I'll start

CDPR should look at this PSP game called Monster Hunter

in the boss battles of W2 the Kayran moves were practically telegraphed since it took up most of the screen and the Draug was open for attacks almost all the time with Yrden and the 100% knockback rate (when you hit him he gets stunned a little bit) there should be times where he doesn't flinch so he has a chance to attack you. In MH you pretty much had to observe your opponent and find openings yourself with the the Draug his opening was not only obvious but it worked every time while in MH enemies will have different openings depending on what attack they were doing.The monster there even escaped ,healed up by eating other monster,sleeping or drinking water from the waterfall to restore stamina. You could also cut some of their parts so it couldn't attack with those also they didn't have life bars you pretty much had to guess if it was going to die by the way the monster behaved.

in general TW2 needed more monsters, but i thought the enemy AI was pretty decent. the real challenge isn't in facing the Draug, but your first time going into that nekker cave in chapter 1, lol.

I wouldn't be looking at Monster Hunter myself. I think the epic boss battles in TW2 lacked strategy compared to the group encounters and smaller bosses. I would just ditch them in the next game. Basically, they should look at any game that does UI and inventory management better, which might be every other game ever made :P

Here's a list I would recommend:

Diablo
DA:O
Deus Ex
Ego Draconis

In regard to the maps, they needed to include more secret/hidden stuff, and Ego Draconis did this very well. You were rewarded more with exploration in that game.

we wouldn't want CDPR to be like Bioware. They take stuff out if people say it's bad instead of making it work.

hunting monsters is pretty much what a witcher does and that includes epic boss battles they can't just dump it. I still want to fight a Manticore and stuff like that.

DA:O and Diablo is definitely NOT the type WC 2 should look at.

Those game has basically turn based combat system. The entire combat is a feast of sure strike. No one block. One a target is selected the PC does all the attack for gamer.

The real time combat is WC2 should look at is assassin creed, Prince of persia 2. They have much better combat moves.

WC2 takes the right direction in their current combat. It syncs the player skills with RPG elements.

Enemy will blocks ... Enemy agressiveness depends on enemy level.

Enemy chance of blocking and dodging depends on the player level.

In the case of lower level, players have to patient and less aggressive. They complain a feast of mouse clicks. Indeed they are doing just that because they don't what else to do. A bit of more game ballance to prevent rolling, dodging, and better AI script will definitely add more challenge to the game.

So far there are plenty of mod that will add more challenge to the game such as downscaling Quen power.

I only meant that the inventories of the games I listed are well done. I don't want TW3 to play like those games.

LA Noire for its facial animations
Shadow of the Collosus, Demon Souls for its boss fights (one of the weakests parts of the game)

isn't the facial animation really costly

I'm up for the SotC boss fights but I don't see Geralt jumping any time soon with that engine.

I don't know how costly facial animation is but I do know its one of the weaker part of the presentation in TW2 (though the overall direction of the scenes could be a bit better)

Regarding SOTC, yeah perhaps the gameplay isn't adequate for this kind of RPG, but at least the epic ness and the well designed fights.

Kayran and dragon are epic fights but they are very poor gameplay wise, and frustrating too

Haven't seen great facial animation with many games though. But I heard L.A. Noire was developed with a new (proprietary) technique.

Yeah, I don't know if they can use that technology but they should definitely improve in this area.

Uncharted 2/3 is another good place to look up to for inspiration in this front

To be fair, they did an ok job (you can see hints of anger or in Geralt's face, creepy smile). The other animations (drinking on the chin, awkward head tilt - esp. with Roche, sex scenes) are more noticeable. The QTE fights on the other hand feels more polished than the cutscenes.

I don't think a lot of resources went into the cut scenes, and to be honest, if they had to skimp on anything, that should be it imo.

Half-Life 2 does it extremely better than both those games. Uncharted's facial tech is laughable because the faces look barely human. The great thing about TW2 is the imperfections in the faces rather than making everyone white and handsome, so Uncharted is definitely not a place to look for it. As for L.A Noire, it steps extremely into the uncanny valley and requires lots of sacrifices, like models and absolutely NO benchmarks.

what do you mean? but i agree, HL2 does has good facial animations