The Witcher Review, Continued
In a further effort to stay true to the books, The Witcher does feature a bit of gore and also some heavily implied sexual themes and nudity. Decapitations do happen, and people can get incinerated by flames; nude or semi-nude bodies are shown as well, with sexual hookups occurring throughout each chapter if so desired. While most gamers have become accustomed to gore in games, the sexual themes are definitely unique, especially when presented in a serious manner. Geralt it turns out is a bit of a curiosity to many females out there, and each lady has a different reason for eventually giving themselves to Geralt, if they choose to do so. It's not always handed to you, though, as many of the ladies require certain gifts or simply the correct type of flirting to take place.
When an intimate situation does occur, the player is presented with a very suggestive if not fully nude painted "card" as can what can only be described as a reward. Beyond random hookups, love triangles also present themselves and there are even opportunities to meddle in the love affairs of others, to help save or destroy them. While I cannot recall love and sex ever being covered so deeply and seriously in previous games, I certainly can appreciate the efforts as it really does go above and beyond to further separate The Witcher from the crowd. It should be noted, however, that the presentation of such is much more developed than what was seen in BioWare's Mass Effect.
The Witcher features plenty of female characters, sexual themes, and romance subplots.
What was most impressive to me was that during my play through, there were so many moments where I was convinced that the game was going to end and that I'd have to wait until the sequel to learn more, when it instead just opened up another chapter of the story. The Witcher is really a game that has so much content in it that the developers could have easily released the game with a fraction of the content and it would have still satisfied many RPG gamers. Instead of seeking to milk the franchise, CD Projekt instead decided to give players a very full and satisfying experience in a game that was developed with so many unique aspects and features in mind. Beyond just a core RPG experience, The Witcher also features little bonuses like a fully developed gambling system involving dice; a boxing system which has you fist fighting other champions for money and glory; a branching upgrade tree that has numerous different exciting upgrades and perks for your character; and a fully developed alchemy system that enables you to make potions, bombs, and blade coatings for your weapons. All in all, CD Project packed so much content and so many features into The Witcher that it has truly become a shining example of what an RPG should be.
Combat is handled in a sort of real-time/turn-based fashion in the mode I selected, however there is an alternative combat and movement mode that I did not explore. Combinations of attacks become unlocked, but require the player to execute them in a timely manner; these attacks are presented by a cursor change from a standard sword type icon to one of two flaming sword stages. Speaking of attacks, there are also three different fighting modes to use while using your standard swords or silver swords. You'll find yourself having to choose between a heavy attack, a fast attack, and a group attack. I preferred the group attack in most situations, as it causes damage to all units in your vicinity and also enables things like knockdown if you advance far enough along the tree.
Spells are bound to your right mouse button, with the number keys used to select the actual spell of choice. The Witcher has you limited to five spells in total, with the upgrades each drastically affecting the way the spells behave. Unique weapons are available to be forged or found, as well as special armor as you progress. While I would have liked to see some more variations, there were enough to keep me satisfied especially considering that the primary combat modes are the bread and butter of the combat system and rely on swords themselves. The axes, knifes, hammers were all decent but I rarely used them.
The Witcher uses Bioware's Aurora engine, which still looks and runs fantastic and actually had me second guessing initially if it were the same technology used in Mass Effect (it did not - Mass Effect uses the Unreal Engine 3). Discussion is all handled in a "choose your own adventure" type of way, where you are offered pre-set responses, questions, or statements. Combat flows quite well and the game has a surprising ability to load some pretty vast areas without requiring load times between them. When there are load times, such as when entering a structure, they pass by very quickly and typically will only take longer if an auto-save is in progress as well. The Aurora engine definitely shows however that it is by no means an old engine and is perfectly capable of supporting a current or even next generation RPG. The only downside of the engine seemed to have been an issue with occasionally crashing, which I was able to fix promptly after reading the support forums. Once the fix was in place, the game no longer would crash at times and I was able to play without issues.
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