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

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Do you understand the difference between planned attack and accidental encounter?

yeah, but im telling you, If it was accidental encounter, Geralt would just kill him or try to kill him where he stands, while Eredin would instantly call every single guard and navigator to capture them so he can use them as bait.... so story wise, such thing would practically make the whole final battle not happening... i can imagine how dissapointed would players be then if the game ended like that...
 
yeah, but im telling you, If it was accidental encounter, Geralt would just kill him or try to kill him where he stands, while Eredin would instantly call every single guard and navigator to capture them so he can use them as bait.... so story wise, such thing would practically make the whole final battle not happening... i can imagine how dissapointed would players be then if the game ended like that...

:facepalm: let's stop here before you come up with an idea of omnipotence of Eredin... not mentioning that the whole final battle is a logical nonsense (it was discussed a lot in a separate thread)
 
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Eredin is KING of AEN ELLE.... kings are always surrounded by their guard... If there was a way how to get to him close... they would have take that chance.... like they did with Imlerith... but i already wrote that, you just ignored it.
 
That would have been a sexual content involving attempted rape of a minor. And you complained that asking for adding regular sexual encounters for Geralt is somehow not appropriate. hmm... I see where your priorities are. lol
sighs

Top kek, by the way, I think you forgot *more with regular. I see instead that your thought is always pointed to only one thing. ;)

Anyway, chapter 5 is where Eredin is more prominent, in his flesh and blood form, basically only that chapter tells more of him than 3 games do, having that source material. W1 had more Eredin...while W3... well we know. A wraith had more character development.
 
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Abigail was a lesser evil, she's not that good as you may think. She definitely summoned the Beast when some villagers killed her puppy. The Beast was killing all people regardless of their guilt. There's nothing good in it. Also, she helped the merchant to kill his brother, therefore, she was an accomplice. And as a cherry on the cake, she was a priestess of Lionheaded Spider cult .

OK, but did you try to pass the game till the end with choosing the side of the priest? In Act 5 or the epilogue (can't remember exactly) there is a sequence where you can absolutely see him for the pathetic man he is, in contrast to Abigail who adopted Alvin (twice).

Maybe I just saw what I wanted to see. Tell me if I'm wrong but, nothing screams louder than the old lady in Act 4 saying that "you killed an innocent person" when you come round the place where Abigail could've been, if you sided with her in Act 1. Also The Wild Hunt just loves to troll you with everything that goes wrong. It's just having a really strong impression on me.

Also don't forget the monster in the Vizima cemetery. Is it not a good vs evil choice? Since (Vestalla I think it's name is) doesn't eat living humans but only dead men.

In general, Act V summed up pretty well to remind the choices in Witcher 1.


Neutrality is not a better choice. It's just a choice. It has its advantages and disadvantages, which I really liked.

That is also true.

Despite some subjective moments where "the lesser evil" approach fails (in my opinion) - neutrality was still a really strong choice with missing out on deeper relations with Scoia'tael and Order. But, at the same time you can avoid killing neither of the leaders and avoid criticism of being impartial from many characters (most important being from Triss) and, in general neutrality is closer to the books. So the advantages of neutrality rationally should outweigh a choice for the other parties. Somehow developers reinforce that belief through not making any content for those who took the Scoia'tael ending except a few lines here and there in Witcher 1 and 2.

Again, sad that it almost doesn't matter for Witcher 2 and 3 (except a nice meet up with Siegfired).
No love for Scoia'tael. Someone should've been disappointed to see Yaevin and Iorveth gone for sure.
Back to the roots of the talk. CD Projekt Red was not immature or taking us as immature. I would even say that Witcher 2 was too Hollywood-y like some kind of Inception thing, but they handled it alright by Witcher 3.

Just a wishful thought that they'll leave a tribute for some characters left to bite the dust in Witcher 3 to never reappear again.
 
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OK, but did you try to pass the game till the end with choosing the side of the priest?
Yes, I tried once a walkthrough where I chose options, which I felt were not right just to see what will come out of this. And since Abigail was a lesser evil, the priest is a greater evil, of course. "You killed an innocent person" phrase I think is a bug, because despite her guilt is definitely lesser she is not innocent. Behaviour of Abigail can be compared to a person who throws a hand grenade in the crowd which contains both attackers and bystanders in the self-defense action.

Also The Wild Hunt just loves to troll you with everything that goes wrong. It's just having a really strong impression on me.
Oh, yes, Ereding in TW1 was great.

neutrality is closer to the books
Neutrality in the books were declared but Geralt by his nature was always breaking it and getting into troubles because of it.

CD Projekt Red was not immature or taking us as immature. I would even say that Witcher 2 was too Hollywood-y like some kind of Inception thing, but they handled it alright by Witcher 3.
Who said that Witcher 2 was immature? Quite an opposite, it was groundbreaking. TW3 (base game) definitely lowered the bar to the teenage level of maturity because of the points I listed. But my complaint was about declared maturity vs actual one. If CDPR said: "You know people, we're sorry, but games for adults don't sell that well and, therefore, we have to make the game more accessible for average gamers who we believe are teens and people in early 20s", then everything would have made sense. They market their games as treating gamers as adults, which is a false advertisement in case of TW3. They improved the content in terms of maturity in both expansions, especially in HoS, in which I cannot find a flaw in maturity of representation.
 
Who said that Witcher 2 was immature? Quite an opposite, it was groundbreaking. TW3 (base game) definitely lowered the bar to the teenage level of maturity because of the points I listed. But my complaint was about declared maturity vs actual one. If CDPR said: "You know people, we're sorry, but games for adults don't sell that well and, therefore, we have to make the game more accessible for average gamers who we believe are teens and people in early 20s", then everything would have made sense. They market their games as treating gamers as adults, which is a false advertisement in case of TW3. They improved the content in terms of maturity in both expansions, especially in HoS, in which I cannot find a flaw in maturity of representation.

In the OP that point was implied.

In my opinion Witcher 3 didn't go farther than Witcher 2 or 1 in terms of maturity. Just less sex scenes, less dirty politics, simplified main story (for it's own loss). The story somewhere down the middle definately seems way too linear.

The side quests were much easier to reach, do and overall fewer bad ones I guess in comparisson to previous games with hunting dogs over Vizima in act 2 if you remember.
My main gripe is how botched down the main story is.
I can forgive them simplifying politics, but at least give good endings in the end! Proper outro videos? I mean Witcher 1 and 2 had awesome CGI at least.

On the politics side, it would do justice to have at least one more ending to go with the scenario where the Northern Kingdoms somehow unify and defeat Nilgaard like in the Battle of Brena. Imho many people are disappointed that not even a simplified version of that was bothered to be included.
 
1. The most annoying immature moment of the Witcher 3 for me is the concept of EEEVIL.

In the previous games CDPR deliberately were showing that your antagonists have reasons to behave like they do but not in the witcher 3. Be it selfishness, taking political advantages, revenge, or even in order to save the world in their own twisted but justified way. What we see in the witcher 3 that instead of grey morality they made some characters EEEVIL. Meaning that they do evil for the sake of being evil and their justifications are justifications of a serial killer lunatics. In case you, kiddies, cannot decide that some person is EEEVIL CDPR made them look ugly. The more ugly the character look the more EEEVIL he/she is. You see, ugly == EEEVIL, like in the comic books for 10 year olds. Killing EEEVIL characters has no repercussions, it's always a feel good experience, you won't think twice why you murder them.

Let's look at Radovid. He was ruthless but adequate king in TW1 and TW2. Now he likes mass murdering mages, herbalists, and non-humans with most sadistic ways possible for no reason. In TW2 he was handsome and reasonable but in TW3 he's one dimentional, looks retarded and speaks some nonsense like a total nutter. I even was expecting him burst in "Muahahaha" evil laughter at some point. The game brands him with personality that leaves no single reason for you to let him live. CDPR gives a nudge to players: "You see, he's EEVIL, kill him, save the people or you're EEEVIL too."

His counterpart, Emhyr, is clearly a lesser evil from the first look. Why? Look at him. Emhyr isn't handsome (because he's also evil) but not as ugly as Radovid. And his daughter Ciri, who doesn't even resemble her father, is super pretty, because she's super good. You see, kiddies, good is always good-looking. You cannot kill Emhyr a la Letho killed Demavend in TW2 because he is lesser evil, therefore, there's no option to kill him on the ship, when you have a perfect opportunity to do so.

Eredin and the wild hunt is just an insult to intelligence. They don't talk, they kill for no reason, their faces look EEEVIL. The goul Vetala from TW1 had more intelligent conversations with Geralt than the elf Eredin who knows Geralt quite well. Geralt, according to the plot, spent several years with Eredin and his riders and they have nothing to talk about? Because the wild hunt is EEEVIL and you don't talk with EEEVIL, you kill it. By the way, what did Geralt do as a rider of the Wild Hunt, killed people for no reason too? No reasons, no motivations, no conversations are there... the wild is just EEEVIL, period, don't think too much about it, less you know the better.

The Whoreson Junior is another EEEVIL character. How do you know, who among the gangs of Novigrad is the most evil? That's right, he's the ugliest looking. He likes to kill girls for amusement and nail them to the walls in large quantities. By the look of his room, the girls didn't even resist. It looks really EEEVIL... and fake because it's made only for the sake of the EEEVIL concept. You cannot dispose of other gangs because they are not EEEVIL, instead they are whitewashed not to look too criminal, especially The King Of Beggars.

There are some other minor EEEVIL characters but I don't want to spend more time on this topic because there are a lot more to cover.

Wow, where to start on this one. It seems like you either have a very selective memory or simply never played the other games.
Witcher 1 and 2 had some pretty obvious EVIL characters. Azar Javed and the Professor both were very ugly looking and despicable men without any redeeming qualities whatsoever. Azar Javed never gives any reason for his behavior, nor do we find out anything about his past. He is just a crazy power hungry lunatic who solely thinks of himself and his own personal gain.
The same goes for Bernard Loredo, who looked like a swine, and behaved like one as well. Loredo as a character is manipulative, calculating and just by all means despicable. Like Azar Javed this guy has no redeeming qualities, and the more you get to know the full scale of his dealings, the more it becomes apparent that this guys is simply rotten to the core.

Then there are the more subtle evil people.
First of all, Radovid's paranoia, scheming and ultimate madness is well established within the Witcher trilogy. In Witcher 1 Radovid wants topple and annex the Temerian lands in multiple ways. On the one side he wants to secure his position as king by royal union with Adda, while on the other more shady and less obvious side, he tries to diminish Temeria by causing chaos and havoc through the religious movement that is known as the "Order of the flaming rose", which in reality is also under his control..
At the end of Witcher 2, when all comes together at the summit of Loc Muinne, and the treachery of the secret lodge of sorceresses becomes apparent, Radovid's paranoia finally makes him snap, and under his command a complete massacre ensues right there and then, followed up by the terrible witch hunts that sweep through the countries afterwards.
The way we see him in Witcher 3 Wild Hunt to me feels like a very natural result of all the things that happened before. This war has truly brought out and strengthened all of his worst traits.
 
Agree with everything in the OP

I spent 1200$ building a PC just for this game and it's the most disappointing thing in my life. It actually made me stop playing video games regularly , playing single player games, or caring and following game development at all. Now I only boot up Dota once or twice a week.

I can't believe they shat the bed so much

I never really cared about Mass Effect so much I didn't even play 3 but this is what everyone must have felt like?

It's like an executive made the writers take out anything in this game that might be too complex for 10 year olds, but the writers still managed to sneak something in with some of the side quests . I cannot believe that whoever wrote TW1 and TW2 is satisfied to giving us this garbage , after all the foreshadowing about The Wild Hunt in the previuos games.

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I mean you have, three four interactions wih Eredin in TW1 (some of them optional) and he's far more interesting character than anything he says or does in TW3.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swEC4gMvCN4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrePxATfvTk

He's really in Geralts head. In his titular game though, he's a dumb mute that barely says anything at all, and his entire motivation and existence is pointless since Ciri saves the world(s?) after all
 
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Agree with everything in the OP

I never really cared about Mass Effect so much I didn't even play 3 but this is what everyone must have felt like?

It's like an executive made the writers take out anything in this game that might be too complex for 10 year olds, but the writers still managed to sneak something in with some of the side quests . I cannot believe that whoever wrote TW1 and TW2 is satisfied to giving us this garbage , after all the foreshadowing about The Wild Hunt in the previuos games.
You are right, Mass Effect 3 feels exactly the same as Witcher 3 - there are parts which writers and designers managed to make solid and reasonable, and there are those revised by sales managers which tried to appeal consoles market. But - Mass Effect 3 failed at that attempt and Witcher 3 has success, so in last case there are both good and bad sides from that change.
 
He's really in Geralts head. In his titular game though, he's a dumb mute that barely says anything at all, and his entire motivation and existence is pointless since Ciri saves the world(s?) after all

Although it is quite possible that only Avallac'h knows that Ciri is capable of saving the world in the first place, and he does not tell it to anyone for his own reasons until after Eredin is defeated.
 
You are right, Mass Effect 3 feels exactly the same as Witcher 3 - there are parts which writers and designers managed to make solid and reasonable, and there are those revised by sales managers which tried to appeal consoles market. But - Mass Effect 3 failed at that attempt and Witcher 3 has success, so in last case there are both good and bad sides from that change.

IMHO, Mass Effect had it's mistakes but it story was never meant for adults. And, despite that fact, in many ways, the story of ME3 was much more superior than TW3's. Especially because Mass Effect told the same story during the three games and the last one was developed as the end of that story. Every character (I repeat, EVERY character) which had importantce was adressed in the final game and they had a quest or two for each one. And there were like 16 of them.

Every major decision had it's consequence in ME3. Some of those consequences were big and the others were small (like the Rachni queen) but they were taken into account in the end. Coherence it's a sign of a game made for adults and TW3 has none of it even when the Mass Effect saga always had that constant of good vs. evil. And even with that, the Reapers were one of the most perfect antagonist that I've ever seen. They even created a DLC in order to explain their origins (something that CDPR won't do with the Wild Hunt)
 
And, despite that fact, in many ways, the story of ME3 was much more superior than TW3's.

LOL
ME3 story is just stupid. Reapers don't capture Citadel first, like previous, and wait when someone build superweapon... hah Reapers build on the Citadel "switches" to help someone destroy them in future... Leviatans build super SI, becouse SI always destroyed organic life!!!... and this SI destroyed them (how?). Most decisions for previous games was marginal (if Mordin die, we have new Salarian, if Wrex die we have his brother, if Rakni queen die we have clone, etc. and block only some new decisions... Endings are just crap... three colors. Nope, ME 3 stoy is bad as hell.
 
Every character (I repeat, EVERY character) which had importantce was adressed in the final game and they had a quest or two for each one. And there were like 16 of them.

Every major decision had it's consequence in ME3. Some of those consequences were big and the others were small (like the Rachni queen) but they were taken into account in the end.

We really didn't play the same Mass Effect 3, then. Because for what I know, ME3 was a failure on MANY narrative ways.

- Besides Garrus, Tali, Liara and Mordin, the others had what... 5/7 minutes of scenes the entire game!? Because they don't really have any quest, since the missions happens with or without them - and if it is without, they just make sure to have some generic character playing the EXACTLY same role, with the EXACTLY same movements and 90% of the EXACTLY same dialogues. Have a romance with, and you have just a 1 minute sex scene plus!?

The only question is if that should be named as bad or completely lazy.

- Choices and consequences, then... Save the Rachni Queen at ME1 and you can met her again; Kill her at ME1 and you find a clone at the same spot, at the same conditions and with the exactly same dialogues. The ONLY difference is receiving a MESSAGE that the clone has gone away. No quest, no scene, nothing... just a single "email".

The only account the game makes, is the number of allies to the final battle, what you not even comes to see when playing. Just changes if you are or aren't seeing a 2 seconds scene of Shepard's breathing.

Make 2 entire playthroughts with a entirely different background, choices and LI's and you will be luck to have AT LEAST 10 minutes of differences the entire game (quite the opposite of TW). And I'm not even entering on the completely bad and messed ending, with simple colour changes and a horrible "God Kid". The Witcher 1, 2 and 3 are faaar superior on all that.
 
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We really didn't play the same Mass Effect 3, then. Because for what I know, ME3 was a failure on MANY narrative ways.

Make 2 entire playthroughts with a entirely different background, choices and LI's and you will be luck to have AT LEAST 10 minutes of differences the entire game (quite the opposite of TW). And I'm not even entering on the completely bad and messed ending, with simple colour changes and a horrible "God Kid". The Witcher 1, 2 and 3 are faaar superior on all that.
I agree that ME3 failed in many ways, but in terms of consequences it is brilliant with exception of rachni and ending. (if you play previous games). I made 5 playthroughs from ME1 to ME3 with different paragon\renegade choices and I added 1 major DLC in ME2 and ME3 on each walkthrough and there was a huge amount of differences in ME3 each time. And the coolest thing is that you meet this differences as a surprise, when you are not expecting them.
If you didn't have save from previous games and didn't buy DLCs, ME3 is simply a crap, which can't be even nearly compared to TW3 or ME2. I tried it once in "action mode" (where you are not making any choices and use a standard build) and it was extremely dumb. So ironically, while managers tried to make game for console market and not for fans, they actually made a game for fans, because I can't imagine how somebody will want to buy those expensive DLCs after playing ME3 without previous ME1-ME2 experience.
In TW3 you can play and enjoy fascinating story without any previous experience with Witcher universe and as I see from this forum you will feel even better without knowledge of previous games. That's why I think that ME3 failed as a game "simplified for teens" and TW3 has success.
I'll agree that ME3 is not even comparable to TW3, but if you'll play all three games ME1-ME3 in a row with all DLCs it will be around 100-120 hours, but that will be 100 hours of constant action and different experiences with fine gameplay, epic story (with exception of ending) and great replayability... so no, as a whole Mass Effect series is on the same level with Witcher series, sales show that too.

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IMHO, Mass Effect had it's mistakes but it story was never meant for adults. And, despite that fact, in many ways, the story of ME3 was much more superior than TW3's. Especially because Mass Effect told the same story during the three games and the last one was developed as the end of that story. Every character (I repeat, EVERY character) which had importantce was adressed in the final game and they had a quest or two for each one. And there were like 16 of them.
Is the story for the adults or no, it is very interesting question. For me adult story follows real life rules (in terms of psychology and common sense) and ME1&ME2 as most of previous Bioware's games is okay with that. Most situations are logical and normal. But in ME3 you can't get rid of constant "wtf?" thought and it is the best sign that game was remade for teens perception ("teen" here didn't mean age, it means life experience), and the same "wtf" is for TW3 (Yen appears out of nowhere in White Orchard, rat killing with Triss, Dandellion part etc). In TW3 I didn't have any previous connection with characters so I can just look at all that situations as something hilarious, not serious and entertaining. But in ME3 main story was a real butthurt and facepalm after ME1&ME2, and as I say without them ME3 simply isn't worth playing.
Look at the sales - ME3 is sold only a bit better then ME2, and TW3 is sold 5 times better then TW2. So CDPR here made in excellent job, TW3 is good both for adults and for teens. And I won't agree that TW1 is so adult game.. it is not black and white, but it is forced gray. Adult life is not gray, and it is not black and white, it is rainbow of colors which are constantly changing depending of the point of view... so maybe TW3 is even more "adult" in terms of world and story..
 
We really didn't play the same Mass Effect 3, then. Because for what I know, ME3 was a failure on MANY narrative ways.

- Besides Garrus, Tali, Liara and Mordin, the others had what... 5/7 minutes of scenes the entire game!? Because they don't really have any quest, since the missions happens with or without them - and if it is without, they just make sure to have some generic character playing the EXACTLY same role, with the EXACTLY same movements and 90% of the EXACTLY same dialogues. Have a romance with, and you have just a 1 minute sex scene plus!?

The only question is if that should be named as bad or completely lazy.

- Choices and consequences, then... Save the Rachni Queen at ME1 and you can met her again; Kill her at ME1 and you find a clone at the same spot, at the same conditions and with the exactly same dialogues. The ONLY difference is receiving a MESSAGE that the clone has gone away. No quest, no scene, nothing... just a single "email".

The only account the game makes, is the number of allies to the final battle, what you not even comes to see when playing. Just changes if you are or aren't seeing a 2 seconds scene of Shepard's breathing.

Make 2 entire playthroughts with a entirely different background, choices and LI's and you will be luck to have AT LEAST 10 minutes of differences the entire game (quite the opposite of TW). And I'm not even entering on the completely bad and messed ending, with simple colour changes and a horrible "God Kid". The Witcher 1, 2 and 3 are faaar superior on all that.

What I remember is like one or two quest for each character. And almos every decision had it reference. TW3 never tried to do this

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Look at the sales - ME3 is sold only a bit better then ME2, and TW3 is sold 5 times better then TW2. So CDPR here made in excellent job, TW3 is good both for adults and for teens.

Not for me. TW3 has no choice/consequence system. Not for the decisions which were taken in the previous games or those which are taken in TW3. Almost every aspect of the game seems adapted for a child of 12 years. And, speaking about the sales. We, (the fans of the previous games) also made an excellent job praising W2 and W1 and sayint that they were the best RPG games with the best narrative for adults. Real tough and grey decisions. And I think that a significant part of us wouldn't had done this if we would had known which was going to be the result. Without that, I think TW3 wouldn't had sold so well. Now, I prefer ME saga or even DA Origins. I want to se what happens with Cyberpunk
 

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What I remember is like one or two quest for each character. And almos every decision had it reference. TW3 never tried to do this

You've not seen BSN around the time ME3 was released, right? One of the most prevalent grievances about the game was treatment of ME2 characters (some of which were LI and, as everyone knows, BW fanbase is notorious for its unhealthy passion for waifus and husbandos). 5 minutes of content and 1 quest per character was faaar from being enough.

Not for the decisions which were taken in the previous games or those which are taken in TW3.

Save import was never the selling point of TW games, unlike ME series. We've seen already in TW2 how much decisions from previous game matters in the sequel.

Almost every aspect of the game seems adapted for a child of 12 years.

Action mode for ME3 and shitload of autodialogues (with "Independence Day" writing quality, at that) says hi!

Real tough and grey decisions.

What are the tough and grey decisions in ME3. AFAIK, paragon options are always the more rewarding ones in the end.

It's okay to be disappointed about how TW3 handled some themes (namely the politics) compared to TW2. It's another matter to call a pulpy space opera about space Jesus and Normandy crew daddy issues an example of mature storytelling. I still quite enjoy ME series, but it's some of the characters that make me like it, not the complex plot nor "mature themes" in ME1, 2 or 3.
 
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Not for me. TW3 has no choice/consequence system. Not for the decisions which were taken in the previous games or those which are taken in TW3. Almost every aspect of the game seems adapted for a child of 12 years. And, speaking about the sales. We, (the fans of the previous games) also made an excellent job praising W2 and W1 and sayint that they were the best RPG games with the best narrative for adults. Real tough and grey decisions. And I think that a significant part of us wouldn't had done this if we would had known which was going to be the result. Without that, I think TW3 wouldn't had sold so well. Now, I prefer ME saga or even DA Origins. I want to se what happens with Cyberpunk
TW3 is so huge that I can't blame authors that they didn't create really diverse and consecutive ways to walkthrough it. At PS4 achievements I see that only 50% of players ever completed the game and only 5% made it on hard difficulty (i.e. played second time). And there is only one class, one gender, all relationships are available during one playthrough and with clarity potion you can try any build you want, whenever you want, so I think developers thought that illusion of choice will be enough. Really, 150-200 hours is huge amount of free time required to finish TW3.
Mass Effect is directly opposite - it is relatively short, but there are at least two different dialog lines for male/female, and in them there are three choices in every decisive conversation and if you want to experience all that dialogs (and you know that many of them are amazingly voiced with proper intonation and meaningful face&body animation) you need to walkthrough ME multiple times and of course different diverse classes and squadmates will help you in that.
I never forget Shepard's face expression when you are deciding to kill rachni queen in ME1, there is such horror in his eyes, horror that he is killing last reproductive member of that race, to save his world from possible problems.. or when you are in search of Tayne's son and come to interrogation room, if you have enough renegade reputation, you may just say "I'm a Spectre, start talking" and that surly guy start to talk immedeately, though if you went paragon way he will f*ck your brain for long.. and there are dozens or even hundreds of similar emotional moments during ME1-ME3, moments which look more sincere that most of Hollywood modern films.. And there is no way to experience most of that cool moments in one or two walkthroughs.
So I think it is not honest to compare diversity and replayability of Witcher and Mass Effect, first was created for one long walkthrough and second is from the base adopted for at least two of them, and you can freely go for 3-4 of them and have different dialog and gameplay. This all is mostly for ME2, ME1 has less diversity and renegade dialog lines aren't always reasonable, and ME3 lives just as a show of consequences of first two parts and is closing many interesting topics in a dumb and short way.

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What are the tough and grey decisions in ME3. AFAIK, paragon options are always the more rewarding ones in the end.

Grey decision 1 - cure genophage or not. Actually there are multiple scenarios which availability is dependent from your actions in ME1 and ME2 and life state of Wrex, Mordin and female krogan. To receive the best result you must have save with right optional actions from ME1-2, and still one of the brightest squadmates will die. And also you final decision will theoretically influence your relations with salarians;
Grey decision 2 - save quarians or geth or both - and again it depends on your actions in ME2. Without precisely right ME2 save you couldn't save both. So in a plain ME3 or even not ideal ME2 save you must choose between arrogant but alive quarians or clever but mechanical geth;
Grey decision 3 - save your krogan friends or rachni.. yes, that part is awfully implemented, bit it is still there;
Grey decision 4 - despite all the criticism of the ending, I'll say that I hate final mission, but not final results themselves. Green, blue and red endings are quite balanced form point of selfishness - in one you are alive but galaxy is in ruins, in second you become a dead god, world is ok, but reaper threat is not eliminated and in third you sacrifice yourself for a new better life for others.. and it seems that Illusion man's idea was not that bad in comparison to obvious red choice.
And now what are grey decisions in TW3? Save Temeria or Redania?

I won't call ME an "adult game" but at least it didn't oppose common sense in first two parts.. and in third it is generally ok if you manage to close eyes on some details, all the crying is about fact that Bioware made just "okay" when they have all opportunities to make masterpiece.

As for the "waifu" and fanatism I never see so determined hate and mad reactions from any fans of single-player game, but which you can see on youtube from witcher fanboys when someone is saying something slightly bad about TW3 or it's characters. No adult person in clear mind will never threat video blogger because of some game.. all that clearly shows that a large part of TW3 gamers are teens in a period of sexual maturation, which have taken all that far-from-reality story too serious and they are living in it for 500+ hours with the same 3-button gameplay.. that is simply awful and ridiculous and it shows that TW3 doesn't do anything good to their mind.
 

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Grey decision 1 - cure genophage or not. Actually there are multiple scenarios which availability is dependent from your actions in ME1 and ME2 and life state of Wrex, Mordin and female krogan. To receive the best result you must have save with right optional actions from ME1-2, and still one of the brightest squadmates will die. And also you final decision will theoretically influence your relations with salarians;

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.

Grey decision 2 - save quarians or geth or both - and again it depends on your actions in ME2. Without precisely right ME2 save you couldn't save both. So in a plain ME3 or even not ideal ME2 save you must choose between arrogant but alive quarians or clever but mechanical geth;
Paragon players can save both provided they've played as paragons in ME2, that's my point. ;)

Grey decision 3 - save your krogan friends or rachni.. yes, that part is awfully implemented, bit it is still there;

Saving the Rachni = a paragon choice if the queen was saved in ME1 (also paragon choice) = more assets.

Grey decision 4 - despite all the criticism of the ending, I'll say that I hate final mission, but not final results themselves. Green, blue and red endings are quite balanced form point of selfishness - in one you are alive but galaxy is in ruins, in second you become a dead god, world is ok, but reaper threat is not eliminated and in third you sacrifice yourself for a new better life for others.. and it seems that Illusion man's idea was not that bad in comparison to obvious red choice.

Agreed, if there is one good thing I can say about the endings it's that they forced the players to make a truly tough decision (for many of them it was for the first time in the entire trilogy).

And now what are grey decisions in TW3? Save Temeria or Redania?

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:
- how to deal with Temerian insurgent in Precious Cargo
- leaving the woman to her fate in Wild at Heart or killing Niellen (the werewolf)
- telling the truth to the mother of Nilfgaardian soldier (deserter) or lying to her in Blood Ties
- killing or sparing Gaetan in Where the Cat and Wolf Play
- siding with the elder or Sven in In the Heart of the Woods
- fighting the soldier or walking away in From a Land Far, Far Away

Not a single one of these quests have a clearly good outcome. That's quite enough for me to call them grey. :)
 
You've not seen BSN around the time ME3 was released, right? One of the most prevalent grievances about the game was treatment of ME2 characters (some of which were LI and, as everyone knows, BW fanbase is notorious for its unhealthy passion for waifus and husbandos). 5 minutes of content and 1 quest per character was faaar from being enough.

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.

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Save import was never the selling point of TW games, unlike ME series. We've seen already in TW2 how much decisions from previous game matters in the sequel.

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

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Action mode for ME3 and shitload of autodialogues (with "Independence Day" writing quality, at that) says hi!

I've already said that ME plot was never meant for adults. It was always about renegade/paragon choices so, it's normal to see those dialogues. On the other hand, TW3 sold itself like a game made for adults and, in the end, there is not much difference with ME3. Just the Baron and maybe one minor quest. All Skellige plot was of the same quality of ME saga. You already knew which was going to be the best option even before the characters opened their mouths

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What are the tough and grey decisions in ME3. AFAIK, paragon options are always the more rewarding ones in the end.

In fact, I was speaking about the vision that many fans had about The Witcher Saga before TW3. I wasn't refering to ME. And with all this, I'm not saying that ME saga was perfect. I didn't like the endings but, as a trilogy, it maintained a relative coherence between the three games and Bioware never sold it like something different of what really was. 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"

And, just to clarify, the problem here is that a game was sold like A and in the end was B. 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. That system is the esence of RPG. If you remove that, what you get it's an action game with a lot of pacing. Also, if you remove key characters of the plot (even when some of them were previously announced) with no explanation and also without telling anyone, you are also treating your fans like idiots
 
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