CD projects irons out the flaws from Witcher I, and delivers a work of passion, polished indefinitely, a masterpiece.
The combat, is satisfying, and a relief for those who disliked the old rythm based system (though I enjoyed it). To succeed in battle you must take advantage of all the parries, light/strong attacks, ripostes, and evasion skill, or specialize in Signs or Alchemy, or find your own balance. The leveling system ensures that your character plays suitable to your playing style, and gains depth as the game progresses. Alchemy I find to be one of the most interesting aspects, dont ask why, but theres something satisfying about making the right preperations and watching how much of an impact those preperations have on the battlefield.
Like the first game, Witcher II is thoroughly unique, each location feels lived in and contains varieties of architecture suited to the personalities of its inhabitors. Reoccuring are the corrupt politics, the foul language, raunchy humor, nonhuman/human tensions and relations, lust, women, love, the tone is always spot on. The story lives up to its consistent tone, and the decisions you make are weighty and meaningful. I can sit here complimenting this game, but all the other reviews are doing that already, I can tell you that this is no rushed Bioware game. This is not a streamlined Dragon age II or Mass Effect 2, this is a masterpiece built by passionate craftsman, it works as a whole and not only in pieces, this is the Witcher II one of the Best Roleplaying Games of all time.
*EDIT*
I have read some reviews that I believe poorly conceive the Witcher II and its combat system, Actiontrip's review for example and others, criticize the fact that the game allows you to become powerful in a certain tree and not require the others in battle. This is bad? It is a ridiculously well thought out leveling system that allows you to play, the way you wish to play, if you want to play balanced, then yes, you could take advantage of all the skills at your disposal, if you go full blown mage mode, go ahead and purely cast signs, swordsmanship, traps, etc. I fail to recognize this aspect as a failure, I do feel that the difficulty often leaps around, but this gives you a nice balance of feeling powerful, and a healthy challenge that tests your tactical abilitity. They also believe the Witcher II has been significantly skimmed down from its rythm based combat counterpart. The Witcher 1's system was much more linear, requiring somewhat of a balanced pallete, not as flexible, much dependant on swordplay. There were a plethora of talents, but most of which were passive like +5 vitality and traits of that sort. Each Talent point placed in the Witcher II's skill tree dramatically impact the gameplay, leveling feels raw, each level is sought after for it could just add another hint of variety to your game style. But I digress, I simply wish to justify a system that is so polished and meticulously designed into a scheme that looks simple, and plays simple, but is so intricately crafted that it remains challenging and flexible, and works no matter where you decide to place your talent points.