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The Witcher (PC DVD) | 
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| From: Atari
Category: Video Games
List Price: £34.99
Buy New: £11.99
You Save: £23.00 (66%)
New (6) Used (2) from £9.99
Rating:  51 reviews
Sales Rank: 1192
Platform: Windows Xp
Genre: role-playing-games
Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
Media: Video Game
Operating System: Windows XP
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.4 x 0.8
EAN: 3546430130087
ASIN: B000PIVX4E
Release Date: October 26, 2007
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews: Read 46 more reviews...
 The Witcher - A breath of fresh air in the RPG market October 29, 2007
11 out of 12 found this review helpful
Just bought this game on Friday and its very good indeed.
From the moment you start up the game (install is 8.5 gigs!) you are treated to a delightful intro sequence which is probably the longest and best intro i have seen for a while. It gives you a little background on your character Geralt - A Witcher. Witcher's are a breed apart from normal human beings: taken at an early age they are trained and modified to fight monsters and creatures of the night, they are expert swordsmen and have some magic ability as well.
Once you are in the game proper : you find yourself at the Witcher castle headquarters with other witchers. This part is mainly a tutorial for you to learn combat, movement etc. So do not be put off by the game if you are unimpressed by the start.
The combat can take some getting used to but if i were to describe it: i would say it is a cross between Diablo style and Knights Of The Old Republic style. There are different camera viewpoints you can use for playing the game: an Over the shoulder 3rd person close-up style, a low isometric 3rd person style (ie further away - more tactical) and a high isometric 3rd person style (more top-down and further away)
Basically with combat; it is about timing and fighting multiple opponents. Pressing LMB on a monster initiates an attack and then you can chain attack combos further if you press the LMB again at the right time. The graphics and animation for the combat are excellent. You see your character Geralt perform some silky smooth sword techniques depending on what level and what upgrades he has.
As well as levelling up your main attributes (str, int, stam, dex) you can upgrade your swordmanship skills in 3 areas: Strong, Fast and Group. Hopefully those are self-explanatory. But the great thing is: when you upgrade one of these you see the new combat animation in battle. You can also somersault and twirl around apponents which becomes handy if you are fighting multiple enemies (common). This combat is very enjoyable which makes a change for an RPG because normally combat takes a backseat in RPGS. You can also upgrade your weapons and collect trophies of boss monsters you have managed to kill.
The Story is fairly unique and interesting as it is based on a series of polish fantasy novels. It is certainly not your standard fantasy fare here. More interesting is that there are a lot of decision-moments in the game where you must make a moral choice and it affects the story! But you dont find out till much later in the game what effect it had. Absolute genius!
Graphics: 93% Graphics are similar to Gothic 3 and better than Oblivion imho. Animation is superbly done and very smooth. What is most impressive is the lighting: morning, afternoon, evening and night, they all look different because of the lighting and it is very atmospheric.
Sound: 90% A Brilliant orchestral soundtrack (using bagpipes?) accompanies the game when your playing.
Gameplay: 95% This is the trump card imho. Gameplay is what makes games great and this has some magic ingredient which hooks you in, its partly the story, its partly the art style and its partly the sound but it all comes together magnificently to create this experience.
Overall 94% It may not have the out and out freedom of Oblivion but it combines some freedom (think slightly more freedom than KOTR) with a superb structure. Tons of sidequests (80 hours+ game) and its not all about simple Fedex quests; a lot of them have heart and soul :)
The interface and menus are very well designed as well - it all feels very fresh and original.
There are so many things i havent mentioned yet but i dont have space: The Alchemy system (brewing potions) is the most in-depth i have seen in a PC RPG. Also because this is an 18 game the story is quite dark and mature! Some of the jokes are quite bawdy as well! So be prepared for that. But when is the last time you played a PC game that treats you like an adult?
There are numerous mini-games with the game, including: fist-fights, dice-gambling and sleeping with women as well as collecting herbs and brewing potions for yourself. And i'm only in chapter 1 !
You know in most RPGS - there are main NPCS and there are the NPCS which are just part of the scenery and dont affect the story/game so much at all. In this game a lot of the so-called minor NPCS actually make a significant difference in the game! In a normal rpg like Oblivion if you ask them something they will respond with a bland nondescript answer but in this game you can get new knowledge, surprises, gifts and money among other things from them!
The way quests are handled is well done as well: If you had a quest to kill x amount of Ghouls you cant just go out and kill them. Because you need to harvest them as well - And for that you need --Knowledge-- You will have to find out about the enemies either through what other NPCS tell you or through books but this is a great innovation. The quests are knowledge dependant which is how it should be! Brilliant!
If you are wondering how well it will run on your system - i am happy to report that it seems to run and scale extremely well for most DX9 systems: im running it on a xps1710 laptop with a go7900GTX and 2gig ram (very important in this game) at maximum settings and its super smooth. I think there may be a few problems with vista users but the developers have been very quick with patches for the game.
Loading times between areas can be a bit long but if you have 2 gig ram it should be fine.
All in all an excellent rpg with 80 hours of gameplay! Finally the clincher.....which other game is so realistic it lets you sleep with numerous women? (collectible cards for each woman!)
A must for all RPG fans November 4, 2007
9 out of 10 found this review helpful
Just when other RPGs failed for so many years to fulfil the standard since Planescape: Torment and Baldur's Gate, The Witcher has brought us an immersive dynamic world, where your decisions throughout the game effect the story development, it has different rich and diverse character designs and really well written quest writing.
The combat movement is highly realistic, since it is motion recorded of trained stuns and swordsmen, and the combat system is something I have never experienced before from any other RPGs. Like the story it is highly immersive.
The world simulates and scripted with its own life, different people appear during different time of the day, and they all have their own jobs and patterns. The weather effect is highly detailed with different degree of rain, and sun light, and all the people (AI) react to it.
The game is estimated to have 50 to 60 hours worth of game time, and after I have completed the game, I did not feel it was that long at all, as every moment of it was highly fulfilling and interesting.
A Different World November 12, 2007
10 out of 12 found this review helpful
Nobody would ever mistake me for an `RPG fan'. In my whole gaming experience I have always gone for my preference of strategy or simulation. I respected the popularity of RPGs but had no wish to become involved in something I did not regard as overly enjoyable.
At the beginning of November there was a lull in my gaming interest, I had the latest Football Manager (and PES 2008) but was using it only infrequently. I looked for a change and happened on the trailer on Amazon for The Witcher.
This is the first RPG I have ever bought and I have been lucky in choosing this time to experiment with other genres. I have found this game stunning and have been playing continuously since its purchase.
On starting up I was pleased to see the system had chosen the highest settings available (I'm using a NVIDIA 7900GTX and dual core processor) and took my first tentative steps into the world of RPG. As a result I'm afraid I can't give the more experienced RPG player a comparison with what has gone before but hopefully can reassure anyone thinking of trying a different gaming world they will not be disappointed.
While the gaming environment features dwarfs, elves, monsters et al the parallels between our own society and the racial and religious intolerance that exists in The Witcher are easy to see. As such you find yourself making decisions based on your real world experience. It is after all only a game and once you complete it using one set of values you can always begin again using another but you are aware when you are making what you consider contra decisions and it does give pause for thought.
The game itself looks fantastic and the attention to detail in the shadow and overall movement in the scenes adds to the enjoyment. The screen shots in the manual showing the various information panels in the game looked frighteningly cluttered at first but it is all fairly intuitive and doesn't take long to become accustomed to.
I'm less adept at the moment with potions and gather every ingredient in sight without a real game plan here. The system automatically mixes them for you though and you can experiment by adding any ingredient manually. I'm also using a high isometric view to get a feel of how things go but you also have a choice between a lower, closer view and an `over the shoulder' view for those of you more used to this. The OTS view requires use of the WSAD keys for movement rather than the mouse as in the other views.
I've seen comment on the text used in the game and while it is to the point in most cases and sometimes appears to be in an illogical sequence it is unfair to suggest this is purely down to the fact the game is Polish in origin. A translator of the original text has confirmed that, for whatever reason, the original English script was ordered to be reworked and in his words, butchered. No matter, while slightly annoying the remainder of the game more than makes up for that.
You will need to download a patch which is already available for some glitches that have been discovered but I haven't encountered anything fatal in the remainder of play.
There have also only been a relatively few generic character features created and at times you will be interacting with a character you spoke to only seconds before but they were then playing a different role.
The one real problem I should mention, and it can be annoying, is loading times combined with auto save. There doesn't appear to be a way to turn of auto save and the game loads scenes with alarming frequency. The further into the game you go the longer and more often the reloads/saves appear to be.
That is the only annoyance I could see however and I would recommend this game to anyone, even those who like myself would not normally consider RPG.
Best RPG ever February 5, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Really enjoying this game and I dont usually enjoy RPGs. The main and subsidiary characters are believable and have an authentic feel. The graphics form a really absorbing and enjoyable environment. I especially like the almost FPS feel of the game using the over the shoulder camera angle. A bargain.
A Very Good Polish cRPG October 28, 2007
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
The Witcher is based on a Polish fantasy saga written by Andrzej Sapkowski. Though the game is set in the world of his books, the plot is original and takes place after the events of the saga.
I love this game, haven't played as good cRPG this year. The fighting system is a bit weird at beginning, but it's pretty fun. Grapics is nice, especially the locations which look astonishing. The plot is what keeps me in front of the computer last two days, but I won't spoil the fun.
The only drawback are hardware requirements, but I'm playing on a lower detail level and the game still rules.
All in all, a great game!
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