Side quested to death

[Vigilance.492]

So if Gwent proves a fun game, collecting cards for it will serve a good purpose, and it makes sense. I also liked collecting Pazaak cards in KOTOR, I had fun improving my deck. Now what's left is for their location to make sense. Climbing a mountain and being rewarded by a Gwent card located on a branch is just wrong.

Oh man, if Gwent is even half as enjoyable as Pazzak I'll probably forget about my anger over the removal of Dice Poker. Although the "enjoyment factor" of Pazzak wasn't even necessarily the game itself, well it was, but it was also the atmosphere of being in those bars, the music, the people, trying to find some slimy fucker to play against and the types of "tournaments" you got yourself into. Hopefully Gwent is similar.

I agree completely with what's being discussed here by the way. I think the furthest I'll accept is if you're rummaging through someone's house and you find a Gwent card in a chest, but if you're finding them in absurd places out in the world, it's really going to kick the immersion.
Collectibles in general I frown upon, but if hidden behind some kind of puzzle or it requires interesting use of gameplay mechanics to obtain, I'm not completely object to it. How DA:I & Assassin's Creed do it is simply awful, however how the Arkham Series do their Riddler Trophies, I actually really enjoyed that (Or at least until Arkham City made you collect 10 billion million of them).

I think there's going to be like a "Tier" of Questing. You'll have main quests (obviously), major side-quests that are on-par with the kind of stuff in The Witcher 2 (And many in W1!), minor side-quests probably similar to the major ones but not quite as large/involved or quite as thoroughly designed (I'd say the one coming with the initial DLC roll-out will probably be like this) and then lastly just fairly standard Witcher Tasks, like killing monsters or finding something that requires going somewhere super dangerous - aka Fetch/Kill quests that are dressed up well enough to not feel like boring generic shit.
I don't think every quest will be on-par with what was featured in the previous games, because it would be insane to pull off W2's level of side-quests in an open world, but I'm sure there will still be tons of those, just more spread out and other "tiers" of those side-quests will fill the gaps, but hopefully nothing awful. Or at least that's my assumption.

 

[Totalimmortal]

Oh man, if Gwent is even half as enjoyable as Pazzak I'll probably forget about my anger over the removal of Dice Poker.

Gwent?

Spoiler

Pure Pazaak

 

[witcher22]

Didn't they say all the buildings were hand crafted? That on it's own allows for quests to be themed around the design of the building.

I.e some one is being thrown off their balcony, by thugs in Novigrad. Getting to the building entrance proves difficult; due to the chaotic slum design.

Do you ignore it? Or break into the house next door/go through the sewer/bribe some of the thugs to show you the way in?

Upon entering the building, you find out the inhabitant was a local spy for Dijkstra, who had turned snitch.

The building is full of documents on Dijkstra and contraband weapons, stolen from a warehouse. Dijkstra had been using them to supply his men in a bid for power.

Geralt is now in a bind:
. The weapons are of the finest temerian steel plundered from the late Foltests private army. (perfect for Geralt and sought by the head of the city gaurd).
.The documents on Dijkstra would have him sentenced to death.

Do you:
.Leave the situation alone?- (30g paid for your silence by the thugs- snitch dies)

.Kill the thugs to save the snitch?- (100g, city gaurd provides information. All documents and weapons go to the city gaurd. The snitch is caught by Dijkstra and betrays you.)

.Wipe out everyone?- (everything goes to you. No one finds out you were involved unless you tell people later. Dijkstra is more cautious of you on the next meeting; he is not foolish enough to incur your wrath despite suspecting you.
.

 

[C0bR]

The open-world / questing problems with Inquisition felt like a knee-jerk reaction by Bioware driven purely by the negative fan feedback from DA2. I felt like they fixated far too much on the issue of heavily re-used environments and lost sight of many of the other factors that made their previous games great. They gave us a massive game with consistently beautiful and unique locales (thus addressing the woes of DA2), but ultimately filled them with a whole lot of nothing. The ratio of bare-bones quests to relevant ones was probably something like 20 to 1.

Inquisition was a huge step forward in environment and level design, but several steps back in side-quests and interact-ability with NPCs. The massive size of the world further emphasized the lack of depth the game had whereas if it were scaled down a bit I doubt it would have felt anywhere near as empty and useless.



A great thing about monster contracts, which was probably the closest thing to fetch-quests in Witcher 2, is that they weren't really fetch quests and can become even less like fetch quests in Witcher 3 if done correctly.

Rather than just killing a given quantity of beasts like in Witcher 1, we can be given unique methods to deal with them. We see a bit of this in Witcher 2 where we have to blow up Nekker holes with crafted bombs, seek out and destroy Endrea eggs, and place traps in Harpy nests. If they expand on this idea in Witcher 3 and give us unique ways to shut down the monsters rather than just kill 20 of them, they can give us "fetch quests" without them actually feeling like fetch quests.

Bioware's problem is that they started developing the game as an MMO (probably on EA's demands). From looking at the game I am quite sure that they first designed the gigantic world and only later went on to fill it with content. Which is of course pretty stupid as you should design the enviroment around the content and not the other way around. That's why the game is filled with meaningless Ubisoft-style objectives. That approach could still somehow work, but not with writers who spend most of the time writing self-wankery romances and developing the witty, sarcastic remark number 1253.

On the other hand, at least from I have read, the world of TW3 grew organically. The game is bigger today than it was 18 months ago not because of someone saying "Hey, let's make the map bigger for the sake of it", but because of the demands of the content creators. So my hoping is that the world of TW3 will feel more natural and the content will be more meaningful.

 

[Tuco]

It's somewhat of a common complaint in the genre but honestly I never had any issue either with side quests being detached from the main plot or with them being "too abundant" in number.

What I have a serious issue with, on the other hand, is both main and side quests often being mechanically dull, non-engaging and unimaginative to play. Some people seem to think that making a quest good is all about sugar-coating it in a good plot-driven pretense.
As far as I'm concerned good writing and a good narrative are just (a very appreciated) added value, but then it's all about what I'm actually doing.
You can have the very same generic premise "(Find item X for character Y") and build over it two different quests, one incredibly passive and dull ("follow the quest marker on your radar, pick up item, take item to NPC") and the other extremely enthralling ("learn about the item's history and make your own idea of where you'll be able to find it, track it down, pass some trap/riddle/challenging fight to reach it, then decide which character will actually get it, with branching consequences from there").

It's all about execution, not about premises.

 

[yokokorama]

Bioware's problem is that they started developing the game as an MMO (probably on EA's demands).

I remember they released the first concept art back in summer 2012 during a convention, and I explicitly remember them not being sure about inclusion of multiplayer, so I am uncertain if this is true.

From looking at the game I am quite sure that they first designed the gigantic world and only later went on to fill it with content. Which is of course pretty stupid as you should design the enviroment around the content and not the other way around. That's why the game is filled with meaningless Ubisoft-style objectives.

I agree with you, but not quite on the idea that they were trying to create an MMO. I personally think they just got tunnel vision due to DA2's backlash and focused so hard on superior environmental design that they completely forgot that world design is irrelevant without meaningful content. They probably realized the lack of meaningful content eventually, but not early enough to properly fill up a world the size of Inquisition with non-filler content.

Check out this video from 2012: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxKB8EFFXv0

The first item the panel member addresses is the fact they are going to "Stop Re-using Levels." To me, that all but confirms that this was basically their mission statement for the game, and it really shows in the final product.

That approach could still somehow work, but not with writers who spend most of the time writing self-wankery romances and developing the witty, sarcastic remark number 1253.

I personally enjoyed the dialogue (barring the zoomed out third person throwaway dialogue with a throwaway NPC), but to each his own.

On the other hand, at least from I have read, the world of TW3 grew organically. The game is bigger today than it was 18 months ago not because of someone saying "Hey, let's make the map bigger for the sake of it", but because of the demands of the content creators. So my hoping is that the world of TW3 will feel more natural and the content will be more meaningful.

If TW3 is basically TW2, but just on a wider scale, I'll be fine with it.

TW2 has a similar format to Inquisition in that it doesn't really have "levels" but several medium sized "open zones" filled with things to do. TW2's areas are obviously much smaller than Inquisition's areas, but my point is that TW2 hit a perfect balance between large areas that aren't completely pointless. Flotsam was probably the biggest "open area" and I found the ratio of meaningful content to exploration space to be adequate. If TW3 can replicate that, then I think they'll be fine.

I know TW3 is going to be fully open world rather than "zones", but what I am referring to is the amount of meaningful content relative to the amount of space in the game. Basically, have an appropriate amount of interesting, good [non-fetch] quests that is proportional to the size of the game, unlike Inquisition where we have a game that is unproportionately large relative to the amount of "real" content in it.

Inquisition is a good (maybe even great) game, but it felt like they got a regular length Bioware story (i.e. a 30 to 40 hour experience) and shoved it into a world that is 80% larger than it should be, thus making the game feel very barren and "empty" (empty of meaningful content, that is).

 

[Journey_95]

as long as we have interesting side quests and not boring &generic shit like in DA:I or Skyrim I'm fine with having a lot of side quests

I also hope that they find the right balance like 50% side quests, 50% main storyline not like Inquisition where it was like 20% story and 80% playing Fetchville

 

[EliHarel]

I also hope that they find the right balance like 50% side quests, 50% main storyline not like Inquisition where it was like 20% story and 80% playing Fetchville

When they addressed the length of the game in interviews they often said 50 hours main quest, 50 hours side quests.

 

[Journey_95]

When they addressed the length of the game in interviews they often said 50 hours main quest, 50 hours side quests.

here's hoping its the truth
I have faith in CDPR !

 

[Scholdarr.452]

When they addressed the length of the game in interviews they often said 50 hours main quest, 50 hours side quests.

Yeah, but that sadly says nothing about the quality of these quests...

 

[Phinnway]

When they addressed the length of the game in interviews they often said 50 hours main quest, 50 hours side quests.

I seem to recall an interview where a developer said those numbers were a "safe" estimate and a more realistic number is 200 hours for full completion. Unfortunately I don't have a source though.

 

[Scholdarr.452]

I seem to recall an interview where a developer said those numbers were a "safe" estimate and a more realistic number is 200 hours for full completion. Unfortunately I don't have a source though.

That would implicate that another 100 hours consisted of pointless side crap for "full completion". I don't think that this'd be good news...

But to be honest those "hour" estimates make litte sense anyways, especially in a huge open world game in which most of the time you're occupied with simply getting from point A to point B. In all of these games (Skyrim, Assassin's Creed, GTA, DAI and so on) most of the time you're walking, running, riding or whatever, even if you use fast travel a lot. And then it also depends a lot on how fast you individually progress during the game and quests.

 

[witcher22]

That would implicate that another 100 hours consisted of pointless side crap for "full completion". I don't think that this'd be good news...

But to be honest those "hour" estimates make litte sense anyways, especially in a huge open world game in which most of the time you're occupied with simply getting from point A to point B. In all of these games (Skyrim, Assassin's Creed, GTA, DAI and so on) most of the time you're walking, running, riding or whatever, even if you use fast travel a lot. And then it also depends a lot on how fast you individually progress during the game and quests.

One of the examples is the leshen request where the elders and younger generation have a dispute and end up killing each other based on what you do.

Another is the woman from the e3 demo you save on route.

They haven't given many examples. It is possible to beat a level 12 dungeon at level 5, if you are skilled enough to not die instantly. Kind of a way to reward you for having enough balls to take it on.

 

[TheEvilChris]

Ah, but what if you are sent on a mission to find a weakness in the flank of the grim reaper? That would truly be a side quest of death.

*Ba-dum tish*

 

[Scryar]

It has probably been posted somehwere, but this article fits with the topic. ( just found it for the first time and haven't read it yet)
It's written by Phillip Weber, Quest Designer at CD Project Red and he writes about the Questdesign of Witcher 3
http://www.makinggames.biz/features/quest-design-in-the-witcher-3-wild-hunt,6896.html
"Filling an open game world with quests is a big challenge. Philipp Weber explains how the quests in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt are created and what is required in order to create a living and, above all, authentic world of The Witcher 3."

 

[Geralt_of_bsas]

The numbers of hours the devs said, while not very precise, can give you an idea of something.

For example, 100 hours of meaningful quests is totally doable without turning the game into DAI, TW1 + TW2 in a somewhat completionist playthrough take around 100 hours, and those games had very few fetch quests, which didn't even took much time anyway, you could gather the items while traveling for other more important things.

Based on this I'd wouldn't be surprised if we get like 120 hours of TW1 and 2 quality main and side quests., add to that that TW3 has other things that also take time of those 100 hours that arent quests, and its a safe bet.

 

[althrian]

That was a fine read. Thanks for posting it and thanks @Benzenzimmern for the answers

 

[braindancer12]

*Ba-dum tish*

 

[Benzenzimmern]

Ha, I did not even know this existed in English on the internet :cheers:

 

[Phinnway]

That would implicate that another 100 hours consisted of pointless side crap for "full completion". I don't think that this'd be good news...

That's a bit of a presumptuous statement. You've never even played the game. So you don't whether the side quests are "crap" or not.

Obviously the the more content a game has the more generic the content usually is. But this is a design issue CDPR intends to resolve in the Witcher 3. If you want to know precisely how they intend to do this you can watch the developer presentation posted earlier in this thread. The presentation part of the video lasts from 8:00-20:00 and everything after that is answers to questions from the audience.

@whiplash27 This Witcher 3 presentation from European Gamers Expo 2013 might help answer some of your questions.