I'd argue each CDPR game improves on the one before including cyberpunk, but since it was a new franchise and perspective it was like creating witcher 1 all over again except...
The combat offered more choice that the witcher games, better 3d level design, pretty solid endings (better than deus ex, and mass effect).
And I'm quick to forget that Witcher 3 had some nasty bugs at launch, too. I was stuck with at that damn giant in the ice cave for like a month before they fixed it.
So did I, but I mean, given the current game development climate, Ciri was an extremely predictable pick.
Not only is Ciri a woman, which modern games seem to be making super majority of main protagonists these days, but she also has market familiarity. Her character is recognizable and therefore has a builtin audience, where a new character does not.
I did. The games already completely shit on the ciri book lore. I was hoping for a fresh slate with new characters, perhaps during a different time period entirely.
How so? One of the endings literally has geralt gift a witcher sword to Ciri. The only thing I'm confused about is how she now seems to have the witcher mutations
It makes perfect sense with two of the three endings, and could even work with the third depending on how much CDPR wants to explain the cosmology behind the white frost.
Problem is (well, not really, but still), she already looked like a real person. Personally know people who look a lot like Ciri, it's not the most uncommon look in Slavic countries.
It may be just the trailer. In some scenes, she looks like herself from the 3rd game, just aged, but in most, she looks a bit... weird. It's really hard to tell what's going on because when you try to compare the models, they do match up.
It looks like they created a monster trying to fit a bunch of features in a face. It's on all thumbnails, same as clickbait videos. It's a marketing stunt.
I was not commenting on her attractiveness, just that the defining character features seem to be different. She doesn't look "older" or less attractive to me from Wild Hunt, just a different person.
It's not as bad as when they dropped the voice actor for Sam Fisher in Splinter Cell though.
You’re the one taking it to gooner/sexist territory, us fans of the series know the characters and when the overall face-shape changes but keeps defining features like the scar on her cheek, it’s a little unexpected and strange at first.
There was some speculations that the next game is gonna let the player create their own character. So, having Ciri as the main character is a surprise for some.
To be honest, I was expecting an AC style game set during the Golden Age of Witchers. The schools of each nation are thriving, magic is abundant, Witchers are respected envoys to rulers, monster population is waning but one thing remains the same: Humans slaughter eachother in droves, rape pillage and plunder. Thus proving once more that Humans are the true monsters.
I was hoping for Eskel or Letho to be honest. Ciri is a safe choice but a bit on the boring side. Eskel would have been a lot more multi-layered protagonist and dialogues would have been funnier.
I was praying for Letho even though we all knew it was going to be Ciri (for better or worse, we'll see).
Leaning into the moral grey of the Witcher world with Letho would have been awesome, he says (in one of the endings to his story) he'll head out east over the mountains so we could have gotten some all-new environments and it would have been 100% CDPR IP so they could have done whatever they wanted without trampling over lore too much. Plus Letho is just an amazing character with huge protagonist energy. Oh well.
Performance mostly. But also even when made by various AAA studios, the resulting games often have this uncanny similar-ness to them. Personally i prefer in-house engines even if its just to maintain variety in the industry.
Also obligatory shout out to id tech for continuing to show off their engines with indiana jones.
like most engines, UE5 is whatever you hack it into being. I hate developing with Unreal but I do have to admit it's solid in a lot of ways. and has pretty mature content/LOD streaming, one of the biggest issues I saw with Cyberpunk at launch.
Guys i need some input. I know im gonna get downvoted, but i really want some input and constructive criticism. Especially from woman.
How do you play a woman character? Like especially the witcher game?
Cuz i remember how many sex scenes were there, W3 never shy away from that aspect. And as a man I know and feel comfortable making those decisions for gerald you know? But if it is ciri, I would feel reaaaallllly weird controlling her "body" (you know?)
Like combat stuff and any other aspect, its the same. But when it gets to stuff that's by design gendered, I honestly don't know how or what to do.
Then there was this aspect of, ciri being a daughter of gerald. And I played gerald so internally i see ciri as like a daughter, and I would be kinda weird if the game starts to explore her sexuality or smth.
Like how many of you would wanna control/watch sex stuff for a character like that?
I haven't played the witcher specifically, but I do think it's worth pointing out that this is the usual experience for women playing mainstream male-led titles with romance arcs. women have been playing and enjoying the witcher for a long while, including its sexual elements. if it's possible for us it could be possible for you too! I know if I'm replaying Mass Effect I'm actually probably more likely to play as male Shepard (because I can't be gay with Tali 😫)
ultimately one of the coolest things a game can do imo is encourage you to step into the shoes of character unlike yourself in a situation you've never encountered and ask you to make decisions as them. If you're uncomfortable roleplaying romantic enounters as a woman, there might be some value in trying anyway! you may find the experience to be more similar than you'd expect. I recognize it's probably more complicated if you have more paternal feelings toward her, but telling her story from her viewpoint does mean including elements that conflict with how she's seen by Geralt - it's her story now and it'd be a disservice to only include what's comfortable from Geralt's POV.
In any case, sexual content may be in the game and referenced here and there, but if it doesn't interest you I expect you'll be able to not see it. correct me if I'm wrong but my understanding is that you could play Geralt as aromantic and asexual if you wanted, yea? I imagine the same would be true here too.
Hey thanks so much for taking the time to answer in detail. I really appreciate it.
It is a bit strange that even though society at large has made so much progress in gender equality, there are still cases that stump me like this. Cuz I don't remember playing any game with a female protagonist that also had a romance element, but then again I haven't played that many games in general.
See, I played the Witcher 3, and did not experience any Sex Scenes, because I wanted to kill monsters, not have sex. So I do not expect my experience with The Witcher 4 to be any different.
Honestly after their absolute shit show with cyberpunk I'm more excited to sit back and watch them fuck it up again than for the game. They've lost my respect and their credibility as developers. I will pirate anything from them
Yeah, they did. I wasn't a fan of every part of Cyberpunk 2077, but I have to hand it to them: the gameplay was pretty solid compared to the mess I read about at launch. They even made the player controls responsive and reasonably nice to use. That alone was a huge improvement over The Witcher 3.
(Geralt, I'll never forgive you for all the times you stepped forward into danger when I pressed back to avoid it, or decided to fiddle about with a candle when there was something more important for your hands to do, or moved like a lumbering sloth instead of... well... a witcher.)
I haven't played the game since launch so maybe I outta give it another try but I still lost respect for them. Releasing an unfinished product shouldn't be praised even if they did fix it. Should've been delayed in the first place.
Why does them being European mean we should support them tho?
They've given Cyberpunk 4 years of support for free since the initial launch, including a full overhaul of the game. I get the state of the launch was dogshit, and you can bet your ass I'm not pre-ordering, but still holding onto this grudge is just petty. How much more sorry do you need them to be?
I don't need them to be sorry. They had years to make the game and released garbage. I'm sick of that happening in the gaming industry and I don't support companies that do it.
I should give it another try but they stopped updating the game. I'm not expecting them to be like no man's sky but you still need mods to add in shit that was promised like the metro system
The devs are amongst the best in the business, blame those responsible, the suits who demand unfinished products to be released. Nintendo with their older mentality of shipping phyisical media does not have the luxury to ship an unfinished product and more studios need to take a page from their book.
A rushed product is forever stained by its bad launch, a delayed product is eventually good. People have been waiting for star citizen for over a decade, we can be patient.