The quest "A land from far far away" it's an often missed quest from Skellege that tracks back to Velen, but it does not really make sence, unless it was meant to be part of a bigger quest later for B&W and was dropped. You don't know where they came form apart from the strange crest on the wrecked boat and possibly the end destination cause Beauclair is mentioned in the journal notes.
I think that's it. Lack of talent and imagination account of the new writers, and the new lead writer, who isn't even credited as a writer in TW2, and in TW1 he's credited as "additional dialogue".
I suspected this was it all along but didn't know for sure. The writing is worse and it's very obvious. The ending to the trilogy's main story really suffered.
In that I have to disagree. you maybe don't like the end of Mass Effect but the C&C system was the most perfect that I ever seen. Batman Arkham Knight was really good in my opinion but it is just an action game. The idea of having the Joker in Batman's mind was genious
In that I have to disagree. you maybe don't like the end of Mass Effect but the C&C system was the most perfect that I ever seen. Batman Arkham Knight was really good in my opinion but it is just an action game. The idea of having the Joker in Batman's mind was genious
I think he didn't mean games as a whole, but endings themselves. In that I must agree with @Shayan762. W3 ending is superb comapred to the games he mentioned (altough Arkham ending wasn't that bad. I liked ambigous nature of true ending).
In that I have to disagree. you maybe don't like the end of Mass Effect but the C&C system was the most perfect that I ever seen. Batman Arkham Knight was really good in my opinion but it is just an action game. The idea of having the Joker in Batman's mind was genious
You didn't get what I meant, I really love those games but the endings aren't very satisfying and The Witcher trilogy ending is pretty good compared to those games.
I think he didn't mean games as a whole, but endings themselves. In that I must agree with @Shayan762. W3 ending is superb comapred to the games he mentioned (altough Arkham ending wasn't that bad. I liked ambigous nature of true ending).
Imlerith Geralt buries his sword in big guys chest, and then imlerith breaks it leaving Geralt with only handle (or whatever it is called porfessionaly in english). I was actually disappointed to see after the fight the sword is ok.
Small detail but it bugged me.
btw why do the bad guys always have to get the most badass looking armor?
Perhaps the Vegelbuds wish to provide as wide a variety of entertainment as possible? There's music, food, gwent, loads of alcohol... so why not strippers too. In fact I remember I heard two random women at the ball mistake Geralt for a male stripper (I couldn't believe my ears when I heard that conversation!).
In Skellige there's a really short side quest called "Armed Assault", where
Lugos' men are after a peasant's blood. Once you kill the bandits (they're hostile on sight) and talk to the peasant there's never any further reference to the event, not even if you go and talk to Lugos.
1)Black Pearl
Sail with guy from Novigrad to Skellige, run through wilds, find him at shore, dive like crazy and when you finally find that black pearl, you just get coin and exp.
There is not a sign of some story in this quest, its just linear walk through the whole Skellige. Not some unexpected diversion, some event or whatever.
2) Madam Blueberry (or whatever, I don't remember that name )
Bassically you defeat the same guy 3 times and that's it. No story, no personality, no reason. He keeps saying something about Geralt offended Madam Blueberry,
but there are no additional dialogue options or quest phases to meet her, talk to her or something...
Seems to me he acts like she is made up and don't wanna provide real reason, why he wants to fight, but then the story hole is even bigger.
Hi,
2) Madam Blueberry (or whatever, I don't remember that name )
Bassically you defeat the same guy 3 times and that's it. No story, no personality, no reason. He keeps saying something about Geralt offended Madam Blueberry,
but there are no additional dialogue options or quest phases to meet her, talk to her or something...
Seems to me he acts like she is made up and don't wanna provide real reason, why he wants to fight, but then the story hole is even bigger.
There's a notice you can find on some Velen notice boards titled "Our Bilberry's died". It's about a little girl passing away, and she could be the same Bilberry whom Ronvid of the Small Marsh is trying to honour. Maybe he's her big brother or something... or perhaps that's a bit too far-fetched.
1)Black Pearl Sail with guy from Novigrad to Skellige, run through wilds, find him at shore, dive like crazy and when you finally find that black pearl, you just get coin and exp. There is not a sign of some story in this quest, its just linear walk through the whole Skellige. Not some unexpected diversion, some event or whatever.
Although this quest may seem a bit featureless at first glance, there's actually a rather interesting little story behind it. In aninterview with TheDailyCrate, the quest's designer Nikolas Kolm (NK) tells us more about the personal side of it:
TDC: In my playthrough, I did come across a certain fetch quest that made me really mad though; a little quest called “Black Pearl”.
NK: I should be able to give some insight. I made it after all!
TDC: Ok, here is my beef: I met an old Soldier named Nidas back in Novigrad, who requested my help in finding a Black Pearl as a gift to his wife. I believe that Geralt even sighed a little at this menial task, but I agreed to it after all. We met up in Skellige, I fetched him his damn pearl and as a quest reward, he gave me 10 gold pieces and a week’s worth of real life sadness. What the hell, Nikolas?
NK: Did I mention the other title for Quest Designers is “Creators of Misery”?
'After you find the pearl and hand it over to the quest giver, he tells you to meet him back in Novigrad to claim your reward. When you do so, you find Nidas gloomy and deep in his cups and eventually learn that the whole Black Pearl adventure was his last attempt to reconnect with his wife, suffering from the disease we call Dementia.'
TDC: On a more serious note; in all the terrible things that happen to the residents of the continent, the story of Nidas and his wife really stood out to me. Can you give some background on this specific quest?
NK: Sure. The initial idea called for Geralt to be asked to help with the request of an elderly soldier. The soldier wanted to reignite his relationship with his wife. When I first looked at the concept I thought it was a neat little idea and proceeded to flesh it out a bit. Thing was, there wasn’t really a twist there; there wasn’t anything to stun or otherwise impact the player. So the writer for the quest (Jakub Szemalek) and I got to thinking…
TDC: “…how can we break as many hearts as possible?”
NK: Well, the next idea was that the wife was actually dead and the soldier was dealing with his grief about her loss by fulfilling a promise he made to her in life. Eventually though, Jakub proposed the idea to introduce the twist that is now in the game, that the wife suffered from a condition similar to Dementia. He thought and I agreed, it would make for an even more powerful impact.
It resonated with me because I had such a person in my family, where every visit was painful because the person just doesn’t remember, no matter how much you wish for them to remember you.
Nidas put his hope on the fact that the the black pearl, a running joke between him and his wife for years, would bring the light back in her eyes, but just as in real life, it just doesn’t work like that. This is why the idea really resonated with me and it was then one of my smaller but most important little quests to put in. Without wanting to judge, we leave it up to the player to ponder the scenario, as sometimes, it can be questionable if living is better than death.
TDC: I was really impressed with the voice acting on that NPC as well. For such a small role, the actor really nailed the disappointment and anger. I don’t think I’ve ever felt for a non-essential NPC like that before.
NK: Yeah! Oh man, when I first played the quest with actual VO, that was chilling!
As we can see, even if a quest may appear incomplete, or may have a rather unsatisfactory ending, the developers put some thought into it, behind the scenes, and sometimes a quest has personal significance. Whether this significance and thought are readily apparent to players in the final game, however, is not always clear.
Black pearl is actually CDPR at their best. That quest, partly because I'm currently dealing with a family member suffering from dementia, slammed me right in the gut. You can do the right thing, the wrong thing, the sideways thing - it doesn't matter when life deals you a shit hand. It's rather amazing the writers packed that kind of gravitas in such a short quest.
As it no doubt did for Nikolas. I often find stories take on a keener force when they resemble episodes of our own life experiences. My sympathies for you and your family member. That is a cruel turn of Life!
Near Frischlow I found a tomb raider's diary in which they have written about the deceased Lady Caroline and the riches hidden in her grave. However I found neither her remains, nor the riches in the cave, only Diagram: Enhanced Griffin Gauntlets. So I concluded that the location design and the content of the letters were developed by different people.
It seems that the devs have completely run out of fresh ideas and started to create "complex" situations with "heavy" moral choice wherever they want. Why should they do it? Is it really necessary to exaggerate the colors and artificially increase the drama? The presented quests do not enable a player to think carefully about different actions and wonder if the current moral decision is right. Rather, a player starts to think, "What do I need these two chairs for when there is third which the developers have hidden from me?". It is unnatural and far-fetched.
There is a tied man called John Verdun near the Inn at the Crossroads. If you are to release him, later Geralt will meet John north of Ursten village and find out that Verdun slaughters and robs people with his gang. The player can choose to a take reward for the release or to say, "Should've left you back there on the bank". Upon choosing the second option a fight begins. Why isn't there an option to refuse to take the money and leave peacefully?
Here is another example: in The Nithing quest Geralt has a dilemma - either reverse the child's curse and invoke it back on the woman who gave it, or do nothing and let the kid die. So, the witcher has to choose the lesser of two evils, while it would be more rational to visit the woman and threaten her with cursing her back, in order to force her to spare the child.
Here is another example: in The Nithing quest Geralt has a dilemma - either reverse the child's curse and invoke it back on the woman who gave it, or do nothing and let the kid die. So, the witcher has to choose the lesser of two evils, while it would be more rational to visit the woman and threaten her with cursing her back, in order to force her to spare the child.
Or, he could just say to the boy's father: "There's the shaft over there, you can write your ex's name on it yourself if you want her to die and save your son, I'm done here..."
Yeah, I get that Geralt is the protagonist and all, but it just feels SO wrong to make such life changing decisions for these people without even discussing it with them first. It just feels OOC for Geralt.
