Who Am I?
I awoke today to a gray dawn, the rain pouring down outside my window. I looked around, uncertain of where I was... and come to think of it, who, what, and when I was. I stood up from my sleeping mat, glanced around the unfamiliar surroundings, and managed to find something that would pass as clothing. Opening the door to my room, I found a small package outside with a note. "You have amnesia. Try this — it will help." What the...?
 Deja vu |
Along with the note was a rectangular box with a strange looking fox head on the cover and the words "The Witcher" across the top. Opening the box, I found a shiny circular disc. Memories poked at my fogged mind: "It's a DVD — you put it inside a computer." My unknown benefactor appeared to be right; the box was helping my memories to return. Walking down the hall, I found a convenient table with food and a laptop sitting on it; might as well get started….
As I watched the opening sequence of this "game", I began to recall more of my past: books I read, people I knew, getting sick at tradeshows, working on computers, and doing something called "benchmarking" until my eyes bled. Another phrase kept popping into my mind: "A non-tech". Who or what that meant, I just couldn't guess. Back to the game, I was walking around a virtual world, talking to people, killing people, and occasionally sleeping with people. Every now and then, I would level up, regaining lost memories and skills.
While my virtual counterpart became more adept at slicing and dicing monsters, my real-world skill upgrades were less dramatic. Typing could be upgraded with 60 WPM and Enhanced Carpal Tunnels, with the level 5 upgrade being Speech-Recognition. Strength upgrades featured skills such as Mountain Biking, Hiking, and the ability to Lug around 20 Pound Desktop Replacement Notebooks. Stamina skills were similarly useful: All-Night Gaming Sessions, Extra Caffeine Tolerance, and Resistance to Tradeshow Meetings. Perhaps I should've started with the Intelligence category, however: Improved Wit, Analogies, Insightful Commentary, and Internet Author were available. Unfortunately, I ran out of skill points after choosing the Author upgrade — it was Improved Wit or the Nacho Champion stamina upgrade! At least you're getting a review, even if it is for a two month old game….
If you're thinking right about now that that's the most clichéd introduction to an article you've ever read, you're probably right. Nevertheless, the same cliché serves as the basis for The Witcher, a game developed by CD Projekt and published by Atari. Don't let that deter you, however, as what follows that generic introduction is anything but. The Witcher is set in a fantasy world based on the books of Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski.
 Believe it or not, there's a laptop on a desk inside |
Who? Okay, so most of us very likely don't speak Polish and have never read any of his books, but they appear to be extremely popular in Poland and they are being translated into other languages. I'm a huge fan of fantasy and sci-fi books, and I often wish that the stories in computer games could reach the same level as what we find in the pen and ink world. Some of my favorite games of all time have been based on literature — Neuromancer and Betrayal at Krondor — so I was more than happy to give The Witcher a shot.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
39 Comments
View All Comments
haplo602 - Friday, January 25, 2008 - link
Nice review, I skipped the garbage at the beginning :) but rest is fine.I was quite interested in the game until the problems page. My old PC won't handle this game it seems (1GB ram, x1650XT, athlon 64).
Anyway I read some of the Witcher books and I can only highly recommend them. If the story in the game is only half as good, it's a great game.
sjaxkingpin - Friday, January 25, 2008 - link
Nice to see a review of one of the best games in a long time. Seems like the Eastern Block is responsible for alot of good games recently, with Crytek, Stalker and now the witcher. Too much corporate influence over here, I suppose.BTW, to the earlier poster who linked to the Zero Punctuation stuff, I'd never seen em before and I think I watched every one back to back... HILARIOUS!!!
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/edit...">http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/edit...
saiga6360 - Thursday, January 24, 2008 - link
Bar none.WorldMus - Thursday, January 24, 2008 - link
this game is total garbage. A grindfest centered around collecting nuke cards. Oblivion makes this look like trash, not to mention the horrible interface, ridiculous bugs and loading times, and the overall boring storyline and poor npc coding. Two thumbs downstick to hardware jarred - you don't know gaming
hekuball - Thursday, January 24, 2008 - link
Couldn't agree more - this game is total garbage. I have never seen so many cut scenes in my entire life!Every single tiny scrap of dialogue is done via lengthy cut scenes. Basically it gores something like this....
Walk to top of stairs, meet npc (cutscene dialogue), go through door (loading time), walk through for 5 yards (another 30 second cut scene telling you what you have to do for next 60 seconds), engage bad guys in short pointless combat involving choice of stance followed by repeated left clicking with a modicum of basic timing that a 2 year old could master, thrown in.
Kill enemies, cut scene, followed by another cutscene carrying on from the last one, run for 5 seconds til go through door (long load time), followed by cutscene...aaarrrggghhhhhhhh!
I got so fed up after a few hours, I rebooted and swore never to touch this amateurish excuse for a linear piece of crap rpg again.
JarredWalton - Thursday, January 24, 2008 - link
There are plenty of "cut scenes" at the beginning, presumably to introduce you to the game world. All of them can be skipped by pressing ESC. I guess you played the first part of the Prologue and called it quits. Me, I enjoyed the background information, dialog, etc. To call all conversations "cut scenes" is ludicrous, though. I guess we're having a cut scene right now?To the earlier poster, having played RPGs since I was under the age of 10. Akalabeth, Wizardry, Ultima, Might and Magic, SSI's Gold Box D&D games... I remember playing all of those as a kid. Granted, it wasn't until around the time of Bard's Tale III that I began *finishing* games, but I'm quite sure I've spent more than enough time with computer games to know what I like and what I don't like.
Now, to the point of whether or not this game is "garbage": As evidenced by the comments (and other reviews around the net), there are MANY people that really enjoy(ed) this game. Obviously, not everyone is going to like it. Lots of people hated Baldur's Gate (and Dungeons & Dragons games in general); if you don't like PC RPGs, I'm *sure* you won't like this game. Even if you do enjoy games like Oblivion, there's no guarantee you'll like The Witcher. I'd wager that with the latest patch, however, most people that like RPG-ish games will enjoy The Witcher.
kilkennycat - Thursday, January 24, 2008 - link
Er, I am enjoying The Witcher. Best story-based PC RPG since VTM:B (with Werner's patches, of course...). Great fun. And the V1.2 patch has significantly improved the load times. The Witcher also happens to have the most-polished (and story-relevant ) introduction of all the PC games in my collection. That short sample should be very tempting to any movie producer... The fact that The Witcher is based on an excellent story-line should make it even more tempting. If drek like movies based on Doom, Resident Evil, AvP can command an audience, what about a monster-movie based on a powerful core character and a great story-line?karioskasra - Thursday, January 24, 2008 - link
Portrayed as food, unintelligent creatures, and cannon fodder, the animals in most RPGs are mere objects; treated reprehensibly and, even worse, ignored most times, by all their games' characters, including the main protagonist. The underlying theme of these games is the slaying of innocent helpless creatures for a pittance of experience points and "Raw Hide", clearly shown by its market value at your nearest vendor. RPGs' objectification of animals is sickening.Jarred, as an owner of a kitten, do you find this aspect of RPGs offensive? I demand that somebody call PETA post-haste.
strikeback03 - Friday, January 25, 2008 - link
bwahaha!Foxy1 - Thursday, January 24, 2008 - link
Portrayed as vile temptresses, witches and whores, the women in this game are mere objects; treated reprehensibly by all the game’s male characters, including Geralt. The underlying theme of the game is the sexual conquest of women, clearly shown by the pin-up cards given as rewards. The Witcher’s objectification of women is sickening.Jarred, as a father of a young daughter, did you find this aspect of the game offensive?