Ведьмак 2: Убийцы королей

As with many others, I think the graphics are nicer but the overall game is a bit of a step down due to the quicktime events, simplified swordplay, and hard-to-manage inventory- though I will give the game credit for giving me a reasonable carrying limit and not making me visit an inn every five minutes to drop off my extra items like the first game. However, even the graphics are a little glitchy, with small items like amulets and hair jittering around and clipping through things, and it even crashed a couple times when going through a door, though that was rare. Most of all, the atmosphere and plot are a bit of a letdown. While the game tells a good story and involves lots of reading like the first, this time around it seems to be mostly about politics and remembering the names and relationships of literally dozens upon dozens of people and kingdoms. I get that Geralt being forced into politics against his will is a theme of both games, but I really feel like they went light on the monster-hunting in this one. Maybe I should try again with Iorveth's path instead of Roche's and see if it's any better? One plus side was the gradual reveal of more and more information about the Wild Hunt throughout the game, which I found interesting and foreboding and which gives me a lot of hope for the third installment, given its title. Also nice was that the sexism was slightly toned down for this one- it's still absolutely rampant, but it feels more like a natural part of the game's world now that Geralt isn't sleeping with half the women he meets and collecting nude trading cards of them. So in short, not a bad effort, but some bad design decisions and a lot of running around punctuated by massive, minutes-long infodumps that can be a bit overwhelming and hard to follow. Oh, and the Draug fight on Dark Mode is incredibly cheap and unfair, not to mention ten times harder than any other fight, so poor balancing too.

Better than Witcher 3 :D

The Witcher is an epic Action-RPG with very well done graphics, story and combat system. Sadly I ran into a couple of technical difficulties (german game version). Also, some of my decisions made some quests in the later stages of the game impossible to complete. I still definitely recommend anyone the game who has played The Witcher 1 and liked it. Especially since you can grab The Witcher 2 for less than 3€ in a sale.

Game feels a little bit "old" when it comes to certain gameplay techniques, but it's still worth checking out for the story. Very much recommended to The Witcher fans, but also to people who dont mind checking out some older RPGs.

I played the original years ago and struggled badly with it, giving up after 10 or so hours. In the following years, I read the entire series of books (both the saga and the short story collections) and thus went into this with a lot more familarity and enthusiasm. Unfortunately...I hated it. The interminable backtracking through a dull environment. The voice acting (who on earth thought Dandelion should sound like that?!). The shallow combat, with dubious hit detection and strikingly limited animations. The performance (framerate drops on a GTX1080, with ubersampling off and at 1080p). The way you have to be angled just so to interact with objects. The drawn-out cutscenes. The QTEs. The cheap boss battles. Such a disappointment.