The Witcher 2 first impressions

I am just asking, as I want to know whatever TW2 is worth buying or not. It started out with such a extremely positive feedback here but now people are saying it is worse than the first one… and if that is the case I don't see any reason to buy it.

There's plenty of feedback on this site from people who've finished it.

I haven't changed my mind about what I said the last time

Originally Posted by DArtagnan
I'd have to say the visuals were FAR beyond TW1 as well

I meant to say that as well. They both have good visuals, but TW2 is one of the best looking games I've ever played.

Originally Posted by GothicGothicness
How much better was the combat? and is gameplay better? those things really sucked in TW1…..

They sucked according to you, not to most people.

Originally Posted by GothicGothicness
I am just asking, as I want to know whatever TW2 is worth buying or not. It started out with such a extremely positive feedback here but now people are saying it is worse than the first one… and if that is the case I don't see any reason to buy it.

No one is saying it's "worse", as that would imply that TW1 was bad to begin with. Nice try though.

Some people liked TW1 more, others preferred TW2. It's a matter of personal taste, just like any other series. I'm guessing you would like the combat a lot more in TW2. The general gameplay isn't a whole lot different from TW1. Some of the mini-games have been changed, and there are now some QTE events in the game, but combat is the only thing that's drastically different.

I am still playing, but my personal opinion so far is that anybody with an interest in story-driven RPGs should by all means give the Witcher 2 a try. It's got atmosphere in spades, its challenging, it takes its players seriouosly, it provides some really different choices and it doesn't shy away from presenting you with the consequences.
I personally really like the combat system and the difficulty level, but it is clear that it is a bit of a love-or-hate thing. Its more action-oriented and more demanding regarding positioning, evading, and use of the signs, bombs etc. - at least at the beginning - apparently later on the difficulty gets reduced. I die a lot, but I always find a different approach after a few tries that works - I like it, if combat is like that.
However, for someone who (I think) is mainly looking for deep character systems, elaborate character customization opportunities, and likes tactical combat - maybe its not for you.

Originally Posted by GothicGothicness
I am just asking, as I want to know whatever TW2 is worth buying or not. It started out with such a extremely positive feedback here but now people are saying it is worse than the first one… and if that is the case I don't see any reason to buy it.

…worse if you prefer tactics above action. If you disliked the gameplay and combat of the first Witcher, chances are good that you'll like TW2 more, since it's quite different. It's also more… "driven"?, though by no means linear. I felt more pressure to push on with the main quest, and it felt to me as if there was a stronger delineation between main quest and side quests than in the first game.

People who don't like messing around with alchemy and inventory items, and who prefer action, will most likely enjoy the second game more.

I agree. A lot of the little fun bits and conveniences have been modified for better or worse. It's a rush straight forward into the action and story.

As far as the combat goes, the targeting's a bit dodgy at times tho in comparison to 1. If I only had a gp for every time i suddenly leapt towards the wrong opponent and into a hail of swords. I dont recall that problem in the original game's combat, at all. In comparison to the inventory/alchemy niggles, near-worthless and unchallenging minigames, some ambiguous quests - this was the greater and more glaring issue that will plague a player more than anything.

Or maybe I just suck at the game. I thought I was fairly good at controlling Geralt, parrying, using signs all that. It can be tough w/ a crowd of enemies to keep that little symbol trained on the right Joe.

I found myself playing the witcher 2 exclusively for plot and discovery reasons. I enjoyed the art direction a lot, the graphics, voice acting, some characters were really well done (Geralt, Triss, Foltest, Loredo, Henselt, Dethmold, Vandergrift). The locations were very atmospheric and probably the best I ve seen. Cutscenes were good but too many of them… way too many. The eternal battlefield on chapter 2 was amazing, favourite part in the game.

What I disliked was the gameplay. I hated having to drink potions before fights, having to roll all over the place, the clunkiness and unresponsive gameplay, that you cant figure what attack geralt is gonna do as sometimes he goes whirling other times he spins and thrusts (animation oriented gameplay instead of being pratical). The game is too much cutscene driven..

Most of my dislike comes from my uninterest on the witcher world though… Aside from the wild hunt theres nothing that stimulates my curiosity. Oh and the portrayal of elves is lame.

Originally Posted by Fadista
Oh and the portrayal of elves is lame.

I didn't think it was nearly as bad as the way they were portrayed in Dragon Age.

Yeah both DA and the witcher take a bad turn when it comes to elves. They portray them as endangered species, like dodos or something.

My DNA refuses immediatly. Still a great game! I was watching a trailer after completing it and realized how many great scenes the game has. Many of its scenes could have been the high points of so many games.

At least most of the Elves in TW have some attitude, and they are proud. The Elves in DA seemed far too docile for the most part, and too accepting of their fate.

Totally agree about TW2 being a great game, even if I liked TW1 a little more. I'm looking forward to playing it again.

I'm in chapter 1 right now on first playthrough - enjoying the game but it is very frustrating. All in all, I'd have to say the mustard has come off the hot dog in my fanboy-ism for CDProjekt. The first downgrade in my respect came with the fact that i couldn't install using the brand new CDs. The next downgrade came with the fact that I couldn't play the game in 3D for 3 months after its release. Now that I'm finally playing it, it's not all that epic after all.

I get a hard lock-up on my PC about 50% of the time I enter a dice game.

The inventory system wouldn't be so bad if not for the way it behaves using a controller. I don't know how many times I've tried to simply read a book, only to find that somehow I took off my boots and now I'm running around barefooted! There's just no excuse for that type of design.

I'm also having tremendous problems with the difficulty. The learning curve is ridiculous, and the tutorial is often vague. The fact that it doesn't pause the action to allow you to read it and only shows up for like, 3 seconds is dumb. Throwing bombs seems pretty random - I can't figure out how to aim them effectively and use them in combination with signs as CDProjekt advertised. - Again, I'm playing with a controller.

I dunno,… so far it's a game I hate to love. The story and atmosphere compels you to keep going in spite of the pretty bad functionality and learning curve. I hope I get the hang of it soon, or this may be a game I have to play in between other titles.

Jabberwocky to throw a bomb effectively you have to have your enemy targeted. If you can see a name above your enemy the bomb will hit, if not it's a wasted effort. The best bomb in game is (IMO) grapeshot and the best tactic (again IMO) is to use Yarden to trap your target, back off, throw couple of grapeshots and rinse & repeat.

Jabberwocky, I'm glad to see you're finally playing it.

I agree the learning curve is pretty tough on your first playthrough. What difficulty level are you playing on?

I never tried using a controller for TW2, but I didn't have any issues with the inventory using keyboard and mouse. I also never experienced any lockups or crashes that I can recall.

Originally Posted by zahratustra
Jabberwocky to throw a bomb effectively you have to have your enemy targeted. If you can see a name above your enemy the bomb will hit, if not it's a wasted effort. The best bomb in game is (IMO) grapeshot and the best tactic (again IMO) is to use Yarden to trap your target, back off, throw couple of grapeshots and rinse & repeat.

Ah, okay. Thanks… I haven't had much luck with the targeting system because it seems every time I lock onto someone I get killed from the 15 other enemies surrounding me. I've had better success with a hit or two at one enemy and moving onto the next. The down side to that tactic is that all the enemies lose health at the same rate - leaving the same amount to hit back until they all drop at once…. I dunno, it's just frustrating.

Originally Posted by JDR13
Jabberwocky, I'm glad to see you're finally playing it.

I agree the learning curve is pretty tough on your first playthrough. What difficulty level are you playing on?

I never tried using a controller for TW2, but I didn't have any issues with the inventory using keyboard and mouse. I also never experienced any lockups or crashes that I can recall.

I'm embarrassed to say that I'm playing on 'normal' difficulty. I'm getting the hang of combat against humans, but so far against monsters (namely Nekkers and Drowners) I'm having a terrible time of it due to the number of enemies at once.

As for the controller, I usually play that way when a game supports it. I may have to try with keyboard/mouse though if I can't get any better otherwise.

I dunno what's causing the lock up, but as soon as the dice screen comes up that asks you for your wager, the buttons for 'ok' or 'cancel' are missing, and it's locked up for good. Sucks because I'm sure there are quests related to dice playing, but I don't want to risk having to reboot just to see.

The normal difficulty for TW2 is like the hard difficulty in most games, so it's nothing to be embarrassed about. There's also not a big difference between normal and hard in TW2, imo. I actually broke a keyboard out frustration during my playthrough.

This is the first I've heard about it locking up during dice poker, but you should probably see if you can find a related thread at the official forums.

Thanks JDR13 - Yeah I refuse to step down to 'easy'. I tried it a little bit in the prologue and it's stupid easy.

I fired up the game for a few minutes and realized what my main problem was with one particular spot - I thought I was using a save game AFTER I drank potions in preparation, but it was actually a save game BEFORE I drank any potions. So several times I charged into combat with a group of drowners completely unprepared, thinking all along that I WAS prepared! D'oh!

As we all know… a Witcher without his potions is only half a Witcher

The bug with the lockup on the dice poker is I think only with the controller and only as of the 1.3 patch. Although many people reported it, it does not seem to have been fixed in the 1.35 patch.

It doesn't happen for me 100% of time, but a similar thing does happen 100% of the time with the trebuchet targeting in the prologue.

I play the game on easy, I'm not even going to hide it. I'm not an action game person and have been basically dragged kicking and screaming into what Alrik calls 'the Age of Action' because all RPGs are made that way these days.

That said, this series is starting to get a little TOO action oriented for my tastes with this whole arena update coming up. I really don't think I'll be pre-ordering TW3 but will take a wait and see approach. I also think my preferences lean further away from action combat than most of you here since the rest of you mostly seem to have little issue with it.

Ah for the days of turn based combat.

Originally Posted by Jabberwocky
Ah, okay. Thanks… I haven't had much luck with the targeting system because it seems every time I lock onto someone I get killed from the 15 other enemies surrounding me. I've had better success with a hit or two at one enemy and moving onto the next. The down side to that tactic is that all the enemies lose health at the same rate - leaving the same amount to hit back until they all drop at once…. I dunno, it's just frustrating.

I don't remember ever being surrounded by 15 enemies but, since Geralt is only a light armor kind of guy, you really shouldn't let yourself be surrounded in the first place Jabber. Remember that back stab does 200% damage to your PC so, if you have somebody behind you, one or two hits might be enough to kill you even if there are only 5 and not 15 of them.
Use terrain/architecture as chocking points to limit your enemies down to manageable level but, if you do get surrounded, just run (or dodge) for it and than come back and pull them in numbers you are comfortable with. Signs and bombs are your friends but remember to carry few traps with you as well. Pulling mobs over traps you set beforehand works wonders!

Good to know about the dice poker bug being controller related. Well, if it's documented I suppose they will fix it hopefully.

Another bug I have discovered: If you save a game within Loredo's compound and load it later, all dialogue will be silent - no speech whatsoever. The only way to fix it is to load a previous save game that is outside his compound. I lost about 15 minutes of gameplay on that little discovery.

@ Zahratustra: Thanks for the pointers. And yeah, I was exaggerating about the 15 enemies - it's more like 5. I was just frustrated. See my previous post, as I figured out what I was doing wrong. I'm back on track and enjoying it again!

With Witcher 2, I found "tactical withdrawal" helped me out quite a bit. Dont commit to a head-on fight, especially against swarmers like the Nekkers. Kill a few, back off. Wade back in and kill some more, then back off. Buff up w/ the shield sign (i forget what it's called atm). If you dive headfirst into the nekkers and go for the win (early game), youre toast.

Skirt the edges of the battle and jump in and pick enemies off gradually, you cant just roll in sword-a-swinging. You'll get the hang of it, and youll start getting good equipment/levels up soon that will help as well.