General gaming discussion

[Mazuuurk]

Cheers thats reassuring. I have this weird thing where I feel I need to play a game "just right". In any game once I have completed the main story, the game usually loses it's charm for me so anything needs to be done before then, so I wanna make sure I do everything that's worth doing before then, and also in these choice-based games I tend to fret a lot about what choices to make as making a "bad" one can really ruin it for me. I have some sort of in-game FOMO or what have you.

What it does is in these massive games by the end I always sort of feel like I've spent SO much time walking around clearing keeps and caves etc that by the time I get back to the main story it feels a bit distant. I like a game where the main story is long enough that you can spread out all the grinding and not miss out on much.

[Ian]

You've probably encountered some already but even some of the little one-off quests have cool or funny little stories. Just hoover up everything, it's good stuff. You could probably leave some of the stuff for the first DLC, Hearts of Stone to space some of the side quests out a little bit if you really wanted. You definitely want to be doing Blood & Wine by itself after the main story for reasons that will become apparent.

[phonics]

After I made the mistake of reading the side-effects of the drugs I've been taking

[Ian]

I need to do another playthrough of the game.

[Raoul Duke]

Gwent is bollocks, by the way

[Ian]

Gwent is fine until after you get a decent deck, at which point you have the same game every time.

[Ian]

Okay we might finally have a VR game I can take an interest in:

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[Disco]

I was ok until he dropped the bottle of perfume.

[Pepe]

The wobbly hands.

That is fantastic. Might have to give it a try.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

If we could co-op it up imagine The Third Hard dance crew.

[SincereTheRebel]

https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/ca...c5df8ed086e26b

Only 44 days last year i never played

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/ca...7b97602da8bdb5

[Shindig]

https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/ca...2cb9d109506893

Bleh. Most of my review work is done on Sundays.

[Raoul Duke]

I've restarted The Witcher 3

[SincereTheRebel]

From what i can remember. Great game.

https://www.greenmangaming.com/games...5203f90a180511

[Shindig]

Nope, just a fantastic first hour.

[Ian]

I've restarted The Witcher 3

My resistance to doing this is definitely weakening.

[Raoul Duke]

My resistance to doing this is definitely weakening.

I'd played through and completed it before the two add-ons were released and I couldn't be arsed to go back. It's been long enough though.

[Ian]

Oh so you've never done either DLC?

[Raoul Duke]

Nope. That plus the TV series has got me back in that mindset

[Ian]

Blood and Wine is a perfect end to the whole thing and Toussaint and people actually respecting Witchers there is just lovely.

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That's just a picture not a story spoiler or anything.

[phonics]

I've always been tempted to get the expansion, the main game was just too long for me so I got bored. Maybe a 20 hour stroll in witcher land would be better.

[Ian]

Oh see I have the opposite problem. My fear about replaying it is that I'll give it the full 100+ hours all over again.

[Raoul Duke]

I've always been tempted to get the expansion, the main game was just too long for me so I got bored. Maybe a 20 hour stroll in witcher land would be better.

You can play the expansions straight off either by using your character or a simulated one at a correct level.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

I was going to start on Witcher 3 as I bought it on Playstation today (sales, yay) and started watching a recap video of Witcher 2 which just made me want to pause the video and play it myself.

[Ian]

Apparently Horizon: Zero Dawn may be coming to PC.

[Mazuuurk]

Get on the Witcher 3 train lads. Amazing being years late to the party and it's still going on

I've...

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...I did the main quest stuff in Novigrad and have just gotten to Skellige now and done some romping with Yen. Was always shagging Triss in the first two games but figured I'd go for Yen in this one since, well, she's there for one and you sort of are supposed to. But I dunno, Triss seems the funnier of the two characters but maybe that changes. I've still saved the "Now or never" quest so that I can change my mind if I wanna.

I still find it hard not to get sucked into the main story in a way. There seems like there such an urgency to whats going on there that going off on a 4-hour trek in the woods just seems a little off. But now I'm at level 22 and seems like I can take on some more interesting Witcher Contracts so was doing that last night.

I'm getting well into Gwent as well, it was a fucking bore at first but as these things usually go (at least in FF games) - turns out it's fucking fun. Bit pissed I already failed the Catch em All quest from not realizing I was supposed to do a gwent tourney at that ball with Triss. Though I still can only play with a Northern Realms deck. I didn't realize you should look to buy cards from any vendor you see at first so now I'm finding it hard to come across cards. Monster decks seem insane, they just get millions of units on the board somehow.

[Ian]

I still find it hard not to get sucked into the main story in a way. There seems like there such an urgency to whats going on there that going off on a 4-hour trek in the woods just seems a little off

I do tend to agree and this is something that open world games in general often struggle with I find.

I think Arkham Knight actually handled it very well by it letting you kid on that you didn't have the info or whatever for the next main story quest so you could go and clear up some other stuff.

[Mazuuurk]

Yeah true. Also it always seems like out of all the content they make anyway, the ration between "general exploration & side quests" and the Main Quest is always off, like the main quest almost always feels a tad short.

I realize this is a difficult thing to master. Final Fantasy games have a good way of making the main quest story absolutely massive while retaining some side quests, but that's partly also because grinding is a part in reaching the next steps.

One problem with the Witcher in a way is that the main quest rewards you enough XP to more or less get by by playing that only it seems. It's even being generous on it.

But still i feel like there could be more ways of pushing the player around the world map and "forcing" you into side quests as part of the main quest, if that makes sense.

Also I'm saying this having not completed the game, so what do I know. But I already have this feeling of "damn I getting there too quickly!".

[Ian]

I honestly can't remember if I had to make a conscious effort to wander off and explore but I don't feel like I did.

[Mazuuurk]

I do all the time. Maybe I think too much about it. But each night I get to play I'm like "OK, I have 2-3 hours here how do I distribute them tonight!".

[Ian]

How much of a backlog of side quests do you have?

[Mazuuurk]

Off the top of my head, I think I have 5-10 side quests active, some which are like level 10-11 most of which are around my level and and a couple (the armorer ones) that are like 24 or so.

Witcher contracts about the same, closer to 10 of them. Though there we have one or two that are just level 6 or something that I caught way past when they would have been challenging so might not ever do them.

2 Treasure hunts, I think.

So all in all around 20 I guess.

[Ian]

Do all of them.

I'm working from home today and the temptation to get Witcher 3 downloading for a replay in the background is getting bad.

[Baz]

I hate how those wrap-up things never count games you play when signed in as player 2+ on someone else’s Playstation.

https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/ca...300bddf80b0dd1

It doesn’t even know I played about a thousand hours of Pro Evo.

[Mazuuurk]

Do all of them.

I'm working from home today and the temptation to get Witcher 3 downloading for a replay in the background is getting bad.

Why I think I will

[Mazuuurk]

In fairness though, the Witcher contracts sometimes get repetetive.

Talk to a peasant
Haggle for cash
Go out in the woods
Follow some tracks
Go back to the peasant
PLOT TWIST
Back in the woods
Potentially: place bait
Kill beast

It's not a bad formulae, but it does seem the same all the time, and the actual fights with the monsters are all mostly the same and a bit anti-climactic IMO.

[Ian]

And the Witcher senses thing is as rubbish as a lot of the Detective Mode stuff in Arkham and whatever other variations but still, I love it. Fuck it, I'm gonna download it.

[Ian]

So I caved and installed Witcher 3 again. When I first fired it up there was a little trepidation that I'd struggle to get back into such a big open world when I'd already done it once. Needn't have worried. It's got me again.

On the road with Roach again.

[Shindig]

Yo, when Aeris dies, I get all her Materia and gear back, right? I'm coming up on that in FF VII.

[Mazuuurk]

Pretty sure you do, yeah.


EDIT: I googled for safety and actually her accessory and weapon etc will go with her. So make sure she's not wearing any Ribbons.

[Mazuuurk]

So I caved and installed Witcher 3 again. When I first fired it up there was a little trepidation that I'd struggle to get back into such a big open world when I'd already done it once. Needn't have worried. It's got me again.

On the road with Roach again.

Awesome!

So I have a question here again. I'm now faffing about in Skellige right, but also went back a bit to Novigrad as per your recommendation. Having separated from Triss, which I kind of didn't really even wanna do, my soft heart required me to go do some questing with Yennefer for comfort (this was right choice, sort of thing). But now I'm right in the middle of some quest that has Yennefer following me around, and I'm sort of suspecting I'm approaching a point of no return in the story here (I read there's a "cut off point" for a lot of secondary quests).

So basically - Can I just leave her standing around in the middle of the quest? I have a million ?-marks to look up in the Skellige waters and I haven't even ventured to the south parts of the map in Velen yet, or even the north-east parts.

[Ian]

I'm pretty sure the game tells you explicitly when the point of no return is so you should be fine to do whatever.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Decided to sack off Witcher 2 and jump into the third.

Died once but liking it a lot.

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I did a side quest ridding a well from a Noonwraith and I had none of the things she is weak against (bar the Yrden sign which seems pretty meh) so died the first time as I didn't have any food quick equipped.

[Pleb]

On top of other major games being delayed (I'm looking at you Cyberpunk) Dying Light 2 is on the delayed list.

[Gray Fox]

Better to be delayed than to be buggy or shit, to be fair.

[Ian]

Yrden sign + silver sword is enough for that, 'How, though Specter Oil helps too.

I'd actually forgotten the little quality of life thing that once you've crafted an oil or potion once you don't need to do it again, just meditate to restock them. I see that there's a mod that auto applies oils for you as well but I'm such a dork that I quite like prepping for the big fights and knowing what I need to get myself set up with.

WHy did you give up on Witcher 2, @Sir Andy Mahowry ?

[Shindig]

Y'know, the way retroarch handles PSX memory cards doesn't half make you think you've lost saves.

[Mazuuurk]

Witcdher 2 was a quality game, and honestly Mahow I'd try to get through it while you still are early enough into the third to turn back (probably that train has left the platform though - once you start something new and all...).

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Yrden sign + silver sword is enough for that, 'How, though Specter Oil helps too.

I'd actually forgotten the little quality of life thing that once you've crafted an oil or potion once you don't need to do it again, just meditate to restock them. I see that there's a mod that auto applies oils for you as well but I'm such a dork that I quite like prepping for the big fights and knowing what I need to get myself set up with.

WHy did you give up on Witcher 2, @Sir Andy Mahowry ?

More of a consoler than a PC gamer (I could have just plugged my controller in though) and because of Maz's posts.