An argument that story fixes/augmentations should take priority over expansions, even from a business POV
[Cross posted on Reddit]
First of all, it goes without saying that I'm super grateful to CDPR for the 100 hours of sheer joy they gave me with The Witcher 3. This being said, though, there's an issue that keeps coming up in the most active threads of this sub-forum that I think could benefit from a direct discussion: CDPR devs keep hinting that they'd love to do Enhanced Edition type improvements to some heavily discussed flaws of the story/main quest, but that they can't afford to cause developing the expansions takes financial priority. This post is gonna argue that they can't afford not to do EE stuff, because the weak points of this otherwise amazing game are exactly everything that has to be a strong point in a game if you hope to sell expansions of the type that CDPR are working on.
The two expansions CDPR are putting all their Withcery resources into are both mega-side-quests, rather than mini-sequels or standalone mini-campaigns. This means, naturally, that players that completed Witcher 3's main quest will only buy the expansions if they either plan on playing the expansions during post-main-quest play, or plan on playing the expansions during a new run-through of the main quest. That's well and good, except there's a consensus (CDPR folks on message boards included) that The Witcher 3 has major storyline and world-state problems that don't stop the game from being great but do result in everybody hating post-main-quest play and in low player motivation to replay the main quest. (Only moderately low for 2nd replay, maybe, but extremely low for 3rd.)
Both issues have been heavily discussed, but let's review them quickly side by side:
1) Almost all players feel that post-main-quest play is depressing, even if there are amazing side-quests left to do. This aversion to post-main-quest-play has two main reasons: a) You're operating in an empty world where all the characters whose presence framed the game-play as a personal, emotional experience are gone. b) You're operating in a broken world-state -- not because it's a pre-epilogue or pre-last-mission world-state, but because throughout act 3 your actions made no difference for the in-game world state when they're logically supposed to ('Reasons of State'), and now that you're not rushing off to the last mission you have time to notice this. Did these problems ruin my experience of The Witcher 3? No, not at all. But am I interested in playing a mega-side-quest in post-main-quest play, the way that post-main-quest play operates right now? Nop.
2) Almost all players feel that the replay value of the main quest (/associated side-quests) is relatively low or very low. Three reasons: a) Most players feel that while the three in-game epilogues are beautiful, they're short enough that if you got an epilogue you're happy with you aren't going to be motivated to do a 2nd or 3rd play-through to get to play the other epilogues. b) The '36 endings' (two minutes illustrated voice-over narration) are considered kind of laughable, so there's no motivation to do 2nd or 3rd play-through to experiment with different choices and their consequences. c) The in-game world's lack of responsiveness to your romance and political choices, like Triss v. Yen choice only changing five lines of dialogue and one cut-scene, or the Radovid plot-line not affecting anything in-game and not responding to any previous choices (e.g. your choice in 'Redania's Most Wanted' not affecting anything in your next interactions with Radovid or Phillippa AFAIK) makes you feel pretty cheated on a 2nd play-through. Did these flaws ruin my experience of The Witcher 3? Not really. But am I interested in playing a mega-side-quest as part of a new replay of the game's main quest, with the world-state's branching still so minimal/broken? Nop.
So, see the problem? The exact things that CDPR does not have plans to fix, cause you can only fix them with major augmentations and CDPR's Witchery resources are invested in developing the mega-side-quest paid expansions, are the things a game has to get right in order to make players who played through the main quest want to buy a mega-side-quest paid expansion. 'The Witcher 3' was obviously designed to make even the average or casual player play the main quest to completion (it literally has a 'Just The Story' mode), so if CDPR don't heavily invest in story/main-quest augmentations that make replays or post-main-quest play a good experience for players the expansions will have real no target audience.
tl;dr: If your game is amazing except for post-main-quest-play being a bad experience and the replay value of the main quest being low, you're gonna have to invest in fixing those problems before investing in paid expansions that are meant to be played in post-main-quest play or as part of a new replay of the main quest
[Cross posted on Reddit]
First of all, it goes without saying that I'm super grateful to CDPR for the 100 hours of sheer joy they gave me with The Witcher 3. This being said, though, there's an issue that keeps coming up in the most active threads of this sub-forum that I think could benefit from a direct discussion: CDPR devs keep hinting that they'd love to do Enhanced Edition type improvements to some heavily discussed flaws of the story/main quest, but that they can't afford to cause developing the expansions takes financial priority. This post is gonna argue that they can't afford not to do EE stuff, because the weak points of this otherwise amazing game are exactly everything that has to be a strong point in a game if you hope to sell expansions of the type that CDPR are working on.
The two expansions CDPR are putting all their Withcery resources into are both mega-side-quests, rather than mini-sequels or standalone mini-campaigns. This means, naturally, that players that completed Witcher 3's main quest will only buy the expansions if they either plan on playing the expansions during post-main-quest play, or plan on playing the expansions during a new run-through of the main quest. That's well and good, except there's a consensus (CDPR folks on message boards included) that The Witcher 3 has major storyline and world-state problems that don't stop the game from being great but do result in everybody hating post-main-quest play and in low player motivation to replay the main quest. (Only moderately low for 2nd replay, maybe, but extremely low for 3rd.)
Both issues have been heavily discussed, but let's review them quickly side by side:
1) Almost all players feel that post-main-quest play is depressing, even if there are amazing side-quests left to do. This aversion to post-main-quest-play has two main reasons: a) You're operating in an empty world where all the characters whose presence framed the game-play as a personal, emotional experience are gone. b) You're operating in a broken world-state -- not because it's a pre-epilogue or pre-last-mission world-state, but because throughout act 3 your actions made no difference for the in-game world state when they're logically supposed to ('Reasons of State'), and now that you're not rushing off to the last mission you have time to notice this. Did these problems ruin my experience of The Witcher 3? No, not at all. But am I interested in playing a mega-side-quest in post-main-quest play, the way that post-main-quest play operates right now? Nop.
2) Almost all players feel that the replay value of the main quest (/associated side-quests) is relatively low or very low. Three reasons: a) Most players feel that while the three in-game epilogues are beautiful, they're short enough that if you got an epilogue you're happy with you aren't going to be motivated to do a 2nd or 3rd play-through to get to play the other epilogues. b) The '36 endings' (two minutes illustrated voice-over narration) are considered kind of laughable, so there's no motivation to do 2nd or 3rd play-through to experiment with different choices and their consequences. c) The in-game world's lack of responsiveness to your romance and political choices, like Triss v. Yen choice only changing five lines of dialogue and one cut-scene, or the Radovid plot-line not affecting anything in-game and not responding to any previous choices (e.g. your choice in 'Redania's Most Wanted' not affecting anything in your next interactions with Radovid or Phillippa AFAIK) makes you feel pretty cheated on a 2nd play-through. Did these flaws ruin my experience of The Witcher 3? Not really. But am I interested in playing a mega-side-quest as part of a new replay of the game's main quest, with the world-state's branching still so minimal/broken? Nop.
So, see the problem? The exact things that CDPR does not have plans to fix, cause you can only fix them with major augmentations and CDPR's Witchery resources are invested in developing the mega-side-quest paid expansions, are the things a game has to get right in order to make players who played through the main quest want to buy a mega-side-quest paid expansion. 'The Witcher 3' was obviously designed to make even the average or casual player play the main quest to completion (it literally has a 'Just The Story' mode), so if CDPR don't heavily invest in story/main-quest augmentations that make replays or post-main-quest play a good experience for players the expansions will have real no target audience.
tl;dr: If your game is amazing except for post-main-quest-play being a bad experience and the replay value of the main quest being low, you're gonna have to invest in fixing those problems before investing in paid expansions that are meant to be played in post-main-quest play or as part of a new replay of the main quest