The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Review

The Witcher 3 attempts to compete with the biggest names in gaming for the best Open World RPG of recent years. Is the game worth picking up? Or should this contract be skipped over until a better offer comes along? Check out this Honest Game Review and make your choice!

The Witcher 3 starts you in a dream sequence with Geralt and Siri. Geralt is the character you play throughout most of the Witcher 3 and Siri is a girl he has raised daughter. Once you wake up you are on the hunt for one of Geralt’s lovers, Yennefer. From there it becomes a search for Siri and a hunt the Wild Hunt. Along the way you will run into tons of characters from previous Witcher games and make choices that ultimately affect the outcome of the game. The choices you make will determine what other characters in the game think of you as well.

Throughout the game you will be doing tons of side content as well. There are of course side quests in every area that will net you EXP, money and sometimes loot. Some of them are your basic fetch and return quests while others are monster contracts. These normally have you fighting rare or epic monsters for good money and good loot. Some of the side quests also have an effect on the story line so they are worth doing. The biggest issue with the side quests is the fact you get TOO high leveled for the main quest. I wanted to do all the side quests before moving on with the story but that just made the story way to easy. Some dynamic scaling with the more important enemies of the story element would have made for a more streamlined experience.

Other than side quests you will be exploring all of the areas for different locations. On each map you will find a bunch of question marks to explore. These range from Bandit Camps and Monster Nests, to Sunken Treasure and Places Of Power. The Places of Power will net you a temporary sign buff as well a skill point. You will also run into random people in need of help as you travel as well. Typically you only need to run about 5 minutes on any map to run into something interesting.

Combat in the game is a bit limited. The attacks cycle and there is only a few magic attacks to use. It’s more about mastering what attacks to use on what enemies then anything else. Do I block or do I dodge? Should I use Quen or Igni? Once you sort out what weakness plagues your current enemy, it becomes pretty easy. Geralt also seems to have to spin for every melee attack he does. It works but it could of been more in depth. Also when you roll you get some invincibility frames, like Dark Souls. If you upgrade your melee you can hold the buttons down for epic attacks, this takes quite a few levels to get to though. You also cannot jump in combat. This doesn’t seem like a big deal, but when you get pushed back against a small fence and you want to get over it you won’t be able to.

You start with a horse that makes getting to places quicker, assuming you stay on the road. The horse is terrible in the woods and going up hills or mountains. Sometimes he will just plain stop or get caught on something you can hardly see. Unless I was on the road I pretty much just went on foot. Swimming is another area that suffers poor controls. When you are trying to get items under water, or just trying to swim around, you will get turned around randomly or the camera will move for no reason. You do spend a lot of the later part of the game underwater so becomes more of a problem as you progress. They have tried to improve it, and to be fair it is better, but it still isn’t great.

There is also something called “Witcher Sense” that let’s you see items and monster tracks in the world. Witcher Sense will become something you use constantly for quests and while getting crafting materials. The crafting system is pretty easy to learn which is nice.

Overall The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is a fantastic single player experience. The true quality of the game shines when you step back to analyze the problems. The inventory system is very sluggish, the crafting is far too complex for what it delivers, mounted combat seems little more than an after thought and if I extinguish one more candle while looking for loot I’ll likely break down and cry. Despite missing the mark on a number of very basic elements, the game still impressed me of almost every level. The best bang for your buck you’re going to get from the latest choices on all platforms, and finally one that met up to its hype.

The Witcher 3 does have some minor flaws but ultimately is a game every RPG fan should play this year. This game is easily going to be a contender for Game Of The Year in 2015.