs and mix that with the fantastic story and characters it's one of the best RPGs we've seen in a long time.

@soulsuppressor said:

@Lulu_Lulu said:

Nobody plays an RPG for good gameplay.

Hence why even a shitty game like Skyrim can get Perfect Scores and GOTY's gallore..... because actuall gameplay is not a factor.

I guess that's "The Witcher players" syndromic excuse.

As for "The Elder Scrolls games" all normal people play them because of this:

I would not try. LuLu-Lulu hate RPG to point that any thing that people say good about RPG game play is breaking the laws of the universe and lying.

The combat is pretty great... I honestly feel like a lot of the complaints are from people over-using the lock-on and/or being impatient and spamming or over-relying on "attack" in combat. The combat in this is far FAR more rewarding than in a lot of RPGs (Skyrim, DA:I, etc). It's difficult and requires planning and a willingness to use many tools at your disposal to win. Perhaps not on low difficulty levels...

I will concur that TW2 had bad combat. It had combat that laid a foundation for what we see in this game, but the controls were so clunky and movement so imprecise that it was often frustrating and not unusual to have cheap deaths (at least on high difficulty, again). But this game takes the complexity and diversity of that combat system and refines it into something more functional.

Could still be better, mind you.

@wiouds:

I love RPGs.... I hate stats......

Its a simple phrase I've repeated a thousand times over and yet somehow you still haven't grasped it...... is it that hard ?

I would simplify it even further but I'm sorry I just don't know how to dumb it down even further for you.

@Toxic-Seahorse

How is the level system and how much does it affect the combat? That is a huge part of what make the game play of a RPG fun and is the key thing I care about.

One thing I want to know is how is the leveling system and how does it affect the game? I have gotten no answer to that.

I can deal with it setting being as &^$#$&^%*@ as the witcher setting is if the level system has a meaningful affect on the game play. What about the player control gear growth? What about the player control stats growth (gear not a factor) and how much does stats matters? How is the player control abilities growth?

I don't need anther Arkham City. I enjoy RPG where stats, hear and abilities are important and depend on the player to make the character role in the game play.

@soulsuppressor:

Huh ? What complaint ? I don't understand what The Witcher Syndrome is........ is it something that you get from NOT playing it ?

It was just a question.... sincerely.

Hm, well, it's not as traditional as Baldur's Gate - but has a lot of the familiar elements and leveling works in several dimensions:

1) monsters do not level with you - some are just too hard to face until the player is tougher, and the player just has to deal with that. There is a color-coding and level number above superior foes so that you can see just how out-leveled you are and decide whether you want to give it a go anyway.

2) some quests have recommended levels as well

3) when the character levels up, the interesting customization is through applying points to new skills and skill upgrades (e.g. resistance to toxicity of the potions you have to drink, stamina recovery modifiers, or adding projectile parry, etc)

4) gear is something you have restrictions on in several ways - you need to be certain levels to use certain levels of gear. On top of that, one of the main ways of upgrading gear is through crafting. But crafting requires schematics and components that you acquire through playing. Moreover, it costs money. And money isn't thrown at you left and right in the way it is in some RPGs - so, again, you have to work for it. Being able to do more dangerous quests and contracts requires higher level, and so it all loops back to needing to progress as a witcher.

5) alchemy is very important to the game, and requires exploration, recipe acquisition, and advancement to improve as well.

It all matters a lot. To expand on how these things tie into combat mechanics: your gear and points allocation help with resistances to various types of attack. They help with stamina and health recovery. They affect stamina loss. Meanwhile you need potions and oils/poisons to be an effective combatant - giving you better dark vision, choosing the right poison for the right type of foe (is it a spirit or a living creature or a vampire or...), affecting health recovery and resistances... you need to craft bombs to blind or damage foes and destroy their nests. Again, different bombs for different purposes, just as with the potions and oils and poisons. You need to set traps, dodge, roll, parry, block, cast spells, throw bombs, use light attacks when appropriate, heavy attacks when appropriate... all of this depends on the foe type and how many, and it all uses stamina and other depletable resources. It's not simple button mashing on a hard difficulty... it can't be or you will die. And hopefully you can see how the leveling aspects above tie into the ability to do all this effectively.

Hope this is helpful - there's a lot going on in terms of mechanics - but nothing a seasoned cRPG person would balk at to be sure.

I beg to differ. Good gameplay is exactly why I had hours of fun with Dragon's Dogma despite it's shitty story.I'm still having a blast with Skyrim too despite its obvious flaws.

That's why it's best to youtube gameplay or wait for a price drop on something you're not sure about. If something doesn't grab your interest or attention from the start, why should you spend more time torturing yourself hoping you'll warm up to it?

@HipHopBeats:

Yes Dragon's Dogma did have good game play..... but it was ruined by the RPG Elenents.

And note that I never said you couldn't enjoy it (why do people keep thinking that ?)

Probably because you never noted that after the fact. The way it read was that 'no one plays an RPG for good gameplay', period.

I will say Dragon's Dogma has one of the best character creators I've seen in a long time from recent RPG's. It's a shame, your only stuck with sculpting face models with hairstyles and not body types in current RPG's.

I agreed with a lot of the complaints initially......until I started to understand that this is The Witcher 3. Not Bloodborne, not Skyrim, nor any other game that I could selectively compile comparisons, and hence, complaints from. The movement felt janky to me at first, and it still is a bit touchy at times, but it's nothing that cannot be adapted to with a little effort. The combat is more than competent for what it has to do and has further blossomed with my understanding of its methodical and tactical nature, which has opened up further with leveling.

I think so many are approaching this with the mind-frame of how it should be played (like other games), trying to implement that style, it doesn't work, then they immediately throw up their hands in frustration and lay fault at the game's feet. So many complaints of TW3's combat always comes along with Bloodborne. This isn't BB. In fact, I'd argue it does a much better job of crowd control than BB ever did, even though the combat engine may be overall weaker.

The Witcher 3 I'd classify as far more "interactive" of a game than gameplay focused endeavors ever could be. No other games allowed me to make decisions that revisit me much, MUCH later in the game and have affected its course. Playing Mario is tweaking switches on an immovable foundation. The Witcher 3 actually allows me to alter that foundation in my choices. And it remains a game because of it.

Because something has to be fresh and innovative to be fun.

@HipHopBeats:

Well nobody does..... if they wanted good gameplay theres a bunch of other games that can satisfy that.

I didn't know character creation of that Calibur was so hard to come by.......

@MirkoS77:

I'm sorry but a game is not defined by how profound the decisions it lets you make...... thats a good argument for a form of art but not for a game.

Why is it not? You said above interactivity defined a game. That's interactivity far deeper than what many traditionally known games do. Yet now it doesn't count?

@MirkoS77:

I said games are interactive...... and thats all I said......

The actual definition of what a game is a heck of alot more than something that is interactive.

Elaborate.

@MirkoS77:

Whats there to Elaborate....... if we define a game as something that is just interactive then everything you do is a game.

Oh c'mon, you know what I mean: within the medium of gaming. I'm out the door, but you've never really articulated on this aside from one sentence write offs to people asking you. What qualifies a "video game" to you?

@MirkoS77:

To me ?

Well I don't really know.....

@xantufrog: Well that make me feel better about The Witcher 3. Are the skill like stats or is more like the lame skill tree systems? I love meaningful stats in a RPG because they make RPG so much more fun. The pick the branch story moment part is still a major problem with with how people still pretend they mean something is a game.

I still stand by my statement. If they do not want it to be judge as a game then do not call it a game. I hate pick the branch story moment in my games but I can ignore them because it they have no part of it being a game.

I disagree about good gameplay not being a reason people would play RPG's. Kingdoms Or Amular had good gameplay but after a few hours, the actual game was boring as shit.

Same deal with Dragon Age Inquisition. Cool combat, but a boring RPG once you sink a few hours in and get to the chorefest farming.

Name a recent RPG that has an extensive character creation like Dragon's Dogma where you can customize your character from head to toe.

@HipHopBeats:

FIFA :D !!!

Well I haven'f played those two games..... is the farming mandatory like in Dragon's Dogma ?

Saying it's better than crap like DA3 or Skyrim isn't exactly giving it a ringing endorsement.

@bussinrounds:

He also used the word "Rewarding"........I wana know what he means by that.

Witcher 3 is all about hype, people are hyped because they see CDPR as a knight for the good side of gaming, an independent studio who can compete with Bethesda's Skyrim.

And its kinda funny to read Kevin Van Ord´s review he overlooks so many bugs, glitches and bad design choices. which makes him sound like a fanboy and not like a critic who had a job to do.

But with that said no Videogames shouldn´t all imbrace gameplay because it's not all about gameplay, Story is also a major key and witcher 3 is a RPG with focus on the stories.

@Lulu_Lulu: More enjoyable ? He gets more satisfaction out of it ?

@bussinrounds:

I don't know the exact definition but a reward is what you get for doing something....... specifically you get it after you do it.

Defeat a tough enemy or Win a Race ? Get some loot

Complete a quest ? Get some narrative.

Beat a high score? Get some braggin rights.

Thats usually how rewards work.......... I was wondering if he chose the word "Reward" specifically because thats how his experience with Inquisition and Skyrim has been. A series of things you do to get something back in Return.

I haven't played the Witcher 3 nor any other Witcher ... Why ? because I don't like action RPG, the fighting is always bad so I stay with JRPG and turn based system as those keep me interested and the story isn't a mess that open world have such a hard time with.