Why the main narrative in the last third of the game is a bad hot mess [major spoilers!!!]

[saladin1701]

I've never said that he is not quailfied. He could be. But his opinion it's not objective, it's just that, his opinion. What he did it was an evaluation of the game just by itself, without comparing with the previous one and that's precisely the point of the people who consider the TW3 a bad written game. TW2 was better by far. And as I said before, you could be a writer, you could love games and play them but that doens't make you a good writer. I'll put some examples: JJ Abrams or Stephenie Mayer. If someone who is a cinema director writes a review saying how awesome was the last Star Wars film, he could say whatever he want, the film is shit anyway.


My point is that, he could be whatever he wants, his opinions are not better than the one which has been written in this post

Not as bad as the Star Trek II: The Wrath of Spock monstrosity Abrams came up with! Compared to that the writing in this game is positively Shakespearean.

 

[szspagna]

The thing about art is no matter how "professional" you are, it's not objective. People in the humanities try rather hard to emulate hard sciences and math with "theories" and an attempt at objective evaluations, but these things will never be objective.

An authority on population genetics cannot be compared to an authority on writing. There's no metric for authorities on writing other than winning a popularity contest among your peers.

 

[Charcharo]

Art is subjective... but it is not THAT subjective...
*sigh*
This is why literature must be taught (admittedly better too) at school.

 

[mecha_fish]

Art is subjective... but it is not THAT subjective...

To what extent is art objective in your humbly subjective opinion?

There is such thing as an underdeveloped idea and whether it's appropriate to present it in a gallery setting -- but it's important to note the degree to which someone holds themselves to that standard, or someone else chooses to hold someone else's work to that standard, is entirely subjective.

 

[StandardEpiphany]

Well, one should look at an art critic the same way one looks at a gourmet when at a new restaurant. They might suggest something enlightening, delicious or simply worth trying. But that's all they can do.

 

[web-head91]

Oh, let's waste some time here:

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/05/29/the-witcher-3-review-pc/

Not only has the author -read- more than one book and played the series, he's -written- things! Like, for games! Like, for (the very good) Sunless Sea! So, yeah, he knows what he's talking about.

And it's always good to know what you're talking about and have the cred to back it up, don't you think? Otherwise, it's just Internet Twaddle.

i stopped reading when i realized this guy was from RockPaperShotgun.com
those are the last guys that i'd consider as "legit" , credible or proper critics in the slightest.

---------- Updated at 11:28 AM ----------

There are also other opinions from respected writers, for instance Eric Kain from Forbes wrote a something I can 100% agree with:

[...], but chief among them is how disappointing The Witcher 3 was compared to its predecessor, Assassins of Kings. Not that it’s a worse game, overall, but because CDPR succumbed to ambition before getting the basics right.

The second Witcher game was a powerful story of betrayal and intrigue that mixed just the right amount of exploration and open-ended quests with its somewhat more straightforward (but branching) story. I was gripped from beginning to end, and had to go back and play the alternate story branch after I’d completed the first http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkai...-year-as-dragon-age-inquisition/#9cff64c17814

The New York Times wrote a great review about Witcher 2, in which they described what made the game so special:
Innovative, unflinchingly mature and richly imagined, it is driven by fascinating, finely nuanced characters navigating a fantasy world of dark political intrigue and ambiguous morals.The world of The Witcher is gothic, soulful and intelligent, yet mercilessly brutal. Innocent people die, and still almost all the characters consider themselves perfectly justified in their actions. After all, one man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter, and which you consider noble depends on your personal circumstances. As the Witcher, an independent, mystical warrior set amid warring medieval kingdoms, you will have to decide what justice means to you.

And that is because The Witcher 2 fully realizes the power of the concept of choice. It is a tenet of role-playing games that players must feel as if they were having an effect on the game world, and The Witcher 2 provides that feeling both more vividly and subtly than any other game. It immediately throws you into a story in which your decisions have far-reaching implications that are usually not obvious when you make them. Those results may be unintentionally catastrophic, but they never feel arbitrary. They make sense within the logic of the game world, and you may kick yourself for not foreseeing them. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/22/a...-projekt-red-in-poland-video-game-review.html



I love the Witcher 3. It's my 2nd or 3rd all time favourite game, but I'm deeply disappointed by the main story of the game.
If you look at other placed on the internet speaking about Witcher 3 , you will usually read about the combat being the biggest complaint.It's never the story which is usually described as good or even great. For me this shows the low expectations people have in video game narratives. This forum on the other hand mostly complaints about the story and characters. It's logical because most of the people on this forum have played the previous games and many have read the books, so they expected more than an above-average video games story. And I'm sorry to say it, but I don't even believe that the story is above-average. The game has some excellent stories within the mainstory like the Bloody Baron or Ladies of the Wood but the main story itself (the search for Ciri and the fight against the Hunt) couldn't be much more simplified. Any interesting topic regarding the Wild Hunt (enslaving of humans, their relation to the Aen Seidhe elves,the whole Aen Elle-Aen Seidhe- humans dynamics, Geralt's time as a Rider of the Hunt) were barely or not touched at all during the game. They even turned the game into a cliche "chosen hero saves the world(s) from the big bad evil" power fantasy story in the last 15 minutes. That was particulary disappointing considering the big strenght of the witcher franchise was always to not be this kind of story. To make matters worse, they even changed the lore to do this (White Frost changed from a nature catastrophe to a villain, who has to be stopped)
Additionaly the politics were simplified to a point in which the user Knight of Phoenix, who wrote this excellnt analysis of the Witcher 2 politics (http://knightofphoenix.tumblr.com/) said that he won't do the same for Witcher 3 because the politics are so simple and dumb that it's just not worth it.
I believe all narrative problems with the game come from the fact that they wanted to reach the mainstream. Something that they never managed with Witcher 2. Did it work? The sales and goty awards say yes.
Was it necessary to dumb down the game? I believe no. I think the console release and open world (though it should have been smaller) would have been enough to reach the mainstream. There was no need to simplify the story,make it less mature,"open" for newcomers and as standalone as possible.(+ other "mainstreamifications"like the ridiculous simple riddles) In opposite to some people I also don't believe the open world itself was responsible for the flaws.People mostly complain about the 3rd act, which is the most linear part of the game, while the main story in Velen is praised, which is the most open part. It was rather a problem of CDP using too many ressources on their open world. But tbh I'm not surprised thinking about the pre- Witcher 3 advertising and how many times times they mentioned how big the game world is.

you sir nailed it :cheers3:.

 

[sv3672]

In opposite to some people I also don't believe the open world itself was responsible for the flaws.People mostly complain about the 3rd act, which is the most linear part of the game, while the main story in Velen is praised, which is the most open part. It was rather a problem of CDP using too many ressources on their open world. But tbh I'm not surprised thinking about the pre- Witcher 3 advertising and how many times times they mentioned how big the game world is.

In an ideal world with infinite resources, it would be possible to make the perfect open world game. However, as you pointed out, the resources needed to implement the huge open world did indirectly affect the quality of the main story. Also, with a "go anywhere and do anything at any time" design philosophy, it is actually harder to implement meaningful choices and branching story paths. Imagine The Witcher 2 with an open world design, where you can freely enter Vergen while on Roche's path (or vice versa), go back to Flotsam after the pogrom, or go to Loc Muinne without even starting Chapter 2, and so on - the game would now have to account for many possible new world states, and it would significantly increase the development costs.

That is why open world games often tend to turn into a collection of isolated or loosely connected "mini-stories" that are themselves mostly linear, Bethesda's games are an obvious example of this. And in TW3 there are also no longer different paths, it is only possible to do certain parts of the main quest line (Velen/Novigrad/Skellige) in different order, but the only consequences of that are minor dialogue changes.

 

[sv3672]

I don't see anything wrong with re-visiting past places, after all, the resources involved in creating these maps was significant. Rather, the issue was a lack of content in the later game. The pacing of the quest progression is off with too much coming too soon in the game. The game needed and still needs more side quests and Witcher contracts appropriate to higher levels across the later acts of the game.

Regarding the quantity of content in each act, here are some - not sure if particularly useful - statistics on the number of unique lines (with duplicates filtered out) said by major characters in various parts of the game. Although these are mostly from the main quests. Default dialogues and voice sets are not included. "Geralt choice" is not a character, these are the choice lines available to the player in conversations. The dialogues have been extracted from the game files with this tool - it may not always work perfectly, and some of the lines are in unused or debug content. For an explanation of what the quest numbers like q310 mean, see the images in this post.

Spoiler

Act 1, all major quests in Velen, Novigrad, and Skellige, up to and including For the Advancement of Learning, Now or Never, and Coronation. Also any side-quests related to politics, Keira, Triss, or Yennefer:

Spoiler

5498 Geralt
1899 Geralt choice
645 Yennefer
561 Triss
387 Keira Metz
359 Baron
295 Cerys
292 Dijkstra
218 Hjalmar
206 Guslar
197 Cirilla
149 Zoltan Chivay
149 Vesemir
107 Udalryk
106 Voorhis
104 Dandelion
101 Tamara
98 Priscilla
90 Celina
89 Crach
79 Godling Johnny
75 Irina Renarde
75 Ermion
74 Ghost In The Tree
72 Roche
72 Menge
72 Graden
71 Von Gratz
71 Folan
69 Radovid

w3unpack -d -i /q00 -i /q10 -i /q20 -i /q30 -i /sq101 -i /sq201 -i /sq202 -i /sq301 -i /sq302 -i /sq312 -i /sq315 -i /mq3012 "The Witcher 3" w3act1sq.txt

Prologue and Act 1, main quests only:

Spoiler

3833 Geralt
1341 Geralt choice
459 Yennefer
317 Baron
222 Triss
206 Keira Metz
198 Dijkstra
197 Cirilla
157 Cerys
149 Zoltan Chivay
149 Vesemir
139 Guslar
102 Hjalmar
100 Voorhis
97 Priscilla
95 Udalryk
83 Dandelion
75 Irina Renarde
75 Ermion
74 Ghost In The Tree
74 Celina
72 Menge
71 Folan
64 Chamberlain Emhyr
58 Cirilla choice
55 Godling Johnny
53 Radovid
50 Rosa Var Attre
50 Cyprian Willey
47 King Beggar

w3unpack -d -i /q00 -i /q101 -i /q102 -i /q103 -i /q104 -i /q105 -i /q201 -i /q202 -i /q203 -i /q205 -i /q301 -i /q302 -i /q303 -i /q304 -i /q305 "The Witcher 3" w3act1mq.txt

The rest of the main quest line from Ugly Baby to all three epilogues, and Reason of State:

Spoiler

2164 Geralt
764 Geralt choice
673 Cirilla
494 Yennefer
336 Lambert
215 Avallach
187 Triss
175 Eskel
151 Vesemir
122 Philippa Eilhart
82 Dijkstra
66 Emhyr
63 Roche
62 Zoltan Chivay
61 Ermion
47 Dandelion
39 Dwarf Sleepy
39 Crach
38 Godling Johnny
36 Dwarf Doc
31 Ves
30 Radovid
30 Cyprian Willey
29 Geels
28 Letho
27 Witch Weavess
25 Werewolf Berem
24 Hjalmar

w3unpack -d -i /q40 -i /q11 -i /q31 -i /q21 -i /q50 -i /mq3035 "The Witcher 3" w3act23.txt

Act 2 only, from Ugly Baby to Blood on the Battlefield:

Spoiler

942 Geralt
353 Geralt choice
336 Lambert
240 Yennefer
195 Cirilla
175 Eskel
151 Vesemir
37 Triss
36 Roche
35 Emhyr
35 Dwarf Sleepy
30 Ermion
28 Letho
27 Dwarf Doc
26 Zoltan Chivay
25 Avallach
21 Ves
21 Hjalmar
19 Keira Metz
18 Ugliest Man Alive
16 Voorhis
15 Crach
12 Ida Emean
11 Dwarf Grumpy
9 Dwarf Bashful
9 Cerys
7 Dijkstra

/w3unpack -d -i /q40 -i /q110 "The Witcher 3" w3act2.txt

Act 3 + Reason of State + finale + epilogues:

Spoiler

1238 Geralt
484 Cirilla
422 Geralt choice
258 Yennefer
190 Avallach
150 Triss
122 Philippa Eilhart
75 Dijkstra
47 Dandelion
38 Godling Johnny
36 Zoltan Chivay
31 Ermion
31 Emhyr
30 Radovid
30 Cyprian Willey
29 Geels
27 Witch Weavess
27 Roche
25 Werewolf Berem
24 Crach
23 Eyvind
22 Talar
22 Margarita Laux Antille
20 Godling Sara
18 Fugas
17 Eredin
12 Imlerith
10 Ves

w3unpack -d -i /q111 -i /q31 -i /q21 -i /q50 -i /mq3035 "The Witcher 3" w3act3.txt

Battle Preparations + finale + epilogues:

Spoiler

550 Geralt
196 Cirilla
166 Geralt choice
148 Yennefer
75 Avallach
66 Philippa Eilhart
31 Ermion
31 Emhyr
25 Werewolf Berem
25 Triss
24 Crach
23 Eyvind
22 Dandelion
19 Witch Weavess
16 Eredin
10 Zoltan Chivay
10 Lugos The Mad
9 Dwarf Doc
8 Donar An Hindar
7 Udalryk
6 Margarita Laux Antille
6 Lady Bran
6 Fringilla Vigo
5 Dwarf Grumpy
4 Dwarf Sneezy
4 Dwarf Sleepy
4 Caranthir

w3unpack -d -i /q21 -i /q50 "The Witcher 3" w3finale.txt

As far as the books go, it's time to utilize the world as a setting only, and let Sapkowski's characters be. You're simply not going to match the nuance when he's had 20 years fleshing them out.

If The Witcher 3 is indeed the end of Geralt's story, as claimed in various interviews, then the next game will allow for starting anew with a different cast of characters not based on the books.

 

[saladin1701]

In an ideal world with infinite resources, it would be possible to make the perfect open world game. However, as you pointed out, the resources needed to implement the huge open world did indirectly affect the quality of the main story. Also, with a "go anywhere and do anything at any time" design philosophy, it is actually harder to implement meaningful choices and branching story paths. Imagine The Witcher 2 with an open world design, where you can freely enter Vergen while on Roche's path (or vice versa), go back to Flotsam after the pogrom, or go to Loc Muinne without even starting Chapter 2, and so on - the game would now have to account for many possible new world states, and it would significantly increase the development costs.

That is why open world games often tend to turn into a collection of isolated or loosely connected "mini-stories" that are themselves mostly linear, Bethesda's games are an obvious example of this. And in TW3 there are also no longer different paths, it is only possible to do certain parts of the main quest line (Velen/Novigrad/Skellige) in different order, but the only consequences of that are minor dialogue changes.

Short of cheating, in The Witcher 3, you can't travel to Velen, Novigrad or Skellige before starting the first Act, and you can't travel to Kaer Morhen before starting the second so why would it be any different had The Witcher 2 been open world? You close off certain maps until you reach a certain point in the story. Similarly they could just as easily close off previous maps once you've reached the same point.

The thing is, we in the community spotted these writing issues as soon as we began playing the game, which begs the question, why didn't CDPR? For example, did it never occur to anyone that Eredin lacked characterization given that he's the game's antagonist? Did no one look at the script and ask "where's the rest of it?". Perhaps resource allocation and time constrains contributed to the issues of the game but all of these issues could have been avoided had someone in the company applied a modicum of common sense.

 

[sv3672]

Short of cheating, in The Witcher 3, you can't travel to Velen, Novigrad or Skellige before starting the first Act, and you can't travel to Kaer Morhen before starting the second so why would it be any different had The Witcher 2 been open world? You close off certain maps until you reach a certain point in the story. Similarly they could just as easily close off previous maps once you've reached the same point.

That is true, although in practice the first restriction (White Orchard only in the prologue) is minor, White Orchard is like an extended tutorial for the rest of the game. In any case, my point was not that the open world design makes it impossible to implement a good narrative with meaningful choices (like in TW2), it just makes it more difficult and resource intensive. And running out of resources apparently was a problem in the development of TW3, hence this particular discussion about rushed content in the later acts. Not that a similar mistake cannot be made even without an open world, as it can be seen in the last chapter of TW2.

 

[saladin1701]

That is true, although in practice the first restriction (White Orchard only in the prologue) is minor, White Orchard is like an extended tutorial for the rest of the game. In any case, my point was not that the open world design makes it impossible to implement a good narrative with meaningful choices (like in TW2), it just makes it more difficult and resource intensive. And running out of resources apparently was a problem in the development of TW3, hence this particular discussion about rushed content in the later acts. Not that a similar mistake cannot be made even without an open world, as it can be seen in the last chapter of TW2.

In which case it comes down to sensible prioritisation of resources and again I point to the fact that no one within CDPR thought the under characterization of Eredin was a problem, that an ending that was so utterly bizarre, not only in its narrative but also in its game design would leave people scratching their heads. No one looked at the script for Radovid when he first meets Geralt and thought "if we put this out we'll end up a laughing stock". It seems to me that the issue isn't one of resources but rather a lack of QA done on the writing or was conducted so late within the development process as to leave them with insufficient time and money to rectify their mistakes.

 

[sv3672]

For example, did it never occur to anyone that Eredin lacked characterization given that he's the game's antagonist? Did no one look at the script and ask "where's the rest of it?".

If I recall correctly they did, according to an interview, but it was too late by then to change the character. So, this particular issue was probably not just a matter of resources, although some others were.

 

[saladin1701]

If I recall correctly they did, according to an interview, but it was too late by then to change the character. So, this particular issue was probably not just a matter of resources, although some others were.

Then that's proof in point for what I said. Lack of QA early enough to make amendments is the biggest cause of the issues. It wouldn't make a difference if it was open world, sandbox or linear, if it comes too late in the process, too much of the budget has been spent already. I agree that this game's ambition outtripped its budget, I just don't agree with a blanket statement of Open world equals poor story telling. The two aren't mutually exclusive if common sense is applied.

 

[ilayoeli]

Maybe it's just plain bad writing

 

[sv3672]

Regarding the writers of the game, there is a thread here where they are discussed, and in this post there is also a link to a table that shows who wrote what quest (although it may not be entirely reliable). Unfortunately, it does not tell who wrote Reason of State (mq3035). Another potentially interesting bit of information is this list of endings, storybooks, and flashbacks from an old leaked document (last modified on 26th Aug 2013, about half way into the development of the game):

Spoiler

 

[Sam2305]

Regarding the writers of the game, there is a thread here where they are discussed, and in this post there is also a link to a table that shows who wrote what quest (although it may not be entirely reliable). Unfortunately, it does not tell who wrote Reason of State (mq3035). Another potentially interesting bit of information is this list of endings, storybooks, and flashbacks from an old leaked document (last modified on 26th Aug 2013, about half way into the development of the game):

Spoiler

Please, could you show us the list of the writers of TW2? I'm wondering if they are the same writers

 

[sv3672]

Please, could you show us the list of the writers of TW2? I'm wondering if they are the same writers

Spoiler

Game Director

Adam Badowski

Lead Story Designer

Sebastian Stepien

Lead Quest Designer

Konrad Tomaszkiewicz

Story Design

Jan Bartkowicz
Arkadiusz Borowik
Artur Sliwinski

Quest Design

Sebastian Luczak
Joanna Radomska
Jakub Rokosz
Lukasz Szczepankowski
Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz

Lead Writer (English)

Borys Pugacz-Muraszkiewicz

Additional Dialogues

Marcin Blacha

 

[Sam2305]

Spoiler

Game Director

Adam Badowski

Lead Story Designer

Sebastian Stepien

Lead Quest Designer

Konrad Tomaszkiewicz

Story Design

Jan Bartkowicz
Arkadiusz Borowik
Artur Sliwinski

Quest Design

Sebastian Luczak
Joanna Radomska
Jakub Rokosz
Lukasz Szczepankowski
Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz

Lead Writer (English)

Borys Pugacz-Muraszkiewicz

Additional Dialogues

Marcin Blacha

First, thank you for the answer.

Second WHAT?? The guy who was responsible for the additional dialogues in TW2 was promoted to lead writer in TW3. Man, that explains a lot. A LOT. Also, I see that some people left the project. It would be interesting to know if those people were the ones who wrote Iorveth path or Act 3 back in TW3

 

[Garrison72]

Maybe it's just plain bad writing

It's both imo. But yes, some of it is without a doubt bad writing and likely having new writers in place of old ones. The lead writer for TW2 is on Cyberpunk. He never touched this game to my knowledge. Stuff like Whoreson Junior, Radovid and smarmy Triss is just bad writing. None of that is due to cut content.

 

[Riven-Twain]

Second WHAT?? The guy who was responsible for the additional dialogues in TW2 was promoted to lead writer in TW3. Man, that explains a lot. A LOT.

To be fair, lest people mistakenly believe he sprang from nowhere, Marcin Blacha has been a member of CD Projekt RED since The Witcher, for which he not only specifically wrote additional dialogue, but also was a member of the writing and scripting team. For Assassins of Kings, he was the gameplay designer as well as one of the -- surprisingly few -- credited writers.

As lead writer for the Wild Hunt, he didn't personally compose every piece of narrative, but rather helped coordinate the team of several writers. As I understand it, there was also very close creative collaboration between the quest design and writing teams in the development of the narrative.

If anyone is looking to lay blame -- which I personally strongly discourage as a general practice -- I would suggest the condition of the game's final narrative is the result of a complex combination of many circumstances, constraints, and changes, rather than that of a single member of the Team.