Poor controls and menus weren't enough to take away from the fantastic game that is The Witcher 2.
So why is it so good in my opinion? Several reasons:
The world, it's just fantastic. This is a mature RPG, and it makes it much more immersive because many of the places are exactly as vile and upside down as they should be considering the events that are going on.
This is helped by the amazing graphics, the game seriously looks stunning at some places.
Dialogue is great. The mature aspect helps again. People behave like they should, not sparing the cursing if it fits. And in how many games you get elves that tell you to go fu*k yourself? Even the side dialogues you can get while following an NPC and the journal are very well written.
The story had me hooked which means it was good. It was like reading a good book, I really wanted to know what would happen next. Cutscenes and quest material like books nicely filled in on information.
And then perhaps what I'm most impressed with.. replay value. The devs put an incredible amount of work into making your choices really matter, and it pays off. Even the prologue can be completed in two different ways, giving you different cutscenes and different people to interact with.
Even a little choice as deciding if bringing an NPC with you to do a quest or not can grant you new information, cutscenes and fights. I know I'm raving about cutscenes a lot, but really, they are very well made and enjoyable to watch.
My first playthrough took ~30 hours, which I don't consider short, but if you do, you will most likely want to play it through once more to see all the aspects you missed the first time. It's alot, I can promise you that.
All in all, it's a fantastic game. It had me hooked and it left me waiting for more.