I'm a bit further into Chapter 2, and while I do find it a fun game, I don't find it as great (so far) as many people here.
The thing that makes the game tick for me is the presentation of the game. Vizima is so goddamn extraordinarily crafted, it's just a pleasure to see it whether it be in full daylight or in the middle of the night. Add to that the fact that gameplay itself is extremely smooth with very few slowdowns.
The world of the Witcher is a complete shithole. Murderers, rapists, slavers and childkidnappers, religious crazies, whores, victims of the plague etc etc. It's a really, really great world to explore, and such a nice change from the usual fantasy stuff. It's extremely well realized.
I thought I would hate Geralt (based on video previews), but he's pretty likeable I think. He's definetely a "good guy" but with a dark edge to him.
So the whole visual shebang, presentation and the world is top-notch. Some of the best I've seen.
The quests are what drags down the game for me. First off there are the "kill monster/collect 10 thingies for me" quests. No further explanation needed.
Secondly, you end up in a rather interesting investigation scenario in Chapter 2. I initially really liked this aspect of the game, but I've gotten extremely tired of the constant running around to the next NPC to question/get something from. The loading times just kill me here, and adding on to that the fact that the game takes quite a long time to save (and it autosaves fairly often). It's a great idea with the investigation, but I don't think it's pulled off entirely satisfactory.
The fact that conversations often "break off" after talking about something, making you restart the conversation, is also extremely annoying sometimes. It's mostly a problem when the character in question is sitting down or lying down, since they will proceed to sit down or lay down after you finish the conversation. And you can't "interrupt" them in this particular animation.
There are also times where you can piss off a NPC temporarily so that he won't talk to you, but after you "zone" (change areas and go back), it seems that you can pursue the conversation again. Extremely weird, and frankly just annoying.
On the other hand, there are instances where I've pissed off NPCs to the point where they don't wanna talk to me at all, which is great.
The dialogues are sometimes pretty good, but a lot of the time they flow in a downright horrible way. I'm not joking when I saw that they sometimes feel like Oblivions famous "Radiant AI conversations", only brought in the conversation interface. They feel extremely disjointed sometimes, and you definetely get the feel that, yes, there are two people talking, but they're not having a conversation.
Still, I'm having fun and will continue playing. One thing I like is Geralt is not able to buy out every single store. I try to save my money as best as I can, and take the chance to participate in stuff like the dice poker and fist fights whenever I get the chance to earn some extra cash.
I don't find combat all *that* fun, but it's one of the best system I've seen in a action-RPG, and it's also satisfying to look at.
The journal is really, really nice. You can look up all kinds of stuff. Monsters, NPCs, quests etc. On the other hand, the inventory is pretty terrible.
So yeah, so far I'm enjoying it, but I don't think it's amazing.
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More problems of this kind in Chapter 2 in Wyzima. It looks like you have to follow exactly the path authors intended or else youre into problems 
