Tag Archives: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

E3 2019: Nintendo

Ah Nintendo, it wasn’t too long ago that everyone made fun of you for making the most backwards decisions possible. While you still make some absolutely bonkers choices, you’ve earned a ton of goodwill since the Switch launched. Personally, I want to know more about Animal Crossing, Super Mario Maker 2, and hopefully some information on the future of Nintendo’s online service, whether that’s new NES games or even SNES or N64 stuff to their offering.

Well, let’s see how wrong I was about all of this, and shine the light on Nintendo, for this, the last of our conference coverage for the week.

SUPER SMASH BROS. ULTIMATE

What better way to kick off E3 than by announcing a new character for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Or maybe 6 characters? They weren’t incredibly clear about how many characters are joining the fight, but my guess is it’s just one character with a couple of different costumes.

Oh, it’s a Dragon Quest character, probably should’ve mentioned that. For those of you still playing Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, I hope this is what you wanted. Another anime character in Smash. I hear the Smash community loves those.

LUIGI’S MANSION 3

I never had the chance to play the second Luigi’s Mansion on the 3DS, and in the face of this announcement, I now realize how upset I am by that fact. Luigi’s Mansion 3 looks so charming and pleasant, adding in a bunch of new features in terms of ghost hunting and multiplayer modes.

I always appreciated how Nintendo was able to make a lighthearted game in a spooky setting while also constantly just giving Luigi the short end of the stick. I look forward to it releasing later this year.

THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: LINK’S AWAKENING

Here’s another one I never got to play, back when it made it’s initial debut. The top down, 2D Zelda games never did the trick for me like the 3D ones, but this one looks so darn cute and adorable, that I’m willing to give this game a shot.

Also, they’re putting in a dungeon maker mode? I hope this is the backdoor pilot to Nintendo actually releasing a full Zelda maker in the vein of Mario Maker. It’ll be out on September 20th, 2019, and I will certainly be getting it.

THE WITCHER 3

It’s impressive as hell that they managed to put The Witcher 3 on the Switch and I don’t want to detract from that. But I’ve spoken about The Witcher 3 before, and while I do genuinely like the game, I don’t know that the Switch version is going to be the best way to experience it. That game had trouble playing on modern consoles as is, and I can’t imagine what it will be like on the Switch. Otherwise it’s a fantastic game that I ended up turning on god mode for most of.

Hopefully it works great and people can enjoy that game on the go. It’s due out later this year.

NO MORE HEROES 3

I have a confession, I’ve never played a No More Heroes game, but I’ve always heard good things about the series, but never got a chance to play it. I have no idea what to expect from the third title, but from my understanding, they’re traditionally fun third person action games. I think it also is a game that has attitude, for whatever that’s worth. With a nebulous 2020 release date, we’ll see how it shapes up.

ASTRAL CHAIN

From what I can gather, in this cool looking action game, you capture the enemies you’re fighting to use their abilities in combat. It looks cooler than I’m describing. You’re basically fighting these big monsters, throwing a chain at them, and then taking control of them at utilizing their abilities in combat while you’re chained to them.

It sounds interesting enough. It comes out on August 30th of this year.

MARVEL ULTIMATE ALLIANCE 3

I always had a hard time getting into the Ultimate Alliance games for various reasons, and lower on that list was the camera angle. I know that the point of the game is to see your allies and cooperate with them, but it always left me feeling a little disconnected from the action on screen. This one seems to have a more traditional 3rd person camera angle while continuing to trade in the same basic action loop the past games did.

Otherwise, I’ve always enjoyed the pitch of the Ultimate Alliance games. All of these superheroes team up to fight an even bigger baddie. It’s a simple concept, but one that manages to hook me every time.

It comes out on July 19th, and I will certainly be checking it out.

ANIMAL CROSSING NEW HORIZONS

Welcome to my deserted island that’s overrun by enterprising raccoons. Animal Crossing New Horizons looks incredible, not only visually, but mechanically. It seems like it’s going for a slightly more survival focused gameplay loop. The player crafted a “flimsy axe” which leads me to believe there’s gonna be some sort of item degradation in it. Also there seemed to be an emphasis on changing weather, which I’m into.

This is all just me speculating, but it seems like they’re trying to add more emphasis on moment to moment gameplay, making you think about your items and needs in the short term, as opposed to just thinking about long term goals.

It’s a shame that it isn’t coming this year, but it won’t be too much longer of a wait, considering it releases in March of 2020.

BANJO KAZOOIE!

They’re putting Banjo-Kazooie in Smash. Everyone can finally shut up and be cool for once… right? This is great, everyone has been clamoring for this for a long time, and it was this inevitable thing that just needed to happen already. They’ll be added to the game this fall.

THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: BREATH OF THE WILD SEQUEL

In what could be the spookiest announcement of the conference, a sequel to 2017’s monumental Breath of the Wild, was announced to be in development. It’s safe to assume that it’s going to play just like Breath of The Wild, so if you didn’t like that, too bad. That’s really it for info, but it’s exciting nonetheless.

More exciting is the prospect of how Nintendo hopes to recapture what made Breath of The Wild so engaging in the first place. The sense of discovery and exploration was incredible, but if we’re traipsing around the same map, I wonder how that sentiment holds up. I’d like to see maybe a new map, or a map so remixed it’s barely recognizable. Also, I think it’s time to let us play as Zelda.

Without a trace of Bayonetta, Metroid, new hardware or any info on their online service, some could look at this presentation as a whiff. I thought this presentation was great though. Still upset about Animal Crossing and it being delayed, but whatever. Nintendo’s lineup for this year looks great.

And that’s it folks. Thanks for riding with us for these conference overviews. There should be some more E3 coverage this week, but not a ton more. After all, I am in New York and can only do so much, but thank you again for sticking with us. See you around.

Blog: The Punch Wizard – 04/03/19

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I’ve never been a fan of the Bethesda styled RPG. They always felt cumbersome and clunky in a way that I just couldn’t get into. Despite having known this for over a decade, I still do a thing every year that defies my internal logic in an attempt to have fun. I started playing Skyrim once more. But this time, I’ve done something different.

See, there’s this video series that I very much enjoy called Monster Factory. It’s the brainchild of the McElroy brothers, known for their various podcasts and work at Polygon.com. They take character creators in games and make the most horrific being that they can using the tools at their disposal. I really like it, but that’s not why it’s important to my latest Skyrim endeavors.

In an episode of The Monster Factory, they take on Skyrim and do their dark magic to the avatar they’re creating. But once they finished making their monster, they played in the world as it. They abused the console commands to give them incredible speed, unfathomable power, and the ability to punch people so hard that anyone near them dies as well. It was the first time I’d seen Skyrim being played that made me want to do the same.

At first I thought this would sound weird, and while maybe it does, I also did this exact same thing in The Witcher 3 and had a fantastic time because of it. So, being the adult I am, I set out to emulate a thing that I saw on the internet. And you know what? I’m having a fucking blast. All it took was me breaking the game to enjoy it; who would’ve guessed?

After this photo was taken, I sent this fool to the moon.

Contrary to how I felt about The Witcher 3, I don’t give two shits about the story in Skyrim. Thalmor? Don’t give a shit. Dragons? That sucks. Dragonborn? Nah, I got console commands. And harnessing the awesome power of the console commands has allowed me to give birth to the unstoppable Punch Wizard.

You see, the Punch Wizard has the ability to launch giants into orbit with a single punch, bring down a dragon with a single shout, and cast a spell that literally kills everyone around me for 15 minutes. Learned a lesson about that last one in the worst possible way. My apologies to the people of Whiterun.

The Punch Wizard is an agent of chaos who not only wields the power to destroy life, but can bring the fallen back to life by typing the word, “resurrect” into the console. He is truly an ambivalent god among mortals, never casting judgement, only spells. And that is why I write this blog, to honor my lord and savior, the Punch Wizard.

We love you Punch Wizard.

Blog: Run it Back Cowboy – 10/10/18

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With the sequel on the horizon, I figured it was now or never for me to revisit Red Dead Redemption and bask once more, in its glory. Hypothetically, this all should’ve gone off without any issues, but of course that wouldn’t be the case. Somehow, I had misplaced the power-brick for my Xbox 360, which was kind of a problem because I was pretty sure consoles needed electricity to operate. Luckily my local GameStop had one for six dollars, and it was smooth sailing from there.

Except for the fact that Red Dead Redemption didn’t age as gracefully as you might think. It’s still a phenomenal game, but the rough edges are a little more apparent, 8 years later. The thing that jumped out at me immediately was the consistent frame-rate dips. Like I mentioned, I’m playing this on my original Xbox 360 Elite, and the there have been plenty of instances where the entire game gets really sluggish. At most, it was an inconvenience

Something that definitely was a constant source of aggravation, was riding the horses. I don’t think any video game has really done horseback riding particularly well, and Red Dead Redemption is no exception. I’ve expressed in the past how a certain horse in The Witcher 3 is a hassle to ride, and I share most of the same frustrations with them as I do all of the horses in Red Dead. It’s just clunky and inelegant to ride these bad boys, and you have to do a lot of it.

But I did learn something new about Red Dead Redemption that I had never known before, which is that you can fast travel from just about anywhere and not just at stagecoaches. This was a fucking revelation for me. A random tutorial popped up and told me to use my campfire to travel somewhere, and it blew my goddamned mind. And you have unlimited campfires. That is insane and most definitely has made this impromptu play session much more tolerable.

There are a ton of little grievances I have with Red Dead Redemption, but as a package, it still stands as a monumental game. The story that it tells is (mostly) captivating and incredibly well told, and the characters are memorable and very well acted. The world itself is perfectly constructed to suit the setting and hammers home the feeling of isolation you’d imagine having when riding alone through the desert. While I’m happy I decided to revisit the game, it’s mostly just to distract me from the fact that we’re still a few weeks away from Red Dead Redemption 2.

Blog: The Awesome Adventures of The Week – 06/27/18

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Oh would you look at the time? It’s half-past what-am-I-playing-o’clock. Here’s what’s been keeping me indoors so far this summer.

The Witcher 3

After finally beating the main quest line of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, I was pretty eager to dive back in and clean up a lot of the side content I had missed. Simultaneously the Steam Summer Sale had begun, and the expansion pass was on sale for like 12 bucks. So instead of doing that aforementioned side content, I just started on the the first expansion, Hearts of Stone. I fear I will never be free of The Witcher 3 in my lifetime.

Dying Light

The recent announcement of a sequel has prompted some friends and I to dip back into the fantastic Dying Light. I had already beaten the game once before, but never touched any of the DLC. Thankfully, thanks to a sale and some participation from friends, I’ve fallen back into the zombie-filled hole that is Dying Light.

The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit

Released a few days ago, this pseudo-prequel to the upcoming Life is Strange 2, is a good foundation for the next entry in an already emotionally devastating series. There’s a lot to unpack in this little hour-long experience, and there is no question that The Awesome Adventures of Captain Awesome is an emotionally draining experience, but it’s definitely worth the price of admission at zero dollars.

Car Mechanic Simulator 2018

Cause of-fucking-course I’m playing this game. Look, I like these kinds of games and I wont apologize for that. There have been significant changes to formula since the last entry in the series, Car Mechanic Simulator 2015, that have made things a lot more interesting. For instance, in the previous entry, changing a wheel was just picking a rim and putting it on your car, tire and all. Now, you need to pick rim sizes, tire types, mount the tires and balance the wheels before you can slap it on a car. It sounds like busy work, but for a simulation game, it’s what I’m looking for.

Blog: Sale! – 06/20/18

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According the to totally accurate and absolutely infallible whenisthenextsteamsale.com, we’re on the eve of the annual Steam summer sale. While a Steam sale isn’t the same spectacle it once was, this is as good a time as any to go through my wish-list and fine-tune it.

The Witcher 3 DLC

Of course this is on here. When I first purchased The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, all of the big expansions hadn’t been released yet. So with my recent love affair with the base game itself, I figure getting the expansion pass is an easy call.

Moonlighter

I’m a big fan of games that have a cool look. It’s gotten me into plenty of trouble before, but I’ve heard pretty good things about Moonlighter. You play as a shopkeeper who has to go through their daily motions of running a store, while also being a part-time adventurer. That sounds pretty neat to me.

Warhammer: Vermintide II

I’ve been super interested in Vermintide II, but never pulled the trigger on it. I’ve also pitched my friends on this Warhammer version of Left 4 Dead, but despite our collective interest, we haven’t made a purchase yet. If the price is right, maybe we’ll all be playing by the end of the week.

PC Building Simulator

I have a problem and I’m well aware of it. Leave me alone.

Battleblock Theater

I really enjoyed Battleblock Theater when it came out in 2013 on the Xbox 360, but I never had the opportunity to really try out the cooperative levels. So my plan is to buy two copies of this and burden someone else with the punishment that is, Battleblock Theater‘s cooperative mode.

Vampyr

I’m fully aware that Vampyr was released two weeks ago and there probably wont be a sale on it at all, but a man can dream, right? It’s gotten a mixed reception since its release, but if it was cheap enough, I’d be willing to give it a shot. I miss demos…

Wreckfest

This is yet another game that just was fully released a few days ago but I’m still having delusional hopes it might be on sale. I just like seeing cars smash up real good.

Descenders

Mountain bikes are cool. This game is about riding them. I could be into that for the right price.

I’m realizing at this point that I’m not genuinely excited to play some of these games, but more curious about them. So either I have to become a millionaire so I can buy all of these games without feeling bad about it, or there should be more demos and trials out there. But there’s a secret third option that could be good too, all of these games could be on sale for a buck each. I’d be okay with that too.

I Finally ‘Get’ The Witcher 3

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It felt like a perfect storm of external forces all converged on me at once, pushing me into trying a game I had bounced off of several times before. After Skyrim and Fallout 4 failed to satiate my RPG cravings, it was the buzz coming out of E3 around Cyberpunk 2077 that served as the catalyst for me diving once more into The Witcher 3. Nearly thirty hours later, I think I can safely say that I am really enjoying my time with it… mostly.

My memory of The Witcher 3 wasn’t exactly positive up until this point. I distinctly recall being turned off in my previous attempts by the first few hours of the game. So instead of starting from the beginning, against my better judgement, I just picked up a year old save and ran with it. Most surprising is the fact that it worked. It’s probably worth noting that I guess I had cheated and boosted my level pretty significantly at some point in this save, which has made the combat incredibly easy.

Gotta shoulder check em’ to keep them off their rhythm

But the combat was one of the reasons I bounced off of The Witcher 3 in the first place. Even when I was fulfilling the power fantasy of being a legendary witcher and just annihilating anything in my path, the combat still felt loose and unresponsive at times. But trivializing the combat was what I needed to do in order to better appreciate everything else that people loved about the game.

It was when I accidentally walked up to the door of a random building that everything clicked for me. The door swung open and revealed a beautiful and detailed home adorned with several shelves that were packed with books and various baubles. Paint cans and brushes strewn across a table with a blank canvas waiting to be propped up on an empty easel. Around the corner was a bed and a large empty basin with a water pump next to it. This didn’t feel like a place where an NPC just stood in, but more like an actual home with the amenities needed for a person to comfortably live in this space. Just to be sure that my admiration was justified, I walked into every house in this city block that I could and found they were all unique in their own ways.

I could listen to this jam all day

As I continued deeper into the city towards my waypoint, I could hear the distant sales pitches of merchants, citizens complaining about the inequalities in their lives, a band playing a really awesome song, and a rather suspicious amount of cats hissing at me. This city felt alive in the way a city that was quietly being overrun with the meanest cats in the universe would be. Suddenly I came to a stop, yielding to a cut-scene of two people getting burned at the stake for practicing witchcraft. It was just as uncomfortable as you’d think it would be.

It’s here that I’d like to mention my first grievance with The Witcher 3. I really don’t like Geralt as a character. I don’t know the history and lore of Geralt outside of what I’ve seen in this game, but he just kind of sucks. I gathered that the witchers are supposed to be emotionless and only do what’s necessary for a paycheck, which seems to be contrary to a lot of what you see in the game itself. I find it odd that an emotionless mercenary like Geralt has any relationship options at all, as well as having dialogue choices that usually grant him options to be a more caring and understanding person. This wouldn’t bother me so much if maybe he just stopped bringing up the fact that witchers went through mutations to feel no emotions. Maybe the past games and books explain this stuff, but for someone like me who is experiencing The Witcher 3 in a vacuum, it just doesn’t make a lot of sense.

“I was genetically altered to kick your ass. Please go home though.”

But none of that is enough to make me stop playing altogether. I’ve genuinely enjoyed some of the story beats of The Witcher 3, even if there are plenty of times I had no idea what was going on. There are a lot of names and places to keep track of and it can get very confusing very quickly. But I was always ready to just accept my fate and go talk to whoever had the waypoint over their head. More often than not, the people I’d talk to were good at clarifying why I was there, and why it was important. That or they just wanted to challenge me to a game of cards or to race horses. The latter being one of the worst parts about the entire game.

This game still looks absolutely stunning

The Witcher 3 has the courtesy to let you opt out of most horse races, which is convenient because your horse, Roach, might be the worst video-game horse in history. This fucker is the absolute worst. The amount of times Roach has decided to not gallop when I hit the gallop button, or better yet, just stop in the middle of a pack of wolves, is unbelievable. Maybe when I spawned him in, he appeared behind a short, hoof-high rock wall or near a small bush. Well fuck me, because getting him out of that mess is going to be a challenge. But my favorite annoyance happens when I have the audacity to use the feature where Roach will auto-run and follow the road. This feature is a lie, and does not actually exist. Roach will ride on the road until he decides he wants to go on his own horsey adventures with or without you. Thank goodness for fast travel, or else I’d just end up walking everywhere.

Fuck you

I’m far from finished with The Witcher 3 but I know that if nothing else, I will see the credits for this game. I’m too invested at this point to just walk away from it like i had previously. In spite of my lack of enthusiasm for fantasy settings, CD Projekt Red has crafted a phenomenal game that I’m glad I can finally appreciate, albeit a few years late.