Did the ending feel quite rushed to you?

[moonknightgog]

While I think the narcoleptic-dwarf-escort was a brilliant jab at stupid escort mission in other games, I have to agree that the production resources could have been allocated better... especially on the ending and the epilogue. I could have done with less main quest padding if the important bits had more substance.

Agreed to the Enhanced Edition...

Or less pointless side quests and more main quests, with different paths based on your choices.

---------- Updated at 01:51 PM ----------

The high point of the game overall was definitely the first encounter with the Crones. It started to feel more and more like budget or time constraints effected it from that point on, though there were still some very, very good parts. Most of Geralt and Ciri's scenes together were excellent, and the battle at Kaer Morhen was also great.

Spoiler

The higher point to me is the Battle of Kaer Morhen, and all the dialogues and scenes between Geralt and Ciri. The only parts that seem to me rushed are...the Act 2 (Brothers in Arms - that quest design is the lower point of the game, it's just...go from A to B and talk to the NPC) and the ending:

1) What are Av'allach plans?
2) What were Av'allach doing in the tower
3) Who summoned the White Frost?
4) Why Ciri needs to sacrifice herself in that moment?
5) How is Ciri survived? Or dead?


I think that there is a lack of a big final dialogue with Av'allach, a la Letho in The Witcher 2.

 

[TudorAdrian]

Or less pointless side quests and more main quests, with different paths based on your choices.

---------- Updated at 01:51 PM ----------



The higher point to me is the Battle of Kaer Morhen, and all the dialogues and scenes between Geralt and Ciri. The only parts that seem to me rushed are...the Act 2 (Brothers in Arms - that quest design is the lower point of the game, it's just...go from A to B and talk to the NPC) and the ending:

1) What are Av'allach plans?
2) What were Av'allach doing in the tower
3) Who summoned the White Frost?
4) Why Ciri needs to sacrifice herself in that moment?
5) How is Ciri survived? Or dead?


I think that there is a lack of a big final dialogue with Av'allach, a la Letho in The Witcher 2.

On topic though you might want to include some SPOILER tags for people coming in here and stumbling across your post Otherwise, good points.

 

[moonknightgog]

On topic though you might want to include some SPOILER tags for people coming in here and stumbling across your post Otherwise, good points.

Oh, I'm sorry.
I believed this was a spoiler thread.

 

[Lightice]

1) What are Av'allach plans?
2) What were Av'allach doing in the tower
3) Who summoned the White Frost?
4) Why Ciri needs to sacrifice herself in that moment?
5) How is Ciri survived? Or dead?

Some of these do get answered:

1) To stop the White Frost
2) To power up the Tower of Falcon with the power of the Elder Blood
3) No-one. Ciri went to the Frost, not vice versa
4) I am assuming that Ciri and Avallac'h started the ritual then and there in the case Eredin won and they had to rush it.
5) This part is highly ambiguous, but I am assuming that if Ciri survives, then she backs down from confronting the White Frost, feeling that she's got all the time in the world to get back to it, now that Eredin's gone.

Yes, there could have been a lot more dialogue to explain some parts. There should have been more foreshadowing and explanation on the threat of the White Frost in the first place, and exactly how the Elder Blood was conceived as a weapon against it. While some mystery has to remain by necessity, the finale comes a bit too out of the left field, inspiring confusion more than anything. I hope that we get an Enhanced Edition where Avallac'h discusses the history and nature of the Elder Blood more.

 

[moonknightgog]

Some of these do get answered:

1) To stop the White Frost
2) To power up the Tower of Falcon with the power of the Elder Blood
3) No-one. Ciri went to the Frost, not vice versa
4) I am assuming that Ciri and Avallac'h started the ritual then and there in the case Eredin won and they had to rush it.
5) This part is highly ambiguous, but I am assuming that if Ciri survives, then she backs down from confronting the White Frost, feeling that she's got all the time in the world to get back to it, now that Eredin's gone.

Uhm...what I understood was that...Av'allach opened the portals between the worlds....the point is...there's no explanation for that.
The conjunction of spheres started on its own? Why in that moment?

Spoiler

And...in 2 endings Ciri lives, but in the last one, Ciri is death. Or is she alive in all the endings, but in the worst one she do not return to Geralt?

 

[Lightice]

Uhm...what I understood was that...Av'allach opened the portals between the worlds....the point is...there's no explanation for that.
The conjunction of spheres started on its own? Why in that moment?

Avallac'h caused the mini-Conjunction to happen, apparently as a side-effect of activating the Tower of Falcon with Ciri's blood, which was apparently a necessary step in defeating the White Frost. It's the whole "why does the Elder Blood work as a weapon against the Frost" that is left annoyingly vague, everything else is either directly told or can be fairly easily extrapolated from the actions of the characters.

EDIT:

Spoiler

And while this part is left highly ambiguous, I believe that Ciri will inevitably die if she faces the White Frost, and that if she returns to you it's because she decided to postpone the heroic sacrifice for another day, or to try and find a better solution

 

[moonknightgog]

Avallac'h caused the mini-Conjunction to happen, apparently as a side-effect of activating the Tower of Falcon with Ciri's blood, which was apparently a necessary step in defeating the White Frost. It's the whole "why does the Elder Blood work as a weapon against the Frost" that is left annoyingly vague, everything else is either directly told or can be fairly easily extrapolated from the actions of the characters.

Uhm...it could be...but, I think that a "Letho kind of dialogue" with Av'allach and Ciri would be necessary.

EDIT:

Spoiler

And while this part is left highly ambiguous, I believe that Ciri will inevitably die if she faces the White Frost, and that if she returns to you it's because she decided to postpone the heroic sacrifice for another day, or to try and find a better solution

The problem is...in all the 3 scenarios, that scene is exactly the same.

 

[Lightice]

The problem is...in all the 3 scenarios, that scene is exactly the same.

The actual confrontation is never shown in any scenario. Only Ciri resolving to do something. What she does depends on the ending. I don't see how that scene could be changed without ruining the playable epilogues.

 

[moonknightgog]

The actual confrontation is never shown in any scenario. Only Ciri resolving to do something. What she does depends on the ending. I don't see how that scene could be changed without ruining the playable epilogues.

I'm sorry, I used the wrong words.
What I wanted to say is not that the scene should be different.

Spoiler

I wanted to say that, in the ending when Ciri is alive and where she is supposed to be death, the scene is the same, so we don't know how she died, or if she died, or how she postponed the sacrifice.

 

[inanimate_object]

Spoiler

And while this part is left highly ambiguous, I believe that Ciri will inevitably die if she faces the White Frost, and that if she returns to you it's because she decided to postpone the heroic sacrifice for another day, or to try and find a better solution

I quite like this interpretation. It plays in well to the overarching themes of the novel as it relates to Ciri's pathological rejection of responsibility. Far better interpretation that she survives because she decides she is not willing to throw away her life. Puts a wrench into an otherwise poor ending.

 

[warbaby2]

I quite like this interpretation. It plays in well to the overarching themes of the novel as it relates to Ciri's pathological rejection of responsibility. Far better interpretation that she survives because she decides she is not willing to throw away her life. Puts a wrench into an otherwise poor ending.

Well, according to the official guide...

Spoiler

Ciri dies defeating the Frost because her resolve isn't strong enough (because Geralt didn't bolster it enough)... if she lives, she is strong enough to defeat it and survive. So, she stops the Frost in any case.

 

[moonknightgog]

Well, according to the official guide...

Spoiler

Ciri dies defeating the Frost because her resolve isn't strong enough (because Geralt didn't bolster it enough)... if she lives, she is strong enough to defeat it and survive. So, she stops the Frost in any case.

So...why this is explained in the guide and not in the game?
And why her resolve should matter something?

 

[Lightice]

Well, according to the official guide...

Spoiler

Ciri dies defeating the Frost because her resolve isn't strong enough (because Geralt didn't bolster it enough)... if she lives, she is strong enough to defeat it and survive. So, she stops the Frost in any case.

I'm not inclined to take the guide at face value. Game guides often include inaccurate information and personal interpretations of the guide writers, rather than what the developers intended. This particular scene, I think, is deliberately left ambiguous, I'm just making my own interpretation about it.

 

[warbaby2]

I'm not inclined to take the guide at face value. Game guides often include inaccurate information and personal interpretations of the guide writers, rather than what the developers intended. This particular scene, I think, is deliberately left ambiguous, I'm just making my own interpretation about it.

Prima guides are usually done with support and sanction of the developers, but everyone can form their own opinion, of course... but since the World of Witcher book also states that Ciri at least stopped the White Frost for good, it's save to say that this part, at least, is accurate no matter what. I doubt that two sources would be false on that fact.

 

[Zeroscape]

Seems like Ciri needs to stop by Westeros one of these days...

 

[warbaby2]

Seems like Ciri needs to stop by Westeros one of these days...

Pf, please, she would sneeze the White Walkers back over the wall on an off day.

 

[shtempik]

Well having the difference of Geralt impacting Ciri positively or negatively in a manner that is the difference between life and death feels to me personally like a childish story... Kinda like love defeats all evil! yada yada...
So I can hardly take that guide seriously unless the Devs do want to share their intent with the endings...
I do agree that it felt rushed after Kaer Morhen now that I read a lot about it... The part in the end was just too weird and went too fast without much explanation so I am trying to piece it together, perhaps a few in game lines will be able to fix most of it and explain what is going on...

First of all I found this: "Ithlinne, an elven prophetess, is famous for her foretelling of the end of the world. According to her prophecy, the world will be destroyed by an ice age and all humans will die. The only survivors will be elves, saved by an offspring of the Elder Blood, known also as the Swallow. Several signs will herald the destruction of the world, and the cataclysm will begin when elven blood soaks the earth. This will mark the advent of the 'Time of Disdain, the Axe and the Wolf's Blizzard', which can be interpreted as a long war or a return to barbarism."

Perhaps killing the Wild hunt especially Eredin = Elf blood spilled triggers the End of the world, the White Frost. Avallach knew this so he took Ciri to that tower in advance, to prepare for the moment where Eredin dies and Things go mad aka Spheres spawning monsters, White Frost incoming and all of that... They wanted to prepare to fix this as soon as possible before it's too late.
So Eredin dies, the event triggers and they are trying to get a hold of it, explains why it can't be delayed any further and it has to be now even if Ciri doesn't fully control her powers yet as Avallach claims... And Avallach's agenda in all of this is simply to be nice to Ciri while protecting her so bad things don't happen in the universe by the likes of Eredin, hoping that when the time comes for the White Frost in their world, Ciri answers the call and agrees to help Avallach's world, risking herself again like in this situation to stop the White Frost over there.
Eredin I suppose didn't believe in the same way as Avallach I imagine so he didn't go with that approach but rather take her blood to both prevent their world's end + have her powers to himself because why not? Traveling between worlds is awesome and I guess he was power greedy or something...

How does this sound to you guys? Did I miss out any other major plot holes?

Oh yeah, Eredin tells Geralt that Avallach has tricked them both and took Ciri, basically he noticed that but he had no idea what Avallach's intentions really were, he didn't trust the Sage at all leading him to think he wanted to kill Ciri and use her blood or whatever, not realizing Avallach had a just cause in all of this so he was mistaken basically, adds some spice and a twist to the ending for the players of course that turns out to be a false twist or a twist of a twist if you will... So you will wrongfully want to kill him (Not sure if you can, I personally chose not to... Dunno what the other option actually does).

 

[Linkenski]

I felt like the whole twist after Eredin's fight was where things started to happen way too fast and I found some of them puzzling. How did Eredin know? Like you say, it seems kind of weird of him to know what Avellac'h is doing. My biggest gripe with the ending is just how quickly that twist with Avellac'h is introduced and resolved, and how major characters get discarded quite undeservingly. Yennefer's last moment on-screen is her lying in the snow after letting Geralt through the barrier. She's merely mentioned in the epilogues sometimes. What happened to Avellac'h after the twist?

I just feel like they were pressed for time and decided to leave too many things ambiguous right at the end of a trilogy when it isn't really a smart idea to make ambiguity. We've followed these characters for 3 games now and one final game that felt really far and wide in scope, and to see so many things be resolved ambiguously is completely unfitting in my opinion.

One thing Witcher 3 has just cemented is that game developers need to learn how to write a proper ending for a trilogy bookend. They're authors and can do as they please, but I really feel like I just want to see a LOTR kind of epilogue for a game trilogy soon rather than these cheap, ambiguous endings. As a player you feel like you've earned more than such a brief resolution.

 

[moonknightgog]

Well having the difference of Geralt impacting Ciri positively or negatively in a manner that is the difference between life and death feels to me personally like a childish story... Kinda like love defeats all evil! yada yada...

I like to think that ciri lives anyway and what you say to her have impact only on her choice.
1) She return to you and became a Witcher.
2) She return to became an empress.
3) She survive but doesn't return. Geralt dies thinking that Ciri was dead.

 

[Uthic]

Very, very rushed throughout that whole final battle. I am still unsure of how Ciri stopped the White Frost, I had thought it was just describing an Ice Age not some sort of malevolent phenomenon.