Such an uninspired disappointing story

[moonknightgog]

not because of a size of the intended audience.

That's...depend.
For the same reason because people like Fast & furious but don't like Birdman.

But yes, the problem is for sure internal. About the Wild Hunt expecially. But even Menge or Whoreson Junior could have been handled better. Or the Sabbath.
But expecially some choices and consequences. I mean...Brothers in Arms...it's useless. There is no consequences, is just useless. Nothing change if you gather allies or not.

But it's even external. Because you just cannot make retcons and mix of different choices.
You have quotes about Vergen even if you choose Roche path, and quotes of the assassin of Henselt even if you choose Iorveth path. A no matter what you choose, Geralt still ask about Saskia to Philippa, even if you released her from the sorceress's control. No, it's simply a mess, and the import save is a joke.

There is only one way to handle a choice from the previous game.
The fall of House of Reardon.

 

[Scryar]

You know I pretty much despise the view that good deep stories can only be for a select audience, and nothing mainstream is ever any good. I get it why such a view exists psychologically, but it is not one of the finest moments of humankind.

The problem with the story in TW3 is not that it can be seen stand-alone, and no books/previous games are necessary for understanding. Also even though the break with continuity is very unfortunate, with such a great variety of very different outcomes of TW2 this stuff realistically had to be sacrificed, though it could be done more gracefully. TW3 story-problems are internal, and have to do with bad character development, cliched characters and over-the-top cheesy presentation, generally weak plot in certain areas, inconsistency of character psychology, motivation, and actions, and a badly done ending.

It is a very mixed bad, with some super-terrific parts somehow co-existing with completely juvenile and moronic. I had no idea it was even possible, and it is obvious that some of CDPR's writers are really good, while others are clearly sub-standard. Or the management simply lacked time and decided as usual on "good enough". None of these faults has anything to do with going mainstream. A good story is a good story because of its internal features, and not because of a size of the intended audience.

I think their decision to go mainstream is the reason why some parts of the game are juveline and characters cliched.
Take Eredin as an example. I'm not sure what they tried to achieve with him but If I had to guess they probably wanted to let him look and act intimidating, mysterious and powerful.
Badass to describe it in one word. They chose this approach over a deep characterization. They basically simplified him for the mainstream, because they tought a complex but not so "epic" antagonist like Letho would be the inferior choice.
His cheesy one-liners, his badass look, his Darth Vader mask, his deep voice . Everything about him screams "we wanted to make him look and act "cool", because that's what the mainstreams wants. That will be enough. No need to waste ressources to give him a decent characterization and personality. His look, they way he speaks and his acts will be good enough.


Take this scene for example. Imo one of the most juveline moments in the game.

"The King is dead. Long live the King". Not only is this a horribly cliched line, but he also says it to himself (respectively to the player), what makes it look even more ridiculous.


Followed by him looking directly into the camera (the player) and hinting a smile. I'm happy the scene ended, because I'm sure he would have started to laugh viciously.


Can anybody imagine Letho being potrayed like that? This is just comical and not something I expected from a witcher game before Witcher 3.

 

[moonknightgog]

@Scryar That scene is just horrible. A playable section with a 15 years old Ciri could have been better. At least to do a better portrait of Eredin.

I have to say that even the voice act is bad. With that Dath Vader vein. Expecially in Cave of Dreams.

 

[Scryar]

@Scryar That scene is just horrible. A playable section with a 15 years old Ciri could have been better. At least to do a better portrait of Eredin.

I have to say that even the voice act is bad. With that Dath Vader vein. Expecially in Cave of Dreams.

Absolutely eveything would have been better.
Regarding the voice. I agree. Maybe we should be thankful he had less than 20 lines

 

[moonknightgog]

Absolutely eveything would have been better.
Regarding the voice. I agree. Maybe we should be thankful he had less than 20 lines

Yeah, maybe.

More dialogues with that voice would have been something like this.

 

[MagnarofThenn]

A lot of the choices and consequences were removed from the game probably because they were running out of time.

Based on the leaked material, your trip to Menge's place could have resulted in saving Rita or finding the vault but not both. You could have invited either Iorveth or Roche to the battle of Kaer Morhen but not both. There was originally going to be a Wild Hunt attack on Novigrad, and there was supposed to be another mission to go after the other Wild Hunt General, Sile de Tanserville was going to play a bigger role in the story if she lived (possibly the Great Escape is with her instead of Rita since you save Rita from Menge earlier). Also saw a mission in Kaer Morhen where you can make eggs for Yennefer,

Hopefully we will get a Enhanced edition at some point that has some of the cut content restored.

 

[moonknightgog]

A lot of the choices and consequences were removed from the game probably because they were running out of time.

Based on the leaked material, your trip to Menge's place could have resulted in saving Rita or finding the vault but not both. You could have invited either Iorveth or Roche to the battle of Kaer Morhen but not both. There was originally going to be a Wild Hunt attack on Novigrad, and there was supposed to be another mission to go after the other Wild Hunt General, Sile de Tanserville was going to play a bigger role in the story if she lived (possibly the Great Escape is with her instead of Rita since you save Rita from Menge earlier). Also saw a mission in Kaer Morhen where you can make eggs for Yennefer,

Hopefully we will get a Enhanced edition at some point that has some of the cut content restored.

BUT NO!

http://forums.cdprojektred.com/thre...eaking-romance-plot-I-feel-dirty-now-Spoilers
http://forums.cdprojektred.com/threads/38294-What-s-wrong-with-Triss-Romance-Scene
http://forums.cdprojektred.com/thre...tment-(sorta-spoilers-)?p=1855790#post1855790


This is more important.
I hate humans.
I hope they will restore those things.

 

[MagnarofThenn]

I have hopes for all but the attack on Novigrad , it's probably not going to make it because consoles would not be able to handle it.

 

[Golden_Phoenix]

Just give us Director's Cut alredy! Give it to us Peter Jackson! CDPR!

 

[Avin]

Too much forcing Yen on us(while shafting Triss the main girl of the first two games)

Not for me. I waited Yennefer for two games. At least on TW1 there was Shani. Triss is boring.

 

[cyberpunkforever]

tw3's main story feels a little "artificial" not so natural like tw1 and 2

 

[Kidoki]

I don't think it was THAT disappointing. It did feel somewhat "meh" at certain points, and i agree with most things people are saying here on the thread.

And we can clearly see and feel the rushed Act 3. I think this game lacked more interaction with our loved characters, and more difficult choices on the main quest. (The side quests are pretty good on this regard!).

The Wild Hunt felt too much like a generic villain, and Ciri's decision to go against the White frost feels strange, though we can somewhat assume Avallac'h slowly convinced her during the time she traveled with him, and in the end she decided to do it. (But how could he succeed in trying to make Ciri do something she doesn't want to is... strange, so i don't really buy into this theory)

But the emotional ride this game provided me was amazing. Finally seing Ciri and having all the father-daughter interactions with her was something i looked forward to since finishing the books on January. Yennefer too, it was so awesome to see her. I didn't find myself crying like a baby when finishing the other games, and this is a rather "important" thing to me.

And don't get me wrong now, but after all the political shit we got into the first 2 games, i'm glad this one was more of a personal quest. (Doesn't mean i dislike TW1 os 2's story. I love both and do think TW2 did it in a much better way than 3)

I hope this "simplification" doesn't happen to any of CDPR's future games, and that this thread proves to be an useful feedback :cheers3:

 

[Dracolich55]

Agreed, the open world did take away from other aspects for the game. For what its worth though, I still enjoyed this one more than any other Witcher game. I think part of the reason people are disappointed, aside from the writing post-Velen, is the continuity of choices. This one, I think is entirely on CDPR, and the genre of RPGs in general.

The best stories in videogames that I have encountered are Planescape Torment and The Last of Us, and even PS:T, which is an RPG, is quite linear by PS:T standards and it does have a definitive ending regardless of the decisions one makes. Of course, in this game, it is the gamer who ponders on his/her own choices and the meaning of their Nameless One, but the ending is always the same. The belief I have is that games with one definitive narrative or a lack of choices tend to be more consistent with the developers vision of what the story should be,.

With The Witcher 3, it seems as if the "choices" and different endings were like checking of a giant checklist just because its required of being an RPG. TW2 did this well, but there is no way CDPR in their current state could have created world states for all the different saves. Of course the actual content in TW3 itself such as the handling of Eredin or Sigi's stupidity is all on CDPR, they clearly could have benefited from say another year of development. Like it or not, the real star of TW3 was the open world.

Which isn't entirely bad of course, because this is the most "fun" Witcher game. Yet at the same time, I really am confused as to what went wrong. Before this game came out, I thought CDPR could screw up the gameplay, open world, graphics etc. but the story would be amazing. Funnily enough, it was the other way around. Everything about this game was bloody fantastic sans the story.

 

[moonknightgog]

I think this game lacked more interaction with our loved characters,

No, it lacks good characters.
Eredin, Radovid...choices from the previous games that don't make any difference.

---------- Updated at 10:27 AM ----------

The Last of Us

The Last of Us is a copy and paste of The Road.
Naughty Dog should be sue for plagiarism.

 

[saladin1701]

I have issues with parts of the story but not the whole thing. The plot was good but spoilt by that awful, nonsensical ending they slapped on it, there's issues surrounding the characterisation of key members of the story, romance issues etc. (they've all been discussed elsewhere) but in other places the writing was excellent. For every Sunstone there was a Bloody Baron. For every swim to Emhyr's ship there was finding Dijkstra's treasure cumulating in the morale quandary of whether to allow your friend/love interest be tortured in order to gain the information. Act 1 contained some of the best writing of the series so far, Act 2 had issues and was where it began to go wrong but Act 3 was an appalling mess that let the entire series down. Simply saying the entire lot was bad is to do it a grave injustice.

 

[wichat]

more difficult choices on the main quest. (The side quests are pretty good on this regard!).

Exactly this. No more words are needed.

 

[lagom76]

I do agree that when talking main quest alone then the W2 win out but keep in mind that its always easier to make a great story in a game that's not open world than the opposite.

Why should it be any harder to write a good story for an open world game? This does not make any sense to me.
Except the one thing, that you put a lot of manpower and work in this open world and to some point ignore the (much more important) main story line and characters...

 

[MagnarofThenn]

I have issues with parts of the story but not the whole thing. The plot was good but spoilt by that awful, nonsensical ending they slapped on it, there's issues surrounding the characterisation of key members of the story, romance issues etc. (they've all been discussed elsewhere) but in other places the writing was excellent. For every Sunstone there was a Bloody Baron. For every swim to Emhyr's ship there was finding Dijkstra's treasure cumulating in the morale quandary of whether to allow your friend/love interest be tortured in order to gain the information. Act 1 contained some of the best writing of the series so far, Act 2 had issues and was where it began to go wrong but Act 3 was an appalling mess that let the entire series down. Simply saying the entire lot was bad is to do it a grave injustice.

I agree with you, and I honestly believe that Act 3 was because they ran out of time. I really hope they come out with an enhanced edition and addresses this. Or at the very least release all the partial assets that they built for the cut portions so the community of modders can restore it like some people did with KOTOR2.

 

[vivaxardas2015]

I have issues with parts of the story but not the whole thing. The plot was good but spoilt by that awful, nonsensical ending they slapped on it, there's issues surrounding the characterisation of key members of the story, romance issues etc. (they've all been discussed elsewhere) but in other places the writing was excellent. For every Sunstone there was a Bloody Baron. For every swim to Emhyr's ship there was finding Dijkstra's treasure cumulating in the morale quandary of whether to allow your friend/love interest be tortured in order to gain the information. Act 1 contained some of the best writing of the series so far, Act 2 had issues and was where it began to go wrong but Act 3 was an appalling mess that let the entire series down. Simply saying the entire lot was bad is to do it a grave injustice.

Yep, TW3 story is very good, and the way crucial secondary quests are incorporated into the main plot made the whole thing very rich. I don't have any qualms with any story-lines, the problem was with the execution of certain parts. Political part in Novigrad is good in idea, but poor in execution (poor characters, motivations, and events), Geralt and Ciri's story was excellent, up to the point when he actually found her. After that everything went downhill. I hope for EE they will make changes, add dialogues, and new events, as they did with act 3 of TW2 EE, and at least some of the shortcomings will be corrected.

 

[saladin1701]

The problem with Act 2 is that was the point in the story they had the chance to develop key relationships. Geralt and Triss (if his LI), Geralt, Triss and Yennefer love triangle, Yennefer and Ciri, Triss and Ciri and especially Geralt, Yen, Ciri and Eredin and his Wild Hunt. The Triss romance - once it had become a romance - was not developed, there was no confrontation between the two women in Geralt's life, no exploration of the bond between those women and Ciri, with Eredin and his Wild hunt reduced to Dick Dastardly and Muttley. Unfortunatley they dropped the ball cutting the act too short and failing to develop these relationships for the player.

Act 3 then just fell off a cliff as far as the writing is concerned, with the reformation of a lodge that plays a bit part at best, characters introduced who are dead within a minute, infiltration missions only to find out you where expected, conspiracies that never develop, one of the most loved characters doing something so extremely out of character it was laughable and an ending that made absolutely no sense.

But you have to take this rough with Act 1's smooth. The complex, multi-layered life of the Stringer family, the horrowing tale of Anabelle in a Towerful of Mice, a woman who organises her sister's death out of jealous love for her husband, the introduction, banter and interaction with Dijkstra, and the beautifully written story of a man who is forced in to a decision that will ultimately break the heart of one of the women he loves, to name a few so it would be wrong to say the entire story was uninspired.

Perhaps it was a time constraint, perhaps it was just plain bad writing but either way, it reinforces the argument for an Enhanced Edition to sort these issues out.