Witcher 3 - Understands War

@warisboring.com Matthew Gault writes about the Witcher 3 through the lens of its war time setting.

Fallout and Call of Duty were fun. Metal Gear was fun and brilliant. But The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt was on another level. It was the best game I played in 2015 and one of the best games I've ever played in my entire life. Polish developer CD Projekt crafted an immersive world, told a compelling story and made every moment fun to experience.

But more than that, CD Projekt took a staple video game setting - war - and presented it in a way games rarely do. War is awful. It shatters lives, separates families and ravages the land. The Witcher 3 understands that.

[...]

Many video games are power fantasies, and most that involve warfare depict the glory of combat and put the player in the lead role. Not so in The Witcher 3. Geralt has his own motivations, and he does his best to avoid politics and the larger conflict between Nilfgaard and the Northern Kingdoms.

And CD Projekt never depicts war as glorious or fun. Soldiers describe combat as a lot of boredom and waiting punctuated by moments of frenzied madness. The Northern War of the The Witcher 3 is all about waiting, survival and boredom.

[...]

Dead bodies litter the ground of the Northern Kingdoms. Nilfgaardians and Northerners alike rot in the sun. People hang from trees, a sign posted in front of their swinging and bloated bodies lists their crimes - desertion, stealing provisions and rape. The North and the South hang criminals in equal measure. Refugees huddle outside of the few cities untouched by the war. Soldiers demand the proper paperwork and keep the rabble from flooding the last civilized outposts in the North.

Civilians cling to tradition and appease whichever army is currently occupying them. They know it could all change tomorrow. There are no heroes, just men and women desperate to survive. This sense of despair and struggle permeates The Witcher 3.