The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
2015 CD Projekt RED Playstation 4 The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is the third game in CD Projekt RED’s The Witcher series based on the fantasy novels by Andrzej Sapkowski. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was the first game that I had played in this series and therefore was genuinely impressed when the end credits rolled that it was based on a series of novels. You play as Geralt of Rivia, one of the last Witchers – monster hunters for hire. The game revolves around finding Ciri, a daughter figure to Geralt as he embarks on a quest that takes him back and forth from White Orchard to Velen, through Novigrad, Nilfgaard and Skellige and back again. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was by far, my personal game of 2015. I found the game fantastic and the story wholeheartedly gripping. I played the game through once on normal mode and then once more straight after on Death’s March mode. It’s safe to say The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt had me addicted and the sad thing is, as much as a trophy hunter that I am, I wished that there was more for me to do after attaining the platinum. I loved this game. The combat of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt takes a little getting used to at first. When I first installed the game, I chose to play on Death’s March, however, after getting my arse handed to me by the first big encounter of the Royal Griffin, I quickly swapped to Normal mode to really get to grips with the combat controls. However, I grew to really love the controls, the dodging, parrying, the casting of signs. This is the game that The Elder Scrolls series should have been. Some of the encounters, especially on Death’s March were extremely challenging and frustrating, however, the sense of satisfaction after overcoming it made it extremely worthwhile. The only real monsters that I despised fighting was Wraiths, some of the fights involving these caused me to swear, a lot. The Botchling encounter and the Witcher Contract revolving around the lighthouse, these involved a lot of Wraiths, a lot of the use of the Yrden sign, Spectre Oil and profanities. I won’t give too much away, but the final battle of the game on Death’s March mode was utterly amazing, a true swords fight of epic proportions that lasts about 40 minutes, what a way to end a game. A true tip of the hat CD Projekt RED. It’s difficult to talk about the story in a game that I thoroughly enjoyed so much, the story has many twists and turns, big decisions to make, extremely dark moments and some very amusing points. The development of the characters themselves is really well done and thought out, each one giving glimpses of their backstory and expanding more and more without even having to play The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings. Yet, for those who have played the previous game, the option to load your previous decisions so that you can continue into sequel is a great addition. One of my favourite parts of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was the inclusion of the mini-game Gwent. I played hours upon hours of Gwent and at parts enjoyed Gwent more than The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt itself. Initially, the first few games can be tricky, but a few innkeeper/merchant battles and the purchases of a few Gwent cards and you’ll become and unstoppable machine. I know a fair few people who actually hate Gwent and struggle to get their head around the game. However, I found the hardest part to Gwent was remembering which merchants/innkeepers that I had played already when collecting their unique cards. I countered this by eventually making a list. For the record, I play a Northern Realms deck, my favourite deck by far. Graphically, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is absolutely beautiful, it uses the REDengine 3 engine, this gives the world and the characters themselves so much definition and realism that at first glance, you would assume it to be a television program. Which leads me to state, sod Game of Thrones, when is there a Witcher TV series coming out? Because that would be amazing if given the right budget and writers. However, I digress. My only main criticism of the graphics in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was that many of the NPC’s that weren’t main characters had very similar features, especially the Dwarves and Halflings. But that is scraping the bottom of the barrel for things to moan about and when thinking about this, how many games can you think of that follow this exact transcript? I often say that my favourite video game musical score is from World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King in the Howling Fjord area. Playing The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt brought back so many memories of being in Howling Fjord for the first time. The music is so vast and epic that it could be slipped into The Lord of the Rings. The harsh drums used during encounters aids in adding to the tension, especially during a boss encounter. The music drifts in and out during your exploration of the world, the score is quite epic and grandiose in Nilfgaard and Redania moving to a more savage and raw sound to match the harsh landscape and peoples of Skellige. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is an absolutely fantastic game, I massively enjoyed playing it and will certainly go back to playing it again in the future just for fun. With the release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Game of the Year Edition being released this year, I may happily revisit the game then. Yes, the game crashed on me a few times, but less than Fallout 4 and certainly less than The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Grand Theft Auto V, but with a game that encompasses so much, it is a testament to the amount of work that the team at CD Projekt RED have put into the game and the finished product is a masterpiece. Even after 1 year, I would class The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt in my top 20 games of all time and yes, the more I think about it, the further up the list it goes! 10/10 Adam
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November 2016
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