The Witcher 3 GOTY Edition

[JDR13]

Why don't you just disable them in the menu?

Because of the reason you gave. A game designed for them is nearly unplayable with them turned off.
I was playing Gothic 3 recently(went in with incredibly low expectations) and nearly every quest that would have required some kind of intricate marker instead was designed to lead me there in some way. Either I'd find it eventually because another quest led me there, an NPC would give me directions, there would be some sort of breadcrumbs, or an NPC would escort me there. It really contrasts with games that just throw a marker on your map and expect you to run towards it.

Gothic 1&2 were even better in that way, (and far better in almost every other way too). Gothic 3 is mostly shit by comparison.

As far as TW3 goes, I played without the mini-map and had no problem finding things in 90% of the quests. You just have to pull up the map screen a lot.

In CDPR's defense, it would be prettty tough to find things from directions alone given the size of the game world.

 

[jf8350143]

saving the baron is the best option
a village is temporary, but a bro is forever

besides, they're probably all going to be killed by nekkers or something a few minutes after you left anyways

Didn't saving the Baron automatically save the village?

It's the orphans gets killed if you save Baron.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

saving the baron is the best option
a village is temporary, but a bro is forever

besides, they're probably all going to be killed by nekkers or something a few minutes after you left anyways

Didn't saving the Baron automatically save the village?

It's the orphans gets killed if you save Baron.

Well then, even less reason to not save the Baron.

 

[razvedchiki]

EE mod was good until they changed the potion effects to some retarded brainfarts the modder had while fapping to anime porn.

 

[DalekFlay]

Only wish I could do something about the markers/cookie trails, but haven't found any good mods for that yet.

It's a key problem with the game and it's just part of the design, I don't see how a mod could fix it. You'd have to add dialog telling the player where to go and what to do that just isn't there.

 

[CrunchyHemorrhoids]

Finding Legendary + 30 in every sack of potato that made most quest rewards worthless. Mainly.

Pretty much all the overhauls change those worst cases of misplaced loot, and there's smaller mods that change just that as well. Just search the overhaul category or loot on nexus.

 

[SkiNNyBane]

Finding Legendary + 30 in every sack of potato that made most quest rewards worthless. Mainly.

Pretty much all the overhauls change those worst cases of misplaced loot, and there's smaller mods that change just that as well. Just search the overhaul category or loot on nexus.

The villagers hide the good shit in potato sacks while giving you junk. Immersion.

 

[JDR13]

Only wish I could do something about the markers/cookie trails, but haven't found any good mods for that yet.

It's a key problem with the game and it's just part of the design, I don't see how a mod could fix it. You'd have to add dialog telling the player where to go and what to do that just isn't there.

Or you could just turn off the mini-map and use the main map like I mentioned above. I had no problem fiinding the vast majority of objectives without it.

 

[Wyatt_Derp]

Finding Legendary + 30 in every sack of potato that made most quest rewards worthless. Mainly.

Pretty much all the overhauls change those worst cases of misplaced loot, and there's smaller mods that change just that as well. Just search the overhaul category or loot on nexus.

The villagers hide the good shit in potato sacks while giving you junk. Immersion.

Rumor has it Poland keeps its actual gold reserves in potato sacks, so it's double immersion.

 

[DalekFlay]

Or you could just turn off the mini-map and use the main map like I mentioned above. I had no problem fiinding the vast majority of objectives without it.

I always remove markers from the HUD when possible, that's not the problem. The problem is the quest design is "go to marker, kill things or use instinct mode, go to next marker." Everything else about TW3 is great, but the shit Assassin's Creed quest design is just terrible (IMO).

 

[JDR13]

Or you could just turn off the mini-map and use the main map like I mentioned above. I had no problem fiinding the vast majority of objectives without it.

I always remove markers from the HUD when possible, that's not the problem. The problem is the quest design is "go to marker, kill things or use instinct mode, go to next marker." Everything else about TW3 is great, but the shit Assassin's Creed quest design is just terrible (IMO).

Funny, you literally just got done saying that was a key problem.

I don't agree that the quest design is terrible. Finding the objective is only part of the quest design. For example, the writing is also part of it, and that was usually really good.

It would have been nearly impossible to find the objective in a lot of those quests simply from spoken directions. Again, the game world is simply too large.

 

[DalekFlay]

I don't agree that the quest design is terrible. Finding the objective is only part of the quest design. For example, the writing is also part of it, and that was usually really good.

The writing is good. The combat is fine. I literally just said "everything else about TW3 is great" except the following one marker to another aspect.

It would have been nearly impossible to find the objective in a lot of those quests simply from spoken directions. Again, the game world is simply too large.

Yes, that's the problem. And size has nothing to do with it, see: Morrowind.

 

[JDR13]

The writing is good. The combat is fine. I literally just said "everything else about TW3 is great" except the following one marker to another aspect.

You said "quest design", so I took that as meaning the quest design in general. I think TW3 has some of the better quests among modern crpgs, but I have no problem agreeing that there's too much hand-holding. Thing is, you have to expect markers in any modern crpg with that kind of budget. It's not like they're going to risk alienating the mainstream with a project that large. At least the HUD is very customizable which is more than you can say for most big-budget games.

Yes, that's the problem. And size has nothing to do with it, see: Morrowind.

Morrowind isn't even close to the same size, but ok.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

The quests that don't involve batman-vision — and the other parts of said quests — are quite good. A lot of very memorable quests in Witcher 3, especially in the DLCs. Some of them were fairly minor(quest where you can help the dying girl near the start, Helping Letho — you did let him live, right, you monster?!), some of them much bigger(I liked basically the entire Keira Metz questline, Bloody Baron quests were excellent)
DLCs had some of my favorite quests though. B&W bank quest, HoS wedding quest, HoS bank heist, HoS old mansion quest

Witcher 3 probably has the most memorable quests of nearly any game I've played.

 

[DalekFlay]

Morrowind isn't even close to the same size, but ok.

Not the same size, no, but it shows how you can do quests in a huge open 3D world without markers.

 

[SkiNNyBane]

Quest markers are fine. Not everyone suffers from autism.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

There's nothing wrong with someone placing a point on your map to tell you where to go. This is essentially something that happened in real life until smartphones became prevalent.
The problem is the GPS.

 

[DalekFlay]

There's nothing wrong with someone placing a point on your map to tell you where to go. This is essentially something that happened in real life until smartphones became prevalent.

Even if I conceded this... which I don't... it still precludes things like the early Morrowind quest of "go to this ruin and get the puzzle box." In a modern game you'd have a marker where the box is, which is lame and removes the feeling of not only playing a game, but also being in that world looking for a puzzle box in a ruin. It limits quest design to errands and going to a point on the map over and over, instead of things more involved.

 

[Ismaul]

it still precludes things like the early Morrowind quest of "go to this ruin and get the puzzle box." In a modern game you'd have a marker where the box is

The marker on the map could be put on the ruin instead of the box, and once inside you'd have to figure it out by yourself. Since the quest asks you to "go to this ruin", the challenge isn't in finding the ruin but the box, so it's ok.

 

[DalekFlay]

The marker on the map could be put on the ruin instead of the box, and once inside you'd have to figure it out by yourself. Since the quest asks you to "go to this ruin", the challenge isn't in finding the ruin but the box, so it's ok.

That would certainly be better, but is not really my experience nowadays. And Witcher 3 doesn't really have big dungeons, so it's not super applicable. I disagree in general anyway, I think NPCs telling you where to go and following directions is part of the experience, but I would take a general "quest starts around this area" only marker, for sure. It would be a big improvement. I believe that's how the big Zelda "RPG" on Switch did it.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

There's nothing wrong with someone placing a point on your map to tell you where to go. This is essentially something that happened in real life until smartphones became prevalent.

Even if I conceded this... which I don't... it still precludes things like the early Morrowind quest of "go to this ruin and get the puzzle box." In a modern game you'd have a marker where the box is, which is lame and removes the feeling of not only playing a game, but also being in that world looking for a puzzle box in a ruin. It limits quest design to errands and going to a point on the map over and over, instead of things more involved.

It depends entirely on the quest's context.
Its been years since I've played morrowind so I honestly don't even remember that quest. If someone is giving you a quest and has a rough idea of where you need to go, I see no issue with them scribbling a mark on your map.
If you found the information some other way — say, through reading a book or something, then it would make far less sense.

 

[DalekFlay]

Its been years since I've played morrowind so I honestly don't even remember that quest. If someone is giving you a quest and has a rough idea of where you need to go, I see no issue with them scribbling a mark on your map.

They know where the ruin is and direct you to it, but no idea where the puzzle box is. Again marking the ruin and that's it would be an acceptable middle-ground for me, but I also would prefer dialogue guidance rather than map markers even for the ruin. The realism of carrying a detailed map of every inch of the island could be debated, but realistic or not I just enjoy games more when I find things myself.

 

[Ismaul]

f you found the information some other way — say, through reading a book or something, then it would make far less sense.

If your character found the exact location of a site / dungeon / city, why wouldn't it make sense for him to mark it on his map?

That is unless the game is designed so that you, the player, mark the map. In other words, that it's designed as part of the gameplay. But that would require there to be actual information and enough of it so that you can mark your map, rather than just using for example a book that only says it contains the info on the location without actually giving the details to the player.

 

[DalekFlay]

If your character found the exact location of a site / dungeon / city, why wouldn't it make sense for him to mark it on his map?

That is unless the game is designed so that you, the player, mark the map. In other words, that it's designed as part of the gameplay. But that would require there to be actual information and enough of it so that you can mark your map, rather than just using for example a book that only says it contains the info on the location without actually giving the details to the player.

A mechanic where you only get map markers if you first seek out information would be cool. Easy quests could have an NPC just mark it for you, but more involved quests could make you research a book to find a temple, or if you've already met the Brotherhood and know where their base is then a later quest telling you to see them would give you a marker, otherwise it wouldn't. Witcher does this with alchemy ingredients and reading about the monsters I believe, could be cool to apply it to quests and still have that "find it" feeling despite the guidance.

 

[JDR13]

Morrowind isn't even close to the same size, but ok.

Not the same size, no, but it shows how you can do quests in a huge open 3D world without markers.

Right, except that you're still trying to compare apples to oranges. TW3 is much larger than Morrowind. There's no way I'd want zero markers in a game that size.

Besides, a lot of the quests do give general directions. Like when you get that quest in the first town about a guy looking for his brother and the notice tells you he's in the ruined house just past the bridge or something like that. Do we really need more than that? I'd rather just assume the quest-giver gave Geralt good directions than have to read walls of extra text every time.