My rating is intended to help people understand what kind of game this is, or rather, what it isn't. It is NOT an "adventure game," as the name implies. The description additionally makes this game sound like it has some sort of campaign or story; "hunt for deadly beasts, solve ancient mysteries, and take part in complex political intrigues. Make choices and face their brutal consequences in a world begging to be explored!" In truth it's just a board game. That may seem obvious if you knew there was a board game version ahead of time, but I did not, and I suspect others don't as well. There are plenty of games that use board game *mechanics* to do more, which is what I expected. A similar example would be Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales. It uses Gwent-like deck-building card game mechanics, but it tells a story where you genuinely do make choices and participate in monster hunting and intrigue and all that stuff. In this game you're really just moving pieces and rolling dice and playing cards. Sure the quests are *framed* as monster hunting or political intrigue or whatever, but there's no cohesive plot or narrative, it's just "go here, collect these, kill that." What character you choose gives you different abilities, but beyond that is irrelevant. And as far as that goes, it's fine? It's a competent Witcher skin for a dozen other board games that operate exactly like this. But there's nothing that really makes it stand out, to me. There's no voice acting for any of the characters, no interactions between them, nothing that makes this a "Witcher" experience but the aesthetics.
