Analysis: With Witcher 3 CDPR no longer treat the players like adults [SPOILERS]

[Guest 3847602]

Iorveth, Saskia, Anais, Natalis, Adda, Sigfried, Yaevinn :0 minutes of content. Sheala, Lady of the Lake: 1 real minute of content. That's FAAAAAAR from been enough. I would had prefer that than what we get. And what I remember for ME3 is that characters like Jacob or Miranda had quest with 15-20 minutes of gameplay and they were always avalaible to talk. That doesn't happen in TW3 even with the main characters that appears in the game. Sorry but those "5 minutes" were really valuable for some of us.

I know already that meeting these characters for 5 min would have been enough for some.
For me, landing at some random planet or a space station in some random system and seeing the familiar faces (with no role in the story) just because they appeared in the previous games is a waste of time.
I would have loved to see everyone of them in TW3 with a purpose other than a meaningless cameo.

It was. In fact, I repeteadly saw many time that one of the many good thing of TW3 was that you were able to import your decisions from the others games. Once many bought the game could actually see the meaning of that: it was put for cosmetic reasons.

Again, TW2 showed already how much the save import means in The Witcher series - a few references here and there plus the swords and armor that became obsolete by chapter 2.

as a trilogy, it maintained a relative coherence between the three games and Bioware never sold it like something different of what really was.

The difference is - both TW1 and TW2 were mostly self-contained plotwise. ME1 and 2 weren't.

It always was about a guy trying to save the galaxy with his team (simple argument). TW changed from a guy who is trying to survive in a caotic world by taking hard decisions to a guy who is looking for his beloved daughter. I can't consider that "adult"

If that's how you saw TW1 and 2 - fine. The way I saw the trilogy was Geralt recovering his identity (TW1), memories (TW2) and finally reuniting with his family (TW3). That's plenty of coherence for me.

You put that with the absence of any kind of choice/consequence system and it's the reason about why CDPR doesn't treat their players like adults.

C&C system works fine for the most part within TW3 itself. It doesn't work well between the games and it never did.

Also, if you remove key characters of the plot

Well, they can't be the key characters of the plot if they were removed, can't they.

 

[Sam2305]

I know already that meeting these characters for 5 min would have been enough for some.
For me, landing at some random planet or a space station in some random system and seeing the familiar faces (with no role in the story) just because they appeared in the previous games is a waste of time.
I would have loved to see everyone of them in TW3 with a purpose other than a meaningless cameo

None of the characte of ME get a "cameo". They get real quest were it's fate were properly adressed. This is the great "victory" of Bioware with ME

Again, TW2 showed already how much the save import means in The Witcher series - a few references here and there plus the swords and armor that became obsolete by chapter 2.

Again, it was sold like a game where you can import your saves an decisions. If they explictly said that. I don't have to think on what they did in TW2. If they hadn't said anything, your argument would be solid but it's not the case

If that's how you saw TW1 and 2 - fine. The way I saw the trilogy was Geralt recovering his identity (TW1), memories (TW2) and finally reuniting with his family (TW3). That's plenty of coherence for me.

And all what happened in the meantime has to be meaningless? Don't think so

Well, they can't be the key characters of the plot if they were removed, can't they.

They are, because if they weren't, there wouldn't be people asking for them after one year of the game. The decision of which characters are "key" depends on which position they occupied in the story. And Iorveth, Saskia, Natalis, Anais or Adda had a decisive role in the events which led to TW3

---------- Updated at 03:32 PM ----------

C&C system works fine for the most part within TW3 itself. It doesn't work well between the games and it never did.

No, it doesn't. You can't see the outcome of your decisions except for the endings in the baron quest (the only one which was written for adults IMO). The most significat prove of this is that you can turn the tide of the war and the world state it's exactly the same after it

 

[Guest 3847602]

Again, it was sold like a game where you can import your saves an decisions. If they explictly said that. I don't have to think on what they did in TW2. If they hadn't said anything, your argument would be solid but it's not the case

And the save import feature is still there - it just sucks. It's not more or less meaningful than it was in TW2.

And all what happened in the meantime has to be meaningless? Don't think so

For me, the player - absolutely not. It was meaningful to me. On the other side, Geralt's priorities changed pretty naturally for someone who's completely recovered from amnesia.

No, it doesn't. You can't see the outcome of your decisions except for the endings in the baron quest (the only one which was written for adults IMO). The most significat prove of this is that you can turn the tide of the war and the world state it's exactly the same after it

Fate of Keira Metz, fate of the mages in Novigrad, ruler of Skellige and the outcomes of many other smaller quests can clearly be seen before the final mission.
Radovid/Dijkstra victory was reflected in the witcheress epilogue. Nilfgaardian victory - in both the witcheress and the empress ending.
Post-ending worldstate doesn't change for technical reasons - that's why the epilogues are restricted to the smallest zone, not because the story wasn't written for adults.

 

[Martinvls]

True, and that's literally the only example in the game where pure paragons lose some war assets. Even then, the cost is fairly negligible:
Sabotaging the cure = 100-something additional war assets from Salarians IIRC. By the end of the game it's easy enough for paragon players to accumulate ~4K war assets, a whole thousand more than it is needed to unlock every ending.
Saving Wrex + curing the Genophage = a far happier outcome at the minimal cost.

You don't believe but there is no any cost for paragon way - you are receiving exactly the same salarian fleet later.

I agree on all points in case that you were paragon in ME1 and ME2, made all loyalty missions, saved everyone in Suicide Mission and passed both reputation checks in ME2, yes, ME3 choices turn into obvious shining white. But if you'll see list of prerequsites for this, you'll understand that they are not that obvious without looking into wikia.. and so if you are playing for the first time in ME2 you can easily fail loyalty checks with Miranda/Jack and Tali/Legion, then game recommends you to go in Omega relay when there a couple of unfinished loyalty missions, so it is easy to receive 2-3 dead people in the end, and they easily can be Legion or Tali. And if anyone of them is dead there is no chance for best outcome between quarian/geth and you'll face gray choice.
And yes all of them - rachni, geth, krogan are bad and dangerous from historical events, so if you are rational person, desicions of their existence is somewhat "gray" choice for you.

Not many difficult decisions in the main quest for me but plenty of them can be found in sidequests. To quote myself from another thread:
Not a single one of these quests have a clearly good outcome. That's quite enough for me to call them grey.

Yes, those quests are staggering. But they are not grey, they are black. They show that no matter what you do everything will be bad. I personally like "Wild in Heart" but it seems it will be better if Geralt didn't took that contract? In any case hunter is dead and that stupid girl is either dead or all alone or losses money. Gray is something with different sides and here are only dark ones. And there no any consequences for them anyway.
Brightest example is White Orchard - there are multiple choices between Temeria/Nilfgaard - missing brother, precious cargo, take or not to take money for griffin and of course quest with arsonist. You can take all the Temeria's sides but still those peasants/bandits will attack you in tavern. After all that quests everyone in village will know that Geralt is loyal to silver lilies, why they must attack him after all good he done to them? If game was really grey, there will be some checks here and there, counting consequnces for all choices and displaying them with different outcomes, at least decorative. But no, there are none.

 

[Sam2305]

Fate of Keira Metz, fate of the mages in Novigrad, ruler of Skellige and the outcomes of many other smaller quests can clearly be seen before the final mission.
Radovid/Dijkstra victory was reflected in the witcheress epilogue. Nilfgaardian victory - in both the witcheress and the empress ending.
Post-ending worldstate doesn't change for technical reasons - that's why the epilogues are restricted to the smallest zone, not because the story wasn't written for adults.

Sorry but, for me, that's not enoughf. Those are just some minor consequences. And as I said, the C&C system it's just one of the many aspects which shows that TW3 it's not a story for adults. There are plenty more reasons which have been mentioned in this thread: Eredin as eeeeevil, the absence of true grey choices except for Baron's quest, how the game adressed the sex scenes (just compare with TW2)...

 

[RezoInverse]

Aryan La Valette, Iorveth, Saskia, Anais, Natalis, Adda, Sigfried, Yaevinn : 0 minutes of content. Sheala, Lady of the Lake: 1 real minute of content. That's FAAAAAAR from being enough. I would had prefer that than what we get. And what I remember for ME3 is that characters like Jacob or Miranda had quest with 15-20 minutes of gameplay and they were always avalaible to talk. That doesn't happen in TW3 even with the main characters that appears in the game. Sorry but those "5 minutes" were really valuable for some of us.

Now, that's another thing. I won't say that CD Projekt did make it right (because it is not the case), but comparing Aryan, Adda, Natalis and even Yeavinn with Jacob or Miranda is not fair - just because none of them was a real part of your group, not a single time on the previous games. Zoltan, Triss and Dandelion, now, that's is another history, because those was part of your "crew", and they received much more time, and many more hours of game than Jacob, Miranda, Samara, Jack...

And what I remember for ME3 is that characters like Jacob or Miranda had quest with 15-20 minutes of gameplay and they were always avalaible to talk.

Well, you're wrong on that. Yeah, they "have" a 15/20 minutes quest (which, again, happens no matter if they are alive or not, they just make a cameo), but you just have a quest, then (on some cases) a two minutes dialogue at Citadel and a "goodbye" at the final mission, through holograms. But there is no single way to talk with them otherwise, even if it is a LI. They just keep with their life along the game.

TW changed from a guy who is trying to survive in a caotic world by taking hard decisions to a guy who is looking for his beloved daughter.

But the notion was always there, provided you know the books. Geralt has no memory on the first two games so, he was just following his life... But once he remembers everything, of course he would go look for Ciri and Yennefer, just like he made along 4 books.

And all what happened in the meantime has to be meaningless? Don't think so

But it wasn't meaningless. On the contrary.

Compare Geralt from the books, then from TW1 and now TW3, and you see how much his character has (or not, depends of players) evolved. All things he's made without memory, made it possible to still make decisions and choices that he would have restrained himself years ago - going with Triss, being the most famous, but also helping on the plans to kill Radovid, or fighting for the mages... Fighting against soldiers for the sake of people, having some fun...

His entire plot was constructed to show him new ways of life, and they really succeded on that.

 

[mico11]

I was reading up on the leaks recently and it seems the graphics weren't the only things that were downgraded. Just superficially looking at quest names, and decisions you can see stuff were more fleshed out and more in the morally gray area. Like at one point the Emperor would betray the lodge and still burn them at the stake, and the Baron was a rapist instead of a golly santa with a drinking problem who takes in stray chidlren. A lot of the politics stuff seems more fleshed out either, instead of the laughably bad "matters of state" quest we got.

Here's the thing, if you go on E3 2013 and 2014 then advertise the game as mature morally gray hard hitting choices, and do the same on steam description, the thing that makes your games stand out from other RPG's then..

why in the fuck would they water that down aspects down. I get the graphics. I get the gameplay, all the little map pointers and lack of puzzles and red trails I get it.

But this...just...why

 

[Garrison72]

I was reading up on the leaks recently and it seems the graphics weren't the only things that were downgraded. Just superficially looking at quest names, and decisions you can see stuff were more fleshed out and more in the morally gray area. Like at one point the Emperor would betray the lodge and still burn them at the stake, and the Baron was a rapist instead of a golly santa with a drinking problem who takes in stray chidlren. A lot of the politics stuff seems more fleshed out either, instead of the laughably bad "matters of state" quest we got.

Here's the thing, if you go on E3 2013 and 2014 then advertise the game as mature morally gray hard hitting choices, and do the same on steam description, the thing that makes your games stand out from other RPG's then..

why in the fuck would they water that down aspects down. I get the graphics. I get the gameplay, all the little map pointers and lack of puzzles and red trails I get it.

But this...just...why

Some of that is just the inevitable culling during the creative process. Those examples you list, not sure they would have made the story better, especially with the Baron being a rapist. That would have killed any attachment I could have for him, which was a huge part of his appeal. Fixing Radovid and the politics would take a complete reconstruction of the plot and his character, not a bit of tweaking here or there.

 

[Riven-Twain]

Perhaps the REDs felt the story might become too dark? After all, not everyone loves being depressed by an entertainment. And perhaps artistically this wasn't their goal? I recall in a few interviews they've mentioned that the idea of the Botchling made some of the development team personally uncomfortable, since many of them are parents themselves. This suggests that the REDs are not insensitive, nor unconscious of the potential impact certain images and narratives may have, which I think shows they are human, like the rest of us. Such a grim and grizzly story mayn't have been the tale they ultimately decided they wishes to tell. At this point, one is questioning, and speculating on their artistic intentions. Merely some ideas to consider.

 

[Guest 3847602]

Like at one point the Emperor would betray the lodge and still burn them at the stake

Well, technically it was Yennefer who would've betrayed them (since Emhyr never officially promised them anything). Anyway, good riddance to that ooc crap, I'm really pleased it was removed before it was too late. :thumbsup:

On the other side, the content planned for Iorveth and Isengrim in Novigrad seemed really interesting to me, shame about that.

 

[Sam2305]

Here's the thing, if you go on E3 2013 and 2014 then advertise the game as mature morally gray hard hitting choices, and do the same on steam description, the thing that makes your games stand out from other RPG's then..

why in the fuck would they water that down aspects down. I get the graphics. I get the gameplay, all the little map pointers and lack of puzzles and red trails I get it.

But this...just...why

Totally agree man. But I think that I know the answer: sales. If they had told the truth, a significant part of the fans would had thought twice to buy the game. Most of us would have though "just wait one month or two in order to see what others say"

---------- Updated at 06:11 PM ----------

Perhaps the REDs felt the story might become too dark? After all, not everyone loves being depressed by an entertainment. And perhaps artistically this wasn't their goal? I recall in a few interviews they've mentioned that the idea of the Botchling made some of the development team personally uncomfortable, since many of them are parents themselves. This suggests that the REDs are not insensitive, nor unconscious of the potential impact certain images and narratives may have, which I think shows they are human, like the rest of us. Such a grim and grizzly story mayn't have been the tale they ultimately decided they wishes to tell. At this point, one is questioning, and speculating on their artistic intentions. Merely some ideas to consider.

If you are right, it would be another proof thay the game was mainly target for teenagers. You don't have to think on those things if you are making a game and a story for adults

---------- Updated at 06:15 PM ----------

Fixing Radovid and the politics would take a complete reconstruction of the plot and his character, not a bit of tweaking here or there.

They problem is that they considered that quest as enough with the kind of game they were looking for

 

[Riven-Twain]

If you are right, it would be another proof thay the game was mainly target for teenagers. You don't have to think on those things if you are making a game and a story for adults

Not necessarily. Not all adults require a remorselessly bitter tale, immersed in relentless gloom and the anguishes of human suffering. (Some have experienced enough of these in their own lives, in fact.) As story-tellers, the trick is to strike a balance between dark and light. Did CDPR please everyone with their narrative? No. But it's a wide audience they were aiming to reach -- with a wide range of preferences and tastes -- but not merely teenagers, I'd wager.

---------- Updated at 11:24 AM ----------

In any event, my main suggestion is that the changes possibly were the result of the developers' personal sentiments and artistic goals, and not merely inspired by marketing or 'age-appropriate' impositions.

 

[str1111]

If you are right, it would be another proof thay the game was mainly target for teenagers. You don't have to think on those things if you are making a game and a story for adults

Only for my this "adults and teengers" thing are stupid?





You say in this topic sex scenes, and nudity are more adult in TW2 but ignoring romances from TW3? For me TW3 in this term is much more adult, and chose betwen Yenn and Triss is much more deep, than romances from TW2.
Next, you speak about maturity, but you must accept, there are people who have different points of wiew (and they are adult too), than you, like about Radovid, he is evil becouse he killing, and Emhyr is better, but what about this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0i88t0Kacs
Ignore it, but why? What about burned villages, robbing, murdering, etc.? It's ok, becouse... becouse why? (I speak about this in different topic).


And choses? Many of you say that Radovid assassination is good choice, ok I understand your point of view, but I don't agree with that. My opinion are not that simple, becouse you see black and white chose, and I see only black or black (Emhyr vs Radovid rule), it's just opinion, against opinion, none of them are bad or good This thread show that all people can see all choices different, not only white or black.
What about second game and Loredo in Iorveth path? We can kill him, or rescue elves, it's mean TW2 is black and white? Or with Henselt, he kill Blue Stripes, becouse they are his enemies, Roche conspired against him, and he do what all kings do, kill the spy, and his men (Loredo in Roche path, anyone?), It's next black and white chose (black- kill good king, who kill his enemies, even if they're our friends, and Henselt behaved like a pig). Next big chose, Stenis live or die, what about this chose? We can't say it was grey, becouse even if he poisoned Saskia, he should have process, not lynch. Kill Arian or not, next black and white (Arian isn't bad, he fight for his family, as Foltest), kill troll, or not, blabk and white (troll didn't killing, he is just alcoholic, who people kill wife)...
It's mean TW2 is for tengers? Of course there are some more grey choses, like fight Letho (kingslayer, but good guy), or help Triss or Iorveth/Roche (rescue our love or help our friend), but who cere, there are many black and white choses, oh crap.
Or maybe there are not black and white, but I see it that (or I can see it that, because I never think about this, and look on TW1, 2, or 3, as a whole game, not some part of them, and say "oh shit, there are no bad or bad choice, it's not for adult", but now when I think about them...)? Maybe black or white don't mean teengers or adult? Do we have in real life only bad vs bad decisions? And only Grey humans?

I ignore all XP arguments, from first post, becouse it's... oh say it, it's just stupid.


Yep I want say only my opinion about this topic,I understand that not everyone has to agree with me, and I accept opinion of all from this topic. Just for me TW3 is adult like previous games.

 

[cyberpunkforever]

some quests, dialogs, characters, elements in the game are for adults and other are not, for not all players are adults or kids, and that is a good thing, for variety makes things more interestin and fun

 

[mico11]

Not necessarily. Not all adults require a remorselessly bitter tale, immersed in relentless gloom and the anguishes of human suffering. (Some have experienced enough of these in their own lives, in fact.) As story-tellers, the trick is to strike a balance between dark and light. Did CDPR please everyone with their narrative? No. But it's a wide audience they were aiming to reach -- with a wide range of preferences and tastes -- but not merely teenagers, I'd wager.

---------- Updated at 11:24 AM ----------

In any event, my main suggestion is that the changes possibly were the result of the developers' personal sentiments and artistic goals, and not merely inspired by marketing or 'age-appropriate' impositions.

Most of the complaints ITT have nothing to do with the tone...It's the terrible portrayal of the Wild Hunt turning them into dumb generic villains (after great portrayal in the first witcher , and a good base from the book to work with). Lack of hard hitting moral choices, lack of morally ambigious world. Basically the three that made the last two witcher games stand out from more generic RPG's, in terms of writing, Also asspul ending that makes the entire conflict with Eredin and the Wild Hunt seem pointless trivial and stupid. Awful ending to the series, considering W1 starts with Geralt running from the Wild Hunt ends with Geralt facing the wild hunt, and so does W2. That wide spectre of people they wanted to please I guess didn't include the people who wanted a properly delievered conclusion to the series with all the stuff they set up paying off


This game didn't have a problem surounding eavle people with corpses of dead women to hammer a point in. Or annoyingly distracting edgy modern swear words (what happened to "plough"). Was that for the mature audience such as myself? And asspul happy ending where the world is saved and everyone is happy is for my little sister

 

[saladin1701]

Not necessarily. Not all adults require a remorselessly bitter tale, immersed in relentless gloom and the anguishes of human suffering. (Some have experienced enough of these in their own lives, in fact.) As story-tellers, the trick is to strike a balance between dark and light. Did CDPR please everyone with their narrative? No. But it's a wide audience they were aiming to reach -- with a wide range of preferences and tastes -- but not merely teenagers, I'd wager.

---------- Updated at 11:24 AM ----------

In any event, my main suggestion is that the changes possibly were the result of the developers' personal sentiments and artistic goals, and not merely inspired by marketing or 'age-appropriate' impositions.

I haven't read the full chain so forgive me if i'm off target on this but not pleasing everyone is not the same as chronic under characterisation, giant plot holes and poor game play mechanics to determine story outcome. CDPR didn't need to please everyone in order to achieve those things. It's their failure that caused dissatisfaction amongst many who played the game, not the fact they were trying to reach a wide audience.

For example, there is no balance between light and dark with Eredin, the game's antagonist, there is simply a vacuum were there should be substance. There is no character development, there is simply a neon sign telling the player this is the bad guy and he's doing bad things because he's' bad. That is neither personal sentiments, artistic goals nor age-appropriate impositions, it's simply bad writing.

Similarly if you read a book were the hero's daughter died because the hero didn't have a snowball fight with her, you'd put it down in disgust. You would feel cheated at such a contrivance. Again that isn't down to marketing or creative decisions, it's simply down to bad writing. The writing in The Witcher 3, whilst fantastic in places, in leaves a lot to be desered in many more.

 

[Riven-Twain]

@saladin1701 , my recent observations in this thread were intended neither to defend nor excuse the work as a whole, but rather as a mere suggestion of how we might consider one particular aspect of the many complex branches of the creative process which contributed to producing the game.

In my opinion, there is no question that the game couldn't have been improved further. It could. I do not consider it to be a perfect narrative -- very few stories are. Nor do I feel it satisfies entirely on all points. I do, however, regard it as a remarkably ambitious work, which is commendable on very many points, and that ultimately these points combine to make for a fine -- if imperfect -- bit of entertainment. By the same token, I also believe that, for one reason or another, this ambitious work may not have achieved its fullest potential in the end. Yet, my personal admiration and respect for the artistic achievements of the many individuals who were able to create and realise the game, however, outweighs my personal interest in criticising their work. (I certainly couldn't have done any better.)

if you read a book were the hero's daughter died because the hero didn't have a snowball fight with her, you'd put it down in disgust.

Incidently, in such a case, I would have a jolly laugh -- and I'm still laughing. Which merely demonstrates how different members of the same audience can react differently to the same story. Is it 'bad writing', or is it merely 'writing'? That depends on whom you ask, and what they expect from the work. I for one find it amazing that the writing team was able to deliver the story they have; since, from what little I understand of their process, they were able to somehow weave a reasonably well-ordered and cohesive narrative out of a tangled skein of chaotic and often confusingly diverse variables.

This, at least, is my view on the matter.

 

[mico11]

I haven't read the full chain so forgive me if i'm off target on this but not pleasing everyone is not the same as chronic under characterisation, giant plot holes and poor game play mechanics to determine story outcome. CDPR didn't need to please everyone in order to achieve those things. It's their failure that caused dissatisfaction amongst many who played the game, not the fact they were trying to reach a wide audience.

For example, there is no balance between light and dark with Eredin, the game's antagonist, there is simply a vacuum were there should be substance. There is no character development, there is simply a neon sign telling the player this is the bad guy and he's doing bad things because he's' bad. That is neither personal sentiments, artistic goals nor age-appropriate impositions, it's simply bad writing.

Similarly if you read a book were the hero's daughter died because the hero didn't have a snowball fight with her, you'd put it down in disgust. You would feel cheated at such a contrivance. Again that isn't down to marketing or creative decisions, it's simply down to bad writing. The writing in The Witcher 3, whilst fantastic in places, in leaves a lot to be desered in many more.

Felt he same way about Mad Rad, the Redenians and the Eternal Fire. Most developers would know to stay away, but CDRR thought they were good enough and gave us one of the cringiest , one dimensional and offensive portrayals of religion I've ever seen. and it doesn't even make sense within the world , and the same conflict was done way better in the previous game with the pastor and Abigail, and The Order and the Elves. As if it wasn't one dimensional enough they whitewash the opposing side which is supposed to be the good side obviously .

 

[Sam2305]

Totally agree with you both @saladin1701 and @mico11

 

[str1111]

And asspul happy ending where the world is saved and everyone is happy is for my little sister

It's invalid logic, they can't destroyed world, becouse games are connected with books, and in books world wasn't destroyed. World survive isn't mean "happy end" and game for teen... Ciri can die, and she is most important to Geralt )and should be to plazer=, not thousands of ppl, not Aen Ellie, and we can't ignore this.

TW3 isn't about politic, isn't about conflict betwen humans and non humans, it's about Geralt personal story, about find his family, he fight only to them and want end with being Witcher, start to be normal human, but many ppl ignore it, and see only unmature becouse they don't accept more personal story, focused most on Ciri.

For example, there is no balance between light and dark with Eredin, the game's antagonist, there is simply a vacuum were there should be substance. There is no character development, there is simply a neon sign telling the player this is the bad guy and he's doing bad things because he's' bad. That is neither personal sentiments, artistic goals nor age-appropriate impositions, it's simply bad writing.

For me it's lack of players logic, if they don't see Eredin motivations and see he as EVIL only becouse he is EVIL, like Sauron. Sauron hasn't any motivations, he killing only to more power, Eredin want protect his ppl, becouse his world dying. We can debate about his methods, but not about his motivations. In WW2 USA use atomic bombs, it's evil or no? If we see only effects, we can clearly said it's evil, but when we think about motivations, all dead ppl when they invade? It's same situation with Eredin, I agree he isn't good guy, and yes he has to small time in game (what is bad), but I don't agree he is pure evil or black and white (he is like main antagonist from TW1, who killing only to protect humanity)
If we ignore Letho motivations (build new WItcher shool, and give living witcher place in society) he is evil too, becouse he used all to his goals, and killing them. He don't kill Geralt only becouse Geralt help him, and he have debt to pay.

Felt he same way about Mad Rad, the Redenians and the Eternal Fire. Most developers would know to stay away, but CDRR thought they were good enough and gave us one of the cringiest , one dimensional and offensive portrayals of religion I've ever seen. and it doesn't even make sense within the world , and the same conflict was done way better in the previous game with the pastor and Abigail, and The Order and the Elves. As if it wasn't one dimensional enough they whitewash the opposing side which is supposed to be the good side obviously .

Pastor in TW1 is evil like church in TW3, he want murder Abigail becouse she is a witch, there are no more reasons. Why Abigail should die? Becouse she sell items used to crimes? Why than all villagers who make crimes are ok? Look what pastor do with his daughter Carmen, only becouse she was pregnant...
And Beast? Geralt say who is response for this. Not only Abigail, but all ppl for village, all this hate make powerful curse.
In conflict betwen elves and order, there are no religion conflict. We see clearly why they attack non humans...

In TW3 church is like in previous games, they are fanatics, but ppl loves them. Look what church do in our world, they killing, burn, etc.


I ave weird feeling, som ppl see only what they wan to see, and what fits their sentence...