All of us here at ActionTrip have been following closely the development of this one, hoping that we might finally get our hands on a decent single-player RPG, a genre which once has shone brightly, but its light is slowly dimming under the heap of pretentious and short-lived games.
As the day approached, we became more and more skeptical, if for no other reason than because this industry has thought[sic: taught?] us to be cynical; to expect titles with not enough marketing clout, with not enough draw for the Attention Deficit Disorder audience...Remarkably, the Polish-based team and the ailing publisher Atari managed to withstand this pressure, to crash against the waves in their makeshift raft and live to reach the high seas.
...From a technical standpoint, there are a number of gamers who have complained about the load times and admittedly, this is a concern. The loading screen will pop up way too often and at every single instance of this game. Interestingly, after the initial annoyance that it caused, I got used to it, and I have to say, at this stage of my Witcher experience it's not bothering me as much.
The reason why my aggravation has been dulled lies in the depth of the game world. The Witcher is an immersive experience on several different levels. While technically pushing the Aurora engine like no other title, the real draw is the rather unorthodox approach to the main character's moral choices...in games like KOTOR for instance, while available, the moral choices that the player had to make were as black and white as pieces on a chess board. And while this makes sense literally, one should keep in mind that the color of the pieces doesn't stand for right or wrong. It is a fight between pawns and kings - all with their tools, means and goals.
...Another issue, which stems from this rather unusual approach to game world building, is the absence of more spectacular and diverse loot in the game. A lot of the emphasis is put on Alchemy (potion-making) for some reason, while through Chapters 1 and 2 and well into Chapter 3, The Witcher has found one really good sword and is still wearing the Studded Leather Armor from the first chapter.
Still, one can simply argue that this is due to the game's design philosophy, and this would be in part true. The same can be said about the amount of dialogue in the game. Often times, The Witcher will seem much more like an adventure game than an action game. In fact, this is NOT an action RPG by definition. This is a...true RPG where dialogue and conversations take center stage over dungeon crawls.
