The Witcher 2 Assassins of Kings

[Gokulo]

"Someone" is very discontented with the game

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/th...ssins-of-kings

[Mistress Stowastiq]

Hmm
I can't decide one whether to wait it out for reviews or try it.

[Odesseiron]

Just picked it up, installin now!

Just buy it! CD Projeckt is the new old Bioware! And that's not trying to bash them, they're just picking up where Bioware left off when they started streamlining certain aspects of games. Kyo if you read this, I still love you and Bioware. My favorite developer still.

Anyway, will let you know how Witcher 2 is sometime this week after I get some substantial play time with it.

[Krandor]

From what the internets are saying, performance is very up and down in this game, I haven't fucked with the graphics too much yet in mine (low balled the settings to get a feel for it, no AA and whatnot), and it seems ok.

The first Witcher was unbelievably buggy, but they eventually patched it up and improved it by a mile with the Enhanced Edition. Hopefully it doesn't take a year plus for everything with this game to be ironed out. At least from a quick run around during the prologue though, I didn't see anything that would prevent me from enjoying the hell out of this game like I did the first.

Also, important note to anyone who uses Avast on their computer, it apparently flags the .exe as a virus, and you'll need to go in and restore the file to play the game.

[Odesseiron]

I installed this just tonight. I maxed out all the settings, and holy shit. This is one of the prettiest games I've ever seen. I've only literally just started, but it's amazing. Definitely works out your system too. My video card ever really has to go to a high fan speed, but this game pushes it up some! I hope they try to optimize some more. I get almost zero slowdown, but once in a while I'll get a tiny hiccup.

I have absolutely no recollection of the past events game, so I'm trying to beat that and import my save to this. I remember the plot point at the end of the game, but everything else really really vague. Even with the EE updated to the latest patch, the game still crashes from time to time. I hope to start Witcher 2 by this weekend.

[Saga]

Ode, what card are you using? Would I be fine with a Radeon HD5850 1GB card?

[Odesseiron]

I don't know ATI cards to be honest, but I'm using a GTX 480 SC from when I built my PC < a year ago. It runs almost everything on highest settings with 0 slowdown. I think the 5850 was that series from ATI when Nvidia was doing the 400 series. Could be wrong though.

Edit; The game was apparently optimized with Nvidia chipsets in mind I think, but I don't really know if that even matters anymore with how powerful cards are nowadays.

[Elvis]

i have everything on max, and it runs smoothly too. but i turned off ubersampling or whatever that is because it improved fps even more plus i didnt notice what the hell it was. game is fun so far, but its mostly cuz of the atmosphere(story) and graphics, combat seems bleh. audio seems to get real quiet and drowned out by the music or SFX sometimes which is odd. i think the combat thing will get better as i progress since im only in the beginning. game looks to be epic

[Kaisha]

Anyone know if the Witcher 2 retail case is considered a limited run? Because I saw a copy in store and it was fucking sexy looking, complete with shit that companies typically charge an extra $10-15 for. Was tempted to pick it up even though I'm barely into the first game, and by the time I do finish it, odds are I could get #2 on Steam for $10. ;/

[Isiolia]

Anyone know if the Witcher 2 retail case is considered a limited run? Because I saw a copy in store and it was fucking sexy looking, complete with shit that companies typically charge an extra $10-15 for. Was tempted to pick it up even though I'm barely into the first game, and by the time I do finish it, odds are I could get #2 on Steam for $10. ;/

I dunno, there's an expensive limited edition already, and the retail release for the first one only got more pimped out down the line.

I need to try the first one again, see if I can get into it...I've gotten a few hours in, and it just never clicked for me. I'm going to pick up the second one either way just to support the developer, just not in a rush due to not finishing the first.

[Cayos]

Is it worth playing Witcher 2 if I've never played Witcher 1? Considering buying it, but I don't really feel like running through the original.

[Shojin]

i have everything on max, and it runs smoothly too. but i turned off ubersampling or whatever that is because it improved fps even more plus i didnt notice what the hell it was.

Ubersampling is for ultra high end rigs only. I'm talking i7-980X with a GTX 590 / AMD 6990, so yeah, keep it off to keep your game playable. Turning off DOF is supposed to give a pretty decent boost too if people need more FPS.

[Isiolia]

Is it worth playing Witcher 2 if I've never played Witcher 1? Considering buying it, but I don't really feel like running through the original.

From what I've read, the game makes the assumption that you've played the first one and thus doesn't really recap much.

[Galkaeater]

I played the first one only a year ago and I had trouble ajusting to what the hell was going on

[Boyiee]

Hopefully you guys can review this quickly. I'm not big into single player games but I do have the time for them right now - never played the first but if the game is decent enough I'll pick this up.

[Elvis]

Man...

Spoiler: show

ending of prologue was epic! good thing, there was no slow-mo-'nooo' voice, and it was all silent. i was starting to like the king too =\

[Arelian]

Short review. I'm at Chapter 2 for anyone that cares.

Graphics: If you can run it, this game can be absolutely gorgeous. There's some optimization issues here and there but CDP has already confirmed they are aware of them and are working on a patch. There's a few glitches here and there, but nothing that destroys my "immersion" totally. if anything, I get pulled out for a few moments and it allows me to appreciate the stuff around me.

Sound: The music is pretty great. Nothing has stood out so far, but that's not always a bad thing. Some of the sound effects are kind of silly, but if this kind of thing frustrates you... well, stop being so easy to piss off.

Dialogue: It's all been pretty good. I've lol'd a few times due to a joke in the dialogue (which is honestly pretty rare for a WRPG nowadays...even if this is more of a Eastern RPG? I dunno). The choices they present you with actually make a difference and aren't all, "Hurr durr dis is gud guy." I've been torn a few times, and not because of game mechanics but because of story-related stuff. There's a few timed responses that I really enjoy, since you don't have a chance to sit there and contemplate. A lot of thought went into the writing of this game, and it definitely shows. They make a lot of references to things that happened in the first game, though. So go play that game first if you think you'll bitch about that. I mean, really. It's the 2nd game of a series. Don't complain if you didn't play the 1st game and don't understand what they are talking about.

Gameplay: This game is hard. It will kick your ass and you really won't understand why. My friends and I are taking the "Demon's Souls approach" where we experiment with everything we get before running into a large group and playing to our own strengths. There's no definite way to say if gamepad or keyboard + mouse are the superior option because this is definitely an action RPG. There's no overhead camera and the game takes place mostly over Geralt's shoulder. The controls take some getting used to, but once you have them down it feels nice and smooth. There's a lot to do in each chapter and this is definitely a long game. There's some "Monster Hunter"-ish ideas present in the game in the sense that you can use the parts you get from monster kills to craft new weapons/armor/potions/bombs.

Afterthoughts: If you're going into this game without playing the first one, do yourself a favor and read the books or check out the wiki. Again; they reference a lot of things from the first game and if you don't have any knowledge of it whatsoever you're likely to get frustrated. There are a few glitches, but nothing gamebreaking thus far. The game is brutal even on normal difficulty level, so if you have a low rage-tolerance either play on Easy or do not pick this game up.

[Kaisha]

There's no overhead camera

Ffs, that's one of my favourite features of TW1. Is the pause function still in there?

[Arelian]

Nope. It's a full blown action RPG. The game does slow down significantly when you go into your in-combat menu, though.

[mightyg]

Extremely impressive game so far. However I am really bad at using the quicksave feature, and it's causing me to have to replay large portions of the game, very frustrating. Also some annoying things about keyboard customization, can't do it from in game, some buttons can't be altered. Very great looking game if you're framerate isn't too bad, very fun, very addicting.