The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings Enhanced Edition

Well it finally here amid some trouble and poor design choices (i'll get to those) but the Witcher 2 has arrived and arrived with a bang. Based off our ever popular Witcher. Geralt or Rivia; he's back and back with a vengeance. I really love the story as it runs right in line with the novels and you feel like this was a true continuation of the first iteration of the Witcher. NO SPOILERS will be given here!!! None the less Geralt is after as the name implies the king slayers and what a ride it is. On the gameplay side the of th fence the combat is much improved (IMO) over the first series, gone are the three stances you had to apply, but the still the choice of blade is there (Silver for monster, Steel for Humanoid), I absolutely love this mechanic. More than once I was flailing away at a knight and making no headway when I realized I still had my Silver sword out. A quick change of blades, a parry here and roll away there, a flash of raw power from my Signs and a dead knight lay sprawled at my feet. At no time did I feel so over powered that I had flash backs of DOA2, and at no time did I feel so weak as i could not think my way out of a situation and pick and poke a much stronger opponent to death (the only exception is my attempt to take on Two Wraiths at level 6...not a good idea). Now for the bad I think everyone can agree on. Why on Earth would not allow the game to have selectable keys???!!! By this the original version of the game came locked down with the WSAD configuration. Now for a lefty like me that just pisses me off. So off I go into the config.ini to reset my keys. WHY?? This is 2011 and not having this ability is just plain dumb. I can live with the assigning of keys outside the game as well as all other aspects of the configuration, but this is inexcusable. Also what is up with the fact you can't adjust the music or volume of voice acting. I hate having subs on, but you almost have to just to understand what is going on here. This also needs to be addressed. OK bad mouthing aside, I know there is the 1.1 patch out for the issues but I have had not had the chance to play it since then as I had to uninstall and re-download the game to get it to work (GGGRRR) but hey I will tip my hat to CD RED for their acknowledgment of when they screwed up and how they are right on top of the game. I don't knock game designers and developers for bringing out a title with a few issues as long as they fix them quick. QA is a hard job and you can never get all the bugs, just won't happen. Bottom line BUY THIS GAME!!!!! It is fantastic, I am already waiting on part III.

I bought the game recently, after very much enjoying the 3rd installment (Wild Hunt+DLCs). Huge disappointment, as the gameplay is very "heavy" (combat, movement) and very constrained (I was expecting some kind of open world). Also, playing with a controller is far from easy; inventory is a mess; drinking a potion requires at least 6 buttons pressed; radial menu is painful. It even features QTEs!

*The Good* - It looks great, especially for a fairly old game. - The setting is still fairly interesting. - There are some nice dilemma's. Basically, i still like all the same things i did in TW1 and some elements were improved. Of course, they did add new bad stuff. *The Bad* - Combat is still worthless. There were only a couple of interesting fights. - Since you get so few skill points you basically have to focus on melee or magic, making combat even more boring. - Literally nothing is explained. Stealth, signs, looting (Space collects all), etc. - Button-mashing and QTEs. Why, oh god, why? - Tons of backtracking... again... - Still no freaking fast travel. - The worst verticality in a game ever. You have to walk to a specific point for the climb trigger to show up. It completely kills the flow and sometimes make you seasick with its janky camera movements. - Vergen seems to have been designed by M.C. Escher. - Constant doors everywhere in Flotsam. Seriously, did they order too many doors or something? - They keep mispronouncing Roche's name as "Roach". Took me a while to realise they were the same person. - At the start of Act II you regain all your items, easily putting you at nearly double the weight limit. There doesn't seem to be a storage or shop nearby, forcing you to crawl to town. - Multiple sleep-inducing sections in which you have to stay inside a mage's magic bubble while not being able to do anything other than walk. - Utterly moronic conclusion to the story. *Conclusion* TW1&2 have the same strengths and weaknesses. The gameplay elements are bad, the other stuff is decent and should have been the focus. Without the bad combat, dreadful navigation and related nonsense (inventory/trading/crafting) these could've been passable games. Or they could've just added fast travel and made combat even just interesting-adjacent (not bloody likely).

I've bought it for just 2 euros+- and at this price it's a steal. Graphics hold well, even today. Gameplay is a bit clunky, but it's absolutely playable. Huge improvement over a witcher 1. Story is interesting, poking at deeper questions. Great continuation of the Witcher story. You can even import saves from previous game with all of your decisions!

I spent my first 2 hours playing the witcher 2 yesterday evening. I must admit I was amazed by how good the game looks. The world really looks "alive"The story seems really promising, not to mention how nice it is, for someone who's read Sapkowsky's books, to find references, characters and events depicted in the books. So far, a wonderful job CD Projekt RED. Keep up the good work! :-)