Mate, that's from 2022. I've scanned through it and it seems completely unhelpful.

Yeah, make me read through an investor-oriented powerpoint from three years ago once, shame on you.

I really had trouble getting in to that game. May try it again but it seemed a bit too… generic?

I really enjoyed that the setting is more grounded than other games. Personally, I wouldn't describe it as generic.

Gameplay-wise it doesn't do much interesting.

I know exactly what you mean. I started it 3 times before I got into it

In my opinion, a lot of the gameplay is fairly generic. Attacking a wraith feels the same as attacking a human

It really shines in the immersion and story, though. The first two times I played it, I was skipping all of the dialog and cutscenes (depression is a bitch), so I missed all the good parts

Once you get into the mindset of "hunting" one of the monsters and selecting the right oils and potions, it can be really fun and feel almost like "strategy". For example, there's a potion that turns your blood poisonous to vampires

I played through it once and really liked it but didn't see myself going back because of the generic gameplay. Apparently, the hardest difficulty forces you to use all of your oils and potions depending on the monster/situation. I think that might solve the gameplay problem since that was pretty much optional in easier difficulties. Not to mention make it a lot more immersive since you have to strategize like the witcher

IMHO, its gameplay is mediocre at best:

• Sluggish controls
• Character movement that is unrealistically limited without offering anything to make up for it
• Fiddly object interaction problems (e.g. candles often getting in the way of more important things)
• Bland combat mechanics
• "Open" world populated almost entirely with copy/paste combat encounters
• Little reward for exploration, since practically everything worth finding has a map marker
• A tiny handful of side quests re-used over and over with different mini-stories to make the quests seem distinct while the tasks to perform are mostly identical

This game's strengths are not the gameplay, but the lore, characters, and story. (All the things that could be had from reading the books, or maybe watching the live action adaptation.)

Oh, and Gwent. Gwent is remarkably well-designed for a mini-game within another game.

Such an amazing game. I’m not into RPGs but somehow got convinced to play this.

I don’t understand how I even had the energy to play 100+ hrs next to work. I often played until 2 am on weekdays, or woke up earlier to play.

I understand the complaints of the gameplay or controls, but the story and the characters are what makes this game special. It’s a journey I will never forget, some memories and feelings from it will stay with me forever

Are they doing some release or something? Or is this just a special commemorative video?

You could try The Witcher 1. Gameplay there is..unique. A little dated today but IMO has the best writing of the three.

The live action adaptation took a steaming dump on the original story sadly, some episodes are still worth watching but it's not made by people who understand what made Witcher special, no wonder Henry Cavill left

What would you suggest for better open world games?

It depends on what aspects of an open world are important to you.

Exploration is at the top of my list, and Skyrim is a good example of doing it well. Its world is full of unique things/places/characters to find, whether through an NPC's directions, or a roughly sketched map picked up while adventuring, or following your curiosity toward an area that looks interesting, or chasing a fox, or simply by wandering off the beaten path.

Map markers appear after you've already been somewhere so you can find your way back again, but since most of them are hidden until then, they don't spoil the experience of discovery.

And, when you find something, it's often genuinely interesting. Not yet another copy/paste monster fight or "hold the button to follow your witcher sense to the lost thing" quest. Not just checking off a task list item (or pre-placed map marker) so you can rush to the next one. The experience itself is rewarding.

Mind, I have criticisms of Skyrim, but it did exploration and environments (including soundscapes) very well, and I wish more open world designers would learn from it and build upon its strengths.

EDIT:

I would love to play a game that reached or exceeded Skyrim's bar for exploration and environmental immersion, Breath of the Wild's bar for freedom of movement and wildlife, and The Witcher 3's bar for characters and story.

Wait so you can let yourself be bitten in order to slay the vampire ? I played it in 2018 but never really did the oils and stuff

I feel CP2077 does great with regard to storytelling and exploration (plenty of nooks and crannies in and around Night City), wildlife is nonexistant though. A Witcher game played in first-person would be cool...

Yeah! Although, it's more of a preventative measure than a trap card. A lot of the oils are pretty boring, but some can be fun to use

I ended up almost exclusively doing the Witcher missions since you usually learn what you're going to fight

I think my favorite part of Cyberpunk 2077's open world was that it was full of activity. The encounter variety might have been a little disappointing, but I was impressed with how they made the city feel dense and populated. It was much more convincing than the miniature towns full of locked doors and fake windows that are passed off as "cities" in so many other games.

The controls I thought were really easy but I played on PC so I could swing the mouse around and I don't need to looks at the keyboard to hit almost any key. So for me I thought it was real easy to control contrary to what I read online

Then I played on a console and then I understood the hate for Witcher 3 controls. I remember it feeling very heavy. Weird to control the camera and Geralt

My disbelief was suspended as well

I feel like you could only think that if you're more interested in learning the setting than seeing the characters interact.