Dreaad
Arcane
She actually seemed like a reasonable and likable human being.
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The Witcher 3 Pre-Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]
Hegel
Arcane
- Joined
- May 12, 2009
- Messages
- 3,274
Is the pic real? Come on, it's not the same game.Indeed.
dragonul09
Arcane
- Joined
- Dec 19, 2014
- Messages
- 1,445
What are you talking about dude?It looks the same,CDprojekt said so,why can't you see it?Is the pic real? Come on, it's not the same game.Indeed.
It's the angle i tell you....oh lord
Last edited:
What are you talking about dude?It looks the same,CDprojekt said so,why can't you see it?Is the pic real? Come on, it's not the same game.Indeed.
It's the angle i tell you....oh lord
It's just a HOAX, I tell you! We have to wait until we have the game in our hands. The forum admin said so and I want to believe.
(But HOLY SHIT, dat grass downgrade. It's not even funny anymore.)
Comrade Goby
Magister
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2011
- Messages
- 1,236
This game is still goat even with downgrade
Stay irate EA
Stay irate EA
Comrade Goby
Magister
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2011
- Messages
- 1,236
Of course there is but it's on consoles. Why are people acting so shocked? Fucking reveling in misery is just what the fucking demiurge illuminati wants you cunts
Sacibengala
Prophet
- Joined
- Aug 16, 2014
- Messages
- 1,147
I don't know if you guys saw this, but this review is hilarious, the comment session is making my day. http://www.polygon.com/2015/5/13/8533059/the-witcher-3-review-wild-hunt-PC-PS4-Xbox-one
Polygon article with unbelievable screenshots:
The so called 'funny' comments section
The Witcher 3makes what should have been a terrifying risk look like the most natural evolution in the world.
The Witcher and its sequel established a fascinating fantasy world full of politics, intrigue, magic and monsters, and rooted it all in Geralt of Rivia, one of the last of the infamous Witchers — bounty hunters created through a potentially fatal series of trials and alchemical mutations, for hire by anyone with coin to destroy monsters. The Witcher 2 placed this within an action adventure context largely linear in structure, albeit with major plot changes and entirely different second halves based on player decisions made early on.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt takes the setting and complicated world-building of its predecessor and blows them out with an ambitious but logical next-step: an open-world game. For a studio without the AAA resources of a Bethesda or EA, transitioning from a more conservative linear structure to an undertaking so massive demonstrates a level of confidence bordering on insanity.
But CD Projekt Red has pulled it off, and in fact, has built a game that succeeds largely based on how well their previous Witcher work and concepts of player choice translate in an open-world setting, even as The Witcher 3 makes steps back elsewhere.
The Witcher 3 opens with Geralt in search of multiple people, namely former love interest Yennifer and his former ward/adopted daughter, Ciri, both of whom appear to be the object of the attentions of the nightmarish Wild Hunt. The story rapidly spirals outward, involving kings and their agents, aligning the political machinations of sorceresses and rulers both with and against Geralt as he seeks to find Ciri and unravel the mystery of her disappearance — and just what the Wild Hunt wants from her.
It's worth saying immediately that the characterization and storytelling of The Witcher 3 is considerably better than The Witcher 2. Where that game often felt like a litany of confusing schemes and plots and a list of various power players that the player might never meet or see, The Witcher 3 is much better at introducing its actors smartly and efficiently — even as the cast ballooned in the middle third of the game, I never felt especially lost or confused about the various intrigues in play, of what I was doing, for who, or why.
This would be impressive enough in an open-world game with a quarter of the story and characters, and for CD Projekt to keep everything straight and intelligible is a genuine achievement. That achievement is compounded by the seeming effect of player actions and choices on moment to moment events in the game.
I don't think there's anything in The Witcher 3 as significant as the Iorveth/Roche moment in The Witcher 2, which dictated an entirely different middle act of that game depending on your decisions, but I did tend to find that my choices in The Witcher 3's major side quests and the things I had done prior to advancing the main plot were reflected in those bigger moments.
The Witcher 3's narrative achievements also don't come at the expense of its broader open-world fundamentals. CD Projekt finds the compulsive, satisfying quest-to-quest momentum that makes the best open-world games so hard to put down and so easy to play for marathon sessions. In part, this is because it's interesting to learn more about the world, its history and the various monsters and factions that populate it. There's a great sense of place, of somewhere where things happened before, and even smaller points of interest establish environmental storytelling. More unusually for the genre, and more seemingly difficult to nail, is a feeling of ecology — that the creatures that live in, or at times die in and then haunt the area do so with an organic sense of history.
Monster contracts express this best, as each requires a bit of investigation prior to the their inevitable confrontation. Witnesses need to be talked to, evidence gathered, leads followed — and the matter-of-fact nature of these moments as side quests really do sell the idea of Geralt's witchering as his profession, with assignments that seem routine and others that rise to more epic proportions. And CD Projekt's production with sidequests do lend them an air of importance, as each seems to involve a fair amount of decent writing and multiple conversation options that could conceivably open more possible means of resolving the issue at hand.
"bless whoever at CD Projekt decided Geralt would automatically draw the correct sword when combat starts"
However, as the game goes on, monster contracts, and admittedly, side quests in general start to bleed together. Objectives in the middle third of the game feel more and more like running from one point to another to try to advance dialogue sequences, which is made more frustrating than it needs to be by an overly restrictive fast-travel system. Fast travel can only be activated at signposts, or, while on a boat, to various harbors throughout the world, and signposts can be pretty far apart. The Witcher 3's world is worth exploring without the artificial enforcement of extended runs whether on foot, horseback or boat.
These are all new considerations in a Witcher game, really, but some things feel much more familiar. Combat is still dominated by a combination of Geralt's steel and silver swords, used against threats natural and supernatural respectively — bless whoever at CD Projekt decided Geralt would automatically draw the correct sword when combat starts — and the use of signs, a collection of defensive and offensive spells.
I think this is where some fans of The Witcher 2 will be most disappointed. Encounters in that game were brutal, and difficult, practically demanding preparation through the use of potions and weapon oils. Combat itself was methodical, with attacks taking stamina and poorly judged swings opening you up for deadly counterattacks from almost any enemy. The Witcher 3 has been greatly simplified. While potions and oils are still present and occasionally necessary, the need for preparation is mostly gone on the default difficulty. Geralt can swing his sword without getting tired, and signs are tied to the same stamina as basic physical actions like dodging.
In my experience, this leads to much more active combat than The Witcher 2, and I liked that I could go for greedy kills and attacks and try to end fights quickly. Signs are available for use much more often, and I found myself experimenting with various spells, sometimes relying on them entirely as I leveled my character to take better advantage of them. It all feels reasonably dynamic, especially when you throw potions into the mix (even if I rarely needed anything more than a basic damage buff and some health regeneration). Signs also add some much needed creativity and benefits to character customization — harpies and sirens didn't prove too much of a hassle for me when I could knock them out of the sky with upgraded telekinesis blasts, and I felt cleverer for my choices in that regard.
But I'll admit to missing the very visceral sense of impact and heavy give and take that defined Geralt's fighting style before. And The Witcher 3's basic mechanics have some more prominent problems elsewhere. The Witcher 3's camera is often terrible, especially indoors. It's hard to appreciate the beautiful world that CD Projekt built when it aggressively occluded my view of the fight in progress, and Geralt's generally great animations were lost on me when I got stuck on various objects in the world trying to avoid attacks.
This problem is even more rage-inducing during timed sequences that frequently feel hamstrung by cumbersome, unintuitive ground traversal that reminded me, in a bad way, of the "stupid-feet" problem that has plagued recent Assassin's Creed releases. When I needed Geralt to do something specific quickly, he often failed me in the worst possible way, running against a wall, failing to turn, or otherwise getting tangled up in the world or himself.
"When I needed Geralt to do something specific quickly, he often failed me in the worst possible way"
Meanwhile, the final hours lose the open aspect the game spends so much time cultivating, instead devolving into a series of not-particularly-interesting boss fights that range from laughably easy to unfair in their sharp spikes in difficulty. These are punctuated by even more egregious, strangely distracting jaunts from points A to B to C and so on.
But if you're playing the game like a normal person, not a reviewer, it will be weeks, maybe months before you ever make it to the less-inspired end-game. There's an enormous amount of stuff to do, people to meet and talk to, monsters to hunt, treasure to find and craft. And despite the weaker mission design, the story doesn't feel in a hurry to end or resolve. There's a sense of real finality present in The Witcher 3's end-game that its open-world peers often struggle to find.
For the advances in technology, writing and basic storytelling chops The Witcher 3 makes, it's a case of more ambiguous momentum elsewhere.
The Witcher 3's expanded cast of characters doesn't preclude more screen time for just about everyone, and CD Projekt has done work to make for more interesting, influential women that feel just a bit more fleshed out than they've been previously. This includes a number of powerful women with complicated motivations and goals of their own.
That said, the world CD Projekt has created is oppressively misogynist. In some ways, the game deals directly with this — characters acknowledge again and again that it's hard to be a woman there, that it's a place of violence and terror and that women must work harder to be recognized and respected.
Then it kills them, over and over. There are several monster types devoted to murdered and wronged women whom Geralt is frequently asked to destroy, and other villainous characters are shown torturing or even butchering women to show just how evil they are. One sequence seemed specifically designed to see how long I could listen to a major female character have her fingernails pulled out before I ended the conversation to attack the individual in question. A later scene shows a villain literally surrounded by the bodies of murdered prostitutes.
a male character criticizing a woman for going into battle with her shirt hanging open is the "snake eating its own tail" of video game sexism
In another, a character who admitted to beating his wife so badly she miscarried is given an opportunity to explain why she had it coming, complete with a sympathetic conversation response option to go with it. The performances all around in this scene are excellent, the presentation among the best, most reined in anywhere in the game, but the message I saw it conveying was abhorrent.
I get that the setting of The Witcher 3 is meant to be a dark, dirty fantasy. But in a world that so explicitly goes out of its way to build a believable, distinctive take on the genre, the inclusion of so much violence explicitly directed against women feels like a clear, disconcerting choice. It's not just present, it's frequently a focus.
When they're not being murdered, women in The Witcher 3 are comically sexualized. Nudity is everywhere — think Game of Thrones on HBO — and even when they're dressed, female leads don't have it much better. One character, the subject of an extended series of side quests and whom plays a fairly important role in advancing the story wears a dress with a neckline so wide I was pretty sure I was seeing an areola every time she turned to the side (no, seriously).
Other moments are truly worthy of eye-rolling — as when one male character criticizes a woman for going into battle with her shirt hanging open, which is really the snake eating its own tail of video game sexism in a game where a significant portion of its speaking female characters are similarly and impractically exposed. Even Ciri, a daughter figure for Geralt and someone revealed to be incredibly powerful in her own right, walks around with her shirt unbuttoned in the middle, with a pretty clear view of a bra underneath — even when her attire changes to feature a fur-lined collar in colder climates.
Also, while I did not by any means see every city, burg and outpost in The Witcher 3's world in my 70+ hours spent within it, I don't recall a single non-white humanoid anywhere — not in Skellige, Novograd, Oxenfurt or anywhere else. Once I realized this I couldn't stop looking for any example of a person of color anywhere, and I never found it, unless you count naked monster women sitting at the feet of a boss like a slightly more awkward tribute to a Frank Frazetta painting. But maybe they're in there, somewhere.
Wrap Up:
The Witcher 3 is a great game — with some major qualifications
The Witcher 3's subject matter, its almost defiant doubling down on its treatment of women as titillating props for Geralt and the player, even as it tries to flesh out more female leads, is its most disappointing aspect. This constant presence weighs down what would otherwise be an excellent bit of closure for Geralt's video game saga — which isn't helped by the control issues that often detract from sequences meant to break up open-world monotony.
The result is still a game that often feels like a stunningly confident, competent shot across the bow of the open world genre, folding in an incredibly strong narrative and a good sense of consequence to the decisions that present themselves throughout, presenting a fun bit of combat creativity into a genre that desperately needs it. With that going for it, The Witcher 3 is a great game though it isn't a classic — and it can carry a somewhat qualified recommendation.
Ed's Note: Our review of The Witcher 3 is based on non-final PS4 code provided by CD Projekt Red. In our time with the game, we saw significant technical issues, including hard crashes, endless load screens, major framerate drops both at random and during more crowded fight scenes, and failures by the game to trigger even scripts which would halt forward progress within a quest until the game was reloaded, or, on occasion, the console restarted entirely.
CD Projekt's review documentation stated that there were a number of bugs on their list to be addressed in time for the retail release of the game, but at this time, we cannot speak confidently as to the release state of The Witcher 3 in this review. As such, this score will remain provisional until we have a clearer understanding of the game's reliability at launch.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was reviewed using pre-release debug code for PlayStation 4 provided by CD Projekt Red. You can find additional information about Polygon's ethics policy here.
The Witcher and its sequel established a fascinating fantasy world full of politics, intrigue, magic and monsters, and rooted it all in Geralt of Rivia, one of the last of the infamous Witchers — bounty hunters created through a potentially fatal series of trials and alchemical mutations, for hire by anyone with coin to destroy monsters. The Witcher 2 placed this within an action adventure context largely linear in structure, albeit with major plot changes and entirely different second halves based on player decisions made early on.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt takes the setting and complicated world-building of its predecessor and blows them out with an ambitious but logical next-step: an open-world game. For a studio without the AAA resources of a Bethesda or EA, transitioning from a more conservative linear structure to an undertaking so massive demonstrates a level of confidence bordering on insanity.
But CD Projekt Red has pulled it off, and in fact, has built a game that succeeds largely based on how well their previous Witcher work and concepts of player choice translate in an open-world setting, even as The Witcher 3 makes steps back elsewhere.
The Witcher 3 opens with Geralt in search of multiple people, namely former love interest Yennifer and his former ward/adopted daughter, Ciri, both of whom appear to be the object of the attentions of the nightmarish Wild Hunt. The story rapidly spirals outward, involving kings and their agents, aligning the political machinations of sorceresses and rulers both with and against Geralt as he seeks to find Ciri and unravel the mystery of her disappearance — and just what the Wild Hunt wants from her.
It's worth saying immediately that the characterization and storytelling of The Witcher 3 is considerably better than The Witcher 2. Where that game often felt like a litany of confusing schemes and plots and a list of various power players that the player might never meet or see, The Witcher 3 is much better at introducing its actors smartly and efficiently — even as the cast ballooned in the middle third of the game, I never felt especially lost or confused about the various intrigues in play, of what I was doing, for who, or why.
This would be impressive enough in an open-world game with a quarter of the story and characters, and for CD Projekt to keep everything straight and intelligible is a genuine achievement. That achievement is compounded by the seeming effect of player actions and choices on moment to moment events in the game.
I don't think there's anything in The Witcher 3 as significant as the Iorveth/Roche moment in The Witcher 2, which dictated an entirely different middle act of that game depending on your decisions, but I did tend to find that my choices in The Witcher 3's major side quests and the things I had done prior to advancing the main plot were reflected in those bigger moments.
The Witcher 3's narrative achievements also don't come at the expense of its broader open-world fundamentals. CD Projekt finds the compulsive, satisfying quest-to-quest momentum that makes the best open-world games so hard to put down and so easy to play for marathon sessions. In part, this is because it's interesting to learn more about the world, its history and the various monsters and factions that populate it. There's a great sense of place, of somewhere where things happened before, and even smaller points of interest establish environmental storytelling. More unusually for the genre, and more seemingly difficult to nail, is a feeling of ecology — that the creatures that live in, or at times die in and then haunt the area do so with an organic sense of history.
Monster contracts express this best, as each requires a bit of investigation prior to the their inevitable confrontation. Witnesses need to be talked to, evidence gathered, leads followed — and the matter-of-fact nature of these moments as side quests really do sell the idea of Geralt's witchering as his profession, with assignments that seem routine and others that rise to more epic proportions. And CD Projekt's production with sidequests do lend them an air of importance, as each seems to involve a fair amount of decent writing and multiple conversation options that could conceivably open more possible means of resolving the issue at hand.
"bless whoever at CD Projekt decided Geralt would automatically draw the correct sword when combat starts"
However, as the game goes on, monster contracts, and admittedly, side quests in general start to bleed together. Objectives in the middle third of the game feel more and more like running from one point to another to try to advance dialogue sequences, which is made more frustrating than it needs to be by an overly restrictive fast-travel system. Fast travel can only be activated at signposts, or, while on a boat, to various harbors throughout the world, and signposts can be pretty far apart. The Witcher 3's world is worth exploring without the artificial enforcement of extended runs whether on foot, horseback or boat.
These are all new considerations in a Witcher game, really, but some things feel much more familiar. Combat is still dominated by a combination of Geralt's steel and silver swords, used against threats natural and supernatural respectively — bless whoever at CD Projekt decided Geralt would automatically draw the correct sword when combat starts — and the use of signs, a collection of defensive and offensive spells.
I think this is where some fans of The Witcher 2 will be most disappointed. Encounters in that game were brutal, and difficult, practically demanding preparation through the use of potions and weapon oils. Combat itself was methodical, with attacks taking stamina and poorly judged swings opening you up for deadly counterattacks from almost any enemy. The Witcher 3 has been greatly simplified. While potions and oils are still present and occasionally necessary, the need for preparation is mostly gone on the default difficulty. Geralt can swing his sword without getting tired, and signs are tied to the same stamina as basic physical actions like dodging.
In my experience, this leads to much more active combat than The Witcher 2, and I liked that I could go for greedy kills and attacks and try to end fights quickly. Signs are available for use much more often, and I found myself experimenting with various spells, sometimes relying on them entirely as I leveled my character to take better advantage of them. It all feels reasonably dynamic, especially when you throw potions into the mix (even if I rarely needed anything more than a basic damage buff and some health regeneration). Signs also add some much needed creativity and benefits to character customization — harpies and sirens didn't prove too much of a hassle for me when I could knock them out of the sky with upgraded telekinesis blasts, and I felt cleverer for my choices in that regard.
But I'll admit to missing the very visceral sense of impact and heavy give and take that defined Geralt's fighting style before. And The Witcher 3's basic mechanics have some more prominent problems elsewhere. The Witcher 3's camera is often terrible, especially indoors. It's hard to appreciate the beautiful world that CD Projekt built when it aggressively occluded my view of the fight in progress, and Geralt's generally great animations were lost on me when I got stuck on various objects in the world trying to avoid attacks.
This problem is even more rage-inducing during timed sequences that frequently feel hamstrung by cumbersome, unintuitive ground traversal that reminded me, in a bad way, of the "stupid-feet" problem that has plagued recent Assassin's Creed releases. When I needed Geralt to do something specific quickly, he often failed me in the worst possible way, running against a wall, failing to turn, or otherwise getting tangled up in the world or himself.
"When I needed Geralt to do something specific quickly, he often failed me in the worst possible way"
Meanwhile, the final hours lose the open aspect the game spends so much time cultivating, instead devolving into a series of not-particularly-interesting boss fights that range from laughably easy to unfair in their sharp spikes in difficulty. These are punctuated by even more egregious, strangely distracting jaunts from points A to B to C and so on.
But if you're playing the game like a normal person, not a reviewer, it will be weeks, maybe months before you ever make it to the less-inspired end-game. There's an enormous amount of stuff to do, people to meet and talk to, monsters to hunt, treasure to find and craft. And despite the weaker mission design, the story doesn't feel in a hurry to end or resolve. There's a sense of real finality present in The Witcher 3's end-game that its open-world peers often struggle to find.
For the advances in technology, writing and basic storytelling chops The Witcher 3 makes, it's a case of more ambiguous momentum elsewhere.
The Witcher 3's expanded cast of characters doesn't preclude more screen time for just about everyone, and CD Projekt has done work to make for more interesting, influential women that feel just a bit more fleshed out than they've been previously. This includes a number of powerful women with complicated motivations and goals of their own.
That said, the world CD Projekt has created is oppressively misogynist. In some ways, the game deals directly with this — characters acknowledge again and again that it's hard to be a woman there, that it's a place of violence and terror and that women must work harder to be recognized and respected.
Then it kills them, over and over. There are several monster types devoted to murdered and wronged women whom Geralt is frequently asked to destroy, and other villainous characters are shown torturing or even butchering women to show just how evil they are. One sequence seemed specifically designed to see how long I could listen to a major female character have her fingernails pulled out before I ended the conversation to attack the individual in question. A later scene shows a villain literally surrounded by the bodies of murdered prostitutes.
a male character criticizing a woman for going into battle with her shirt hanging open is the "snake eating its own tail" of video game sexism
In another, a character who admitted to beating his wife so badly she miscarried is given an opportunity to explain why she had it coming, complete with a sympathetic conversation response option to go with it. The performances all around in this scene are excellent, the presentation among the best, most reined in anywhere in the game, but the message I saw it conveying was abhorrent.
I get that the setting of The Witcher 3 is meant to be a dark, dirty fantasy. But in a world that so explicitly goes out of its way to build a believable, distinctive take on the genre, the inclusion of so much violence explicitly directed against women feels like a clear, disconcerting choice. It's not just present, it's frequently a focus.
When they're not being murdered, women in The Witcher 3 are comically sexualized. Nudity is everywhere — think Game of Thrones on HBO — and even when they're dressed, female leads don't have it much better. One character, the subject of an extended series of side quests and whom plays a fairly important role in advancing the story wears a dress with a neckline so wide I was pretty sure I was seeing an areola every time she turned to the side (no, seriously).
Other moments are truly worthy of eye-rolling — as when one male character criticizes a woman for going into battle with her shirt hanging open, which is really the snake eating its own tail of video game sexism in a game where a significant portion of its speaking female characters are similarly and impractically exposed. Even Ciri, a daughter figure for Geralt and someone revealed to be incredibly powerful in her own right, walks around with her shirt unbuttoned in the middle, with a pretty clear view of a bra underneath — even when her attire changes to feature a fur-lined collar in colder climates.
Also, while I did not by any means see every city, burg and outpost in The Witcher 3's world in my 70+ hours spent within it, I don't recall a single non-white humanoid anywhere — not in Skellige, Novograd, Oxenfurt or anywhere else. Once I realized this I couldn't stop looking for any example of a person of color anywhere, and I never found it, unless you count naked monster women sitting at the feet of a boss like a slightly more awkward tribute to a Frank Frazetta painting. But maybe they're in there, somewhere.
Wrap Up:
The Witcher 3 is a great game — with some major qualifications
The Witcher 3's subject matter, its almost defiant doubling down on its treatment of women as titillating props for Geralt and the player, even as it tries to flesh out more female leads, is its most disappointing aspect. This constant presence weighs down what would otherwise be an excellent bit of closure for Geralt's video game saga — which isn't helped by the control issues that often detract from sequences meant to break up open-world monotony.
The result is still a game that often feels like a stunningly confident, competent shot across the bow of the open world genre, folding in an incredibly strong narrative and a good sense of consequence to the decisions that present themselves throughout, presenting a fun bit of combat creativity into a genre that desperately needs it. With that going for it, The Witcher 3 is a great game though it isn't a classic — and it can carry a somewhat qualified recommendation.
Ed's Note: Our review of The Witcher 3 is based on non-final PS4 code provided by CD Projekt Red. In our time with the game, we saw significant technical issues, including hard crashes, endless load screens, major framerate drops both at random and during more crowded fight scenes, and failures by the game to trigger even scripts which would halt forward progress within a quest until the game was reloaded, or, on occasion, the console restarted entirely.
CD Projekt's review documentation stated that there were a number of bugs on their list to be addressed in time for the retail release of the game, but at this time, we cannot speak confidently as to the release state of The Witcher 3 in this review. As such, this score will remain provisional until we have a clearer understanding of the game's reliability at launch.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was reviewed using pre-release debug code for PlayStation 4 provided by CD Projekt Red. You can find additional information about Polygon's ethics policy here.
The so called 'funny' comments section
DJR11
Been waiting for this game. Liked the Witcher 2 and could not for the life of me get into Dragon Age. Once I finish Bloodborne I’ll be picking this up.
Thanks for the good review
May 13, 2015 | 7:33 PM Reply
JohnnyRockets
I’ve been waiting for this review! I was wondering what happened when Polygon didn’t have their review up yesterday but good it’s here.
But…
No Quality Control???
The first thing I looked for was Quality Control so I could listen on my drive home. Audio > *. Any plans for a W3 QC?
May 13, 2015 | 8:25 PM Reply
Kirielson
Kirielson
Moderator, Polygon
I don’t know, but you better send in your questions ASAP to the email.
May 13, 2015 | 8:26 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
Reviewers have been busting their butts (at most major outlets) to play the game these last few days. I would rather the review on any given site reflect as much of the game experience as possible, and be written by an author that has had time to collect their thoughts. What’s the rush? It isn’t like the game drops a few hours from now. Even if you wanted pre-order whatevers, you still have plenty of time.
May 13, 2015 | 8:28 PM Reply
ewokskick
ewokskick
I really don’t see how making the Witcher 3 more open world is a "terrifying risk." Maybe it would have been 6 years ago, but by now most AAA games are open world. It would have been risky for them to stick to their guns with linear storytelling as the invested more into the game. Going open-world minimizes their risk. I actually can’t believe the review thinks otherwise.
May 13, 2015 | 7:41 PM Reply
Arthur Gies
Polygon Reviews Overlord
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
May 13, 2015 | 7:43 PM Reply
Barnsley Pal
Barnsley Pal
Yeah, but they’re already GOG damned rich!
May 13, 2015 | 10:21 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
It’s the studio’s first open world game, and they didn’t have the financial resources from a major publisher like Activision or EA. So yeah, in a sense I see where Arthur is coming from. Yeah, the market wants (and probably even expects) an open world Witcher game in this day and age, but that doesn’t mean CDPR was necessarily going to hit it out of the park when it came to execution. Pile on the studio’s ambitious attempt at making the world feel life like with weather, choices affecting villages later down the line, general fidelity, and the combat overhaul and it becomes pretty apparent that they were aiming high. Fortunately for everyone, they seem to have succeeded for the most part. Hopefully the day one patch cleans up the game’s performance issues.
May 13, 2015 | 7:49 PM Reply
coil
coil
A technical/design risk, not a marketing one.
May 13, 2015 | 8:04 PM Reply
Gmr_Leon
Gmr_Leon
Exactly. Open worlds, as Ubisoft has aptly proven, are a nightmare to get right and easily slip into unstable tedious messes of collectibles and uninteresting side events when done wrong.
…And yes, I’m suggesting that almost all of Ubisoft’s open world games are mostly subpar, because for them it’s a standard marketing tick-off box at this point.
May 13, 2015 | 9:07 PM Reply
DrownedAmmet
DrownedAmmet
Dragon Age Inquisition went for an open-er world and it made that game a lot worse
May 13, 2015 | 9:38 PM Reply
talhak91
And I would say otherwise. Opinions are great!
May 13, 2015 | 10:20 PM Reply
Boss Kowbel
Boss Kowbel
inb4 "8 is too low."
But holy fuck, if 70 hours is a rushed playthrough, it seems claims of 200+ hours of content was not just usual PR spiel. Good on the developers, bugs or questionable portrayals of women otherwise.
May 13, 2015 | 7:43 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
I want to ask something very seriously and I really hope my comment won’t be deleted. Is the way a game treats women one of the criteria by which you rate the games in your reviews?
May 13, 2015 | 7:44 PM Reply
Mantis6
And lack of people of colour. I thought those 2 things were odd to point out since they shouldn’t have anything to do with the review.
May 13, 2015 | 7:45 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
Why not? Reviews are about subjective criticism of the medium, not objective things like "graphics are technically impressive". If there was a heavily-misogynist movie with only white characters, then it would certainly be mentioned by many reviewers. Gaming shouldn’t be immune to this sort of criticisms just because they’re video games and not movies or novels – not if we want the art form to be taken seriously.
Now, if you want to have a serious discussion about whether or not the game is truly misogynistic, then sure! The reviewer clearly thinks so, and it obviously impacted his experience, but that’s where the point of discussion should be – not whether or not we should even talk about it.
May 13, 2015 | 7:53 PM Reply
Mantis6
Alright, good point. I guess maybe it should more so be a part of the review that shouldn’t affect the overall score. Like, the reviewer addresses the issues he/she has with the portrayal of a group, keeping it in the review but as a separate section.
Maybe I just have an odd view of the whole "X character is displayed in a very Y way"
May 13, 2015 | 7:58 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
I’m not sure why people stress so much over specific scores, and what should or shouldn’t go into determining a score. While I’m not a huge fan of scoring things in general, if you are going to do it, I think it makes sense to include anything that impacted your play through in that score. After all, if the reviewer found aspects of the game’s setting distracting enough to impact his enjoyment, shouldn’t that also impact the score?
May 13, 2015 | 8:01 PM Reply
Ingsoc
Yes, absolutely. Excluding key elements that affect the enjoyment of the game experience from the score seems like a ridiculous proposal to me. A game’s score – to the extent that we even need them – _should _capture the overall impression that the game left on the player including all aspects of that impression.
Also, a game review – in my opinion – should not be some kind of robotic listing of attributes like "gameplay", "graphics", etc…
And even if it were a bland list of this kind, it would still fail to be "objective" in the sense some expect.
So, I guess I’m saying that I think a lot of people don’t actually know what a "review" is.
May 13, 2015 | 9:21 PM Reply
Rttu
Well if it does affect the score the reviewer gave it, but it’s not a factor for you, you can probably count 1+1 and understand that you will probably give the game a higher score yourself. That’s why it’s good to read the reviews and not just the scores, because you get insight on how high you think you might score it yourself.
May 13, 2015 | 8:06 PM Reply
Boss Kowbel
Boss Kowbel
The final score should be dictated by the review’s overall text, pros and cons, warts and all. If an editor only concentrates on the game’s strengths and omits the blemishes, he or she does a disservice to the readers.
May 13, 2015 | 8:08 PM Reply
Symphony Man
Symphony Man
Assistant to the Community Overlord
This is why a group of editors assign the score, not the reviewer. Brilliant way to do it in my opinion.
May 13, 2015 | 8:12 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
a game that often feels like a stunningly confident, competent shot across the bow of the open world genre, folding in an incredibly strong narrative and a good sense of consequence to the decisions that present themselves throughout, presenting a fun bit of combat creativity into a genre that desperately needs it. With that going for it, The Witcher 3 is a great game though it isn’t a classic — and it can carry a somewhat qualified recommendation.
That sounds exactly like an "8". Scale that up or down depending on how heavily you want to consider the "qualified" (like a big "but …") portion. Racism and sexism don’t look like they factor into the number.
May 13, 2015 | 8:22 PM Reply
HMRr0cks
HMRr0cks
One thing you have to remember is that the reviewers do not assign the score to the review. Arthur stated his opinion and then another individual and or a group decided the score based off of the text.
May 13, 2015 | 8:23 PM Reply
DrownedAmmet
DrownedAmmet
I don’t see why that shouldn’t be reflected in the score. Games are a sum of all their parts, if those parts affected the reviewer enough it should be reflected in the score
May 13, 2015 | 10:43 PM Reply
Kagero
The world setting of Witcher was created by a Polish guy, so I can’t imagine his sensitivity for persons of color is comparable to those who grew up in some parts of the United States. As for gender, the game looks very western middle ages to me, which makes powerful female leads a little unrealistic.
Of course, we’re in a fantasy world so why not have it all, but I don’t think it deserves so much focus in a short review. I wouldn’t expect this in a Mario game, where a third of the review is about the lack of a powerful unsexualized female lead. I’d rather see it in an opinion piece, but that’s just my… opinion :wink:
May 13, 2015 | 8:01 PM Reply
NitroFrost
You’re not allowed to have those around these parts buddy.
May 13, 2015 | 8:02 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
That’s pretty funny, considering this thread is already full of people criticizing Arthur for his opinion. Because, you know, that’s what a review is, right? An opinion on something?
May 13, 2015 | 8:02 PM Reply
Kagero
I wish it was in a separate opinion piece since the comments section just became a flame war. But that’s just my opinion.
May 13, 2015 | 8:19 PM Reply
Ingsoc
I wish the audience would be mature enough to understand the nature of the review, and to intelligently comment on it without the flame war happening. I wouldn’t want to see this stuff spun off into an opinion piece simply because the audience can’t be trusted to behave themselves in the comments.
May 13, 2015 | 9:18 PM Reply
Drew Besse
Drew Besse
The fact that its a fantasy world is part of what makes it a problem.
If they were going for some historical piece… sure, I can understand some of the decisions. But its a fantasy world. If your "fantasy" is that black people don’t exist and women are little more than sex objects then yikes.
May 13, 2015 | 9:31 PM Reply
dunnetg
This game was made in Poland, by a Polish dev team, and based on novels written by a Polish author. Demographically, Poland is about 98% ethnic Poles, a fair-skinned Slavic people. With the origins of the game firmly in mind, I doubt anyone even took into consideration the concerns of Americans and their expectations of a globally representative multiracial melting pot.
May 13, 2015 | 9:58 PM Reply
Ingsoc
That’s a reasonable point, but nevertheless, I don’t think it negates how the game will be received by various audiences. The game may be received differently in different parts of the world, for example.
May 13, 2015 | 10:00 PM Reply
Rineocerous
Yeah like how everyone outside of China hates those Kung-Fu movies because they typically only hire Chinese actors and in the rare cases where white people are depicted they are nefarious villains who are looking to exploit the Chinese.
Personally I had a hard time enjoying Robin Hood as a child because there were no South American tribes.
May 13, 2015 | 10:34 PM Reply
docmars
docmars
This. Exactly this. I’m digging the sass :wink:
May 13, 2015 | 10:39 PM Reply
Rineocerous
The Witcher 3 is a mixed bag. The gameplay is fun, the graphics are nice, the story is deep and interesting but it’s almost as if the developers went out of their way not to depict any automobiles. Sure you could argue that the game takes place in a time before such technological advancements but it’s a fantasy game depicting magic and all sorts of unrealistic beasts so there is really no excuse why there couldn’t be cars or at least a motorbike. Also there is a wide variety of food items available to restore your vitality but most of these items are forms of meat dishes.. making the game unnecessarily difficult for vegans on higher difficulties. The writers of The Witcher 3 also failed to address the social and financial difficulties of being a single father which I found distracting and unfortunate. Ultimately The Witcher 3 is a good game that falls short in a few key areas and may only be worth your time if you are a bachelor who prefers the outdated transportation method of enslaving horses and who feasts on an abundance of meat.
May 13, 2015 | 10:24 PM Reply
lilkwarrior
lilkwarrior
I wholeheartedly agree with Silellak. The reviewer had every right to point out his views on these aspects of how the game made him feel overall. It’s an experience after all.
That said, I think the reviewer could have criticized the game portrayal of women & etc. with more context regarding such criticism with how it compares to previous games in the series and the how such portrayals compare to other efforts from Polish.
For example, Americans sensitivities to sex & race (perceived often as being immature or hypocritical by European countries) is very distinct from the culture the developers of this game call home.
Did the segments of Ciri allowed the serendipity of freedom you’d expect playing as a female protagonist?
It’ll be very interesting what Phillip Kollar thinks of this game during the upcoming Quality Control related to this game.
Personally, as far as previous blockbusters in the genre this game has shown extensive promise of being warrantable of being superior than Dragon Age: Inquisition—which I expected (while having a fantastic time playing that game)—the last AAA game with the aims of being a open-world & having heavy investment behind it.
Based on the added complexity it brings to the established gameplay systems of the series that warranted it having high media & preorder attention, it sounds like the game has overwhelmingly succeeded providing a distinct, worthwhile experience warrantable of purchasing this new entry of the series.
May 13, 2015 | 10:31 PM Reply
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
No, but for this game in special, it shouldn’t, as the game is based on a book that started in 1986, so those things are expected.
May 13, 2015 | 7:50 PM Reply
coil
coil
Keep in mind that the score is one agreed upon by the author and the site editors after the review itself has been written, and is intended to reflect the review as a whole but is not (strictly speaking) defined by it. There’s no "-0.5 points for no PoC" or anything, but if the game stumbles in one respect or another that would be considered.
Personally I appreciate that Polygon is interested in looking beyond the simple technical aspects of the game, and considering more diverse points of view in its review process.
May 13, 2015 | 8:11 PM Reply
DisgruntledGoat
DisgruntledGoat
The "mature" themes of the Witcher series feel very much like the juvenile wank fantasies of a 14-year-old boy.
I was hoping that the devs would have matured after the laughable sexuality of Witcher 2, but it looks like that didn’t happen.
May 13, 2015 | 8:36 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
Sexist portrayals aside, many reviews (including this one) say that the story is actually much more mature and respectful of an adult intelligence than many recent games. So it sounds like it gets things very right, and very wrong, on the same front.
May 13, 2015 | 8:38 PM Reply
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
People have sex, why shouldn’t have in a game like this?
May 13, 2015 | 9:46 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
I… I don’t think anyone has said they shouldn’t…
May 13, 2015 | 9:52 PM Reply
Seneschal
Seneschal
The Witcher series has, so far, had a core theme of the issues of marginalized minorities and prejudice in society, and TW2 did a great job of fleshing out its nonhuman/nonmale/nonstraight characters – let’s remember that the actual plot revolves around an all-female cabal having internal schisms and secret machinations about ruling the world; Geralt is just the boy-toy of one of them, so he gets caught up.
So, whether the sequel lives up to the series previously established thematic undertones is kinda relevant. Much like ME2 was criticized for having a "filler plot" that lacked the first one’s wonder and focused storytelling. That doesn’t mean that it didn’t have great writing (particularly the characters) and peerless gameplay at the time, just that it diverged from the tone of the series enough to be a deal-breaker for some.
May 13, 2015 | 8:52 PM Reply
PEREGRINVS
PEREGRINVS
For a progressive website who purports to care about how culture, gender, and race are used or not used in video games and media, they seem to never take the second step in their research. First of all, the game is based on a twenty five year old Polish High Fantasy novel. So it helps to reflect on the time and place where that was written. Second, I think as a United States website it’s ethnocentric to judge foreign games by anglo-american values and criticize people from another culture with another history. Polygon is especially harsh when talking about Japanese games. I’d enjoy reading an opinion piece lampooning the portrayal of women and people of color in Japanese or European games, written however by a Japanese or European.
May 13, 2015 | 9:31 PM Reply
snphillips0
snphillips0
There are a few problems with this line of thinking. First, the game is based on the books, but is not an adaptation of any of them; this is an entirely original story, written this decade. Second, issues of representation are not bound by cultural borders. While they may be there because of prevailing culture in their nation of origin, it does not affect whether or not they are problematic in their depictions of historically underrepresented and persecuted minorities; and if anything, it demonstrates an even greater importance in discussing these issues if they are fundamental to a culture, because it demonstrates how that culture might itself have a fundamental problem.
May 13, 2015 | 10:00 PM Reply
PEREGRINVS
PEREGRINVS
"demonstrates how that culture might itself have a fundamental problem."
What criteria are you using to discern what facet of a culture is problematic?
"While they may be there because of prevailing culture in their nation of origin, it does not affect whether or not they are problematic in their depictions of historically underrepresented and persecuted minorities"
Underrepresented and persecuted minorities in Poland were the Polish for most of the 21st century. This is the ethnocentrism I’m talking about. Everything is through this American lens. It’s the egocentric predicament specifically for people living in the United States.
May 13, 2015 | 10:11 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
Arthur seems to have encountered more technical issues than the other reviews I’ve read. Most of them have only complained about occasional frame rate drops. Maybe they’re just glossing things over on the assumption that the patch will take care of it all? Still, not a terrible score by any means, and I’m looking forward to this game.
May 13, 2015 | 7:44 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
Giant Bomb hasn’t posted a review yet, but on the Bombcast, they definitely mentioned some major technical problems.
May 13, 2015 | 7:57 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
It makes sense. Polygon and Giantbomb normally do seem to be more forthright with these sorts of issues.
May 13, 2015 | 8:00 PM Reply
_txf_
They won’t be posting a review.
May 13, 2015 | 8:02 PM Reply
mosespippy
Is that a result of having a broken build or the length of the game? Ever since the back to back of FFXIII and Red Dead taking up three weeks of Brad’s time I don’t think they’ve allocated the sort of resources necessary for reviews of long games, which is why I find their editorial content has a massive blind spot.
May 13, 2015 | 8:13 PM Reply
_txf_
GB doesn’t review RPGs, they have no interest in it. They barely review anything any more. shrug, it isn’t why people go to that site.
Note that is is a supposition, but seems likely.
May 13, 2015 | 8:14 PM Reply
Kharn_
I didn’t know that, damn, it’s unthinkable to me to be a gamer and not play RPG.
May 13, 2015 | 8:57 PM Reply
mosespippy
Oh they play them. They all played Dark Souls II, they all played Bloodborne, Jeffs been talking about FFX/X-2 and Diablo 3 for a while now. They just don’t review any of them because they don’t see the point if they can’t get a review up in a timely manner. That’s why their Red Dead review is finished but was never published; it was a week late because of FFXIII.
May 13, 2015 | 9:29 PM Reply
Friendly Neighborhood Dissenter-Man
Some reviewers were playing on debug PS4 consoles that already had the day one patch applied.
May 13, 2015 | 9:54 PM Reply
JBarAUS
JBarAUS
This review is lower than the average it seems – I’m fine with that though. Its nice to get some actual disclosure on the technical issues.
May 13, 2015 | 7:45 PM Reply
Mantis6
I don’t exactly get the point of addressing Ciri’s "revealing" clothing. Does it really matter for a review? Shouldn’t the main focus be the stability of the game, how well the characters interact with each other, and the story? I get the lack of ethnicity. That just seems odd that you found only white people. But for Ciri’s design choice, does that TRULY have a major role in how you see the game?
May 13, 2015 | 7:49 PM Reply
Kagero
I get the lack of ethnicity. That just seems odd that you found only white people.
The Witcher world’s setting was created by a Polish guy after all, I don’t think he is as sensitive to race as us Americans are. And treatment of gender, maybe the author was shooting for a little realism in this fantasy land (by realism, I mean mimicking the structure of the middle ages).
May 13, 2015 | 7:55 PM Reply
Philip Kollar
Philip Kollar
Senior Editor, Polygon
Oh! I thought by realism you meant the dragons and griffins and shit. Good to clear that up.
May 13, 2015 | 7:58 PM Reply
Average Gamer
Average Gamer
So I have been keeping an eye on this game over the last couple of days. It has gained my attention, I just have one concern: Can someone who hasn’t played any Witcher games be able to grasp the story and game play mechanics? I never played any and I’m considering picking this up.
Thank you for any advice given!
May 13, 2015 | 7:51 PM Reply
Mantis6
Jesse Cox on youtube just recently released a video about the game and thats one thing he mentioned. Apparently it will be very accessible to people who havent touched 1 and 2. And my memory could be wrong but he said you can choose the transfer events if you dont have 1 and 2 due to the consoles.
May 13, 2015 | 7:53 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
Both Game Informer and IGN are claiming that it’s accessible to new players.
May 13, 2015 | 7:59 PM Reply
ASEdouard
Videogame sequels are ALWAYS accessible to new players. Not being so would destroy sales.
May 13, 2015 | 8:12 PM Reply
Sanunes
I am going to have to find more reviews to see what people think of the controls for if it does have the same weakness as Assassin’s Creed games, I will have to take a pass for I don’t want to have my memories of this game be filled with rage like Assassin’s Creed.
May 13, 2015 | 7:59 PM Reply
Xicon329
Xicon329
Bummed to hear about the game’s treatment of women. Have been super looking forward to this game after loving the first two, perhaps naively hoping that it’d be less gross about it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:04 PM Reply
LordCrash
LordCrash
The game doesn’t treat women in any way. Characters in the game treat women in certain ways, fitting to the setting, story and characters. When will reviewers and gamers finally learn the difference…
May 13, 2015 | 8:07 PM Reply
epicmaster
Wait, but didn’t the game developers, who created the game, create also the Characters? It’s a choice made by the devs.
May 13, 2015 | 8:10 PM Reply
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Not that simple, there are 8 books that already created and defined the boundaries of the world, and the developers have to respect that.
May 13, 2015 | 9:44 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
The games are still built around the lore and world that the books created, and it’s definitely not a fair-minded world. People treat others unfairly, including the guy you play.
May 13, 2015 | 10:16 PM Reply
Brill
I stayed away from the first game because of this crap. I think it was the first game I really consciously decided to skip because of it. I’m not even remotely surprised that it hasn’t gotten better.
May 13, 2015 | 8:07 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
It has gotten considerably better since the first game, by a huge degree.
Looking back on the 2nd game, women were the ones pulling the strings for most of Geralt’s journey, and vying for power as greedily as other men in leadership roles. Certainly the game never did anything like the trading card stuff again.
May 13, 2015 | 10:19 PM Reply
hypermog
I just wanna say, the design of this site is great. Love the layout.
May 13, 2015 | 8:08 PM Reply
Damienduerst
Hey good read Arthur. Obviously most of these comments are going to be on Arthur’s continuing crusade of sexism and racism which is w/e. But I think the bigger thing we should talk about is the possible stability issues on PS4. Giant Bomb was having troubles with it on PS4 also which is worrying.
If you guys want to get up in arms over Arthur’s quirks go ahead but I feel like we should be able to read his point on Women and race and ask ourselves does it matter? If it doesn’t to you ignore it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:08 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
Well stability should be talked about after the day one patch hits, because that will have some effect.
May 13, 2015 | 10:20 PM Reply
Gaming_L8
I am glad Arthur raised how women and ethnicities are represented in the game. It is why I sought out this review, knowing that he would bring up the issue if it was needed. My wife was interested in the game but hates sexism in all forms. Now I know not to recommend it to her. It is too bad. I would like the rest of the experience, but like interacting with a sexist inlaw, the good does not outweigh the bad.
May 13, 2015 | 8:12 PM Reply
NitroFrost
How is the game being sexist?
May 13, 2015 | 8:13 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Please for god’s sake. The game is not sexist. Have you ever watched a movie based in medieval Europe? Well, chances are it was a lot more sexist than this game.
Please. Check the game, it’s totally worth anyone’s time. I really can’t wrap my head around the closemindedness towards different cultures that’s displayed here.
Just see it for yourslef.
May 13, 2015 | 8:21 PM Reply
Xicon329
Xicon329
The existence of more sexist things does not make this game "not sexist."
May 13, 2015 | 8:22 PM Reply
Rttu
If his wife hates "sexism in all forms", then she probably didn’t like the sexist medieval movies either. It’s okay to say that sexism in a video game doesn’t bother you, but please don’t claim it’s not sexist like it’s a fact – especially when you haven’t even played the game.
May 13, 2015 | 8:26 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
I’ve read all the books and played the previous two games bro. I think I’m qualified to speak about this game even without playing it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:28 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
I think I’m qualified to speak about this game even without playing it.
This is just…the single best sentence ever. Hilarious.
May 13, 2015 | 8:30 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
He did graciously omit a word. "Intelligently".
May 13, 2015 | 8:32 PM Reply
Rttu
Okay whatever, but what you are not qualified to speak about, is what other people should deem sexist and what not – especially when you’re using arguments like "at least it’s less sexist than X or Y".
May 13, 2015 | 8:33 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Point taken. But what I meant is the following: I have never ever in my life watched a medieval movie at the end of which I thought "What a goddamn sexist movie this was, just horrible". I take it as a historical reference. It’s just the way it was back then. And I have no issues with this. It’s history. I just can’t comprehend how it can be offending to someone and how can it stop anyone from enjoying the movie/game/book/whatever.
I’m sorry if I offended someone, it’s probably coming from our cultural differences. As an eastern european maybe I just don’t understand your mentality concerning sexism and racism. They were never an issue in my country.
P.S. When I said I felt qualified to speak about the game, I meant about it’s setting and portrayal of charecters, not about it’s mechanics.
May 13, 2015 | 8:41 PM Reply
Rttu
The difference here is: The Witcher is not based on reality – it’s a fantasy novel. It’s not supposed to portray any historical era. Or do you recall an era in human history where there were dragons and griffins? I’m also from Northern Europe, and I can say for certain that racism and sexism has been and is a problem in every European country. It’s still a problem, but saying it has "never been an issue" is just a bold lie.
May 13, 2015 | 8:45 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
I’m not from Northern Europe. I come from a post socialist country. 50 years of communism eradicated sexism here. At least in the sense it’s used by americans.
May 13, 2015 | 8:51 PM Reply
Rttu
Allow me to laugh. Name me one Easter European country that is free of sexism? I come from one of the most gender equal countries in the world, (can you guess already?) but even I wouldn’t dare to say that sexism has been eradicated here – not even close.
May 13, 2015 | 8:55 PM Reply
Boss Kowbel
Boss Kowbel
Speak about preview coverage and trailers, yes. Speak to the final product of the game "without playing it," no.
May 13, 2015 | 8:59 PM Reply
Drew Besse
Drew Besse
If you aren’t a woman, you aren’t really qualified to speak about the game not being sexist towards women.
May 13, 2015 | 9:35 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Wow. I rest my case, I don’t see how I could fit in with people with your mindset.
May 13, 2015 | 9:49 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
Although what Drew Besse isn’t entirely true, you do need to consider the fact that even though you understand what sexism is, there’s a nuance you won’t fully understand or appreciate unless you are a woman. Keep that in mind.
May 13, 2015 | 9:54 PM Reply
Ingsoc
That’s a valid point, but I think Drew was basically making a false statement earlier on. Men can – and should – have an appreciation and understanding of the nature of sexism. Many of the comments against this very review suggest that there’s still a really long way to go before men as a whole do have that fuller understanding.
May 13, 2015 | 9:58 PM Reply
Ingsoc
How does that make sense?
May 13, 2015 | 9:54 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
Have you ever watched a movie based in medieval Europe?
If only we had a chance to re-imagine a similar time period with new, modern ideas. You know, like…some sort of…fantasy.
May 13, 2015 | 8:31 PM Reply
Rttu
Wait.. that sounds amazing! Then we might even add other non-realistic things.. Like.. Umm.. Dragons? Maybe some monsters called Drowners? And Griffins? Can we have Griffins?
May 13, 2015 | 8:35 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
Yes, but not succubi. Too much bewbs.
May 13, 2015 | 8:36 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Well, that’s your oppinion. For example, as a guy who lives in Eastern Europe, I enjoy the Witcher games because they are based in a setting I can feel somehow connected to and I didn’t enjoy the Dragon Age series because their setting is a bit of a mish-mash that I don’t find very convincing.
May 13, 2015 | 8:47 PM Reply
lilkwarrior
lilkwarrior
I agree the industry needs more scrutiny in the fantasy lands it creates; but this is an adaption that had pretty well-defined characters with certain attitudes—some deliberately perverse—regarding woman.
Arguably a trope of depicting medieval times is the blatant sexism possible in those times; this is especially true with villians / corrupt people in those times.
It’s definitely noble to change an established entity with more "corrected" or "balanced" portrayals of different kinds of people, but that can dilute the core themes of the series.
There’s a reason scenes like the woman obviously being mistreated by guards that was going to hanged during a Witcher 3 trailer or how witches seem to be treated throughout the actual game are so moving.
May 13, 2015 | 10:45 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
Well, if I understand it well, it isn’t criticized for depicting misogynistic patriarchal world where women need to work harder, but for using too much violence against women to stress how dark this world is. Original novels are taking place in the same world, but Sapkowski didn’t have the need to prove it by murdering women specifically.
May 13, 2015 | 8:35 PM Reply
Swiller
The original books have the exact same tone. People should know what they are getting into and either decide if it’s for them or not.
Besides I would rather have a woman’s take on these issues. Between this review and Bayonetta 2, it seems like Arthur’s big play to be a serious jornalist and putting too much gravtis in a industry that has always been hopelessly immature and violent. I really like how indie games are giving games a new voice and welcome it. But this is a Witcher game dude, and very much like the source material! The video game audience will eat it up.
May 13, 2015 | 8:19 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
People should know what they are getting into and either decide if it’s for them or not.
…isn’t that exactly what a review is for?
May 13, 2015 | 8:32 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
Knowing what you’re getting into, goes beyond the review of one person. Others might will see the game differently.
May 13, 2015 | 10:23 PM Reply
gamer1234cv
gamer1234cv
Only a 8 not a 10.
May 13, 2015 | 8:26 PM Reply
Ofx360
Ofx360
I went to a Renaissance Fair once, I was the one of two black people there (or at least, as far as I could tell). The women there wore very thin, very revealing clothing, with various ornaments and jewelry that enhanced there naughty bits! Also, a lot of sexual jokes…I mean, jeez! A lot of jokes around gender and sexual orientations.
I’m pretty sure the Renaissance Fair is an appreciation of a specific romanticized time and this game seems to be focused on themes around it. So maybe the point of this game’s world is to, in a way, faithfully represent that theme.
I’m not sure if Arthur’s enjoyment is really being slain because of the lack of colored people and/or because of the sexist ideas a relatively faithfully recreated medieval setting might have, but I would guess as a reviewer, you should know that going in? Maybe not.
I guess as a reader, you guys should know Arthur is a really sensitive dude when it comes to this stuff and maybe you should just expect it from him and ignore it?
I’m just reading the comments here and responding to that, though. I’ve skipped reading the review as I want a fresh experience going into this game. The 8s, 9s, and 10s are making me pretty confident in the purchase.
But man…hopefully they fix all the bugs I’m hearing about at launch. Apparently Jeff Gertsman had it hard crash on him twice in 3 hours >___> That’s rough… And the bug report at the base of this review makes it sound more like an unplayable game than an 8/10
May 13, 2015 | 8:31 PM Reply
Drew Besse
Drew Besse
"I went to a Renaissance fair and it was sexist, racist and homophobic so its okay that this is too"
May 13, 2015 | 9:34 PM Reply
Ofx360
Ofx360
Yeah, pretty much, right?
I mean, if you’re recreating themes from a certain era or style, does it not make sense that those themes be apart of it? Say you’re making a game about the deep south in the 1950s? You CAN erase all of racism as a way to white-wash history to support your current cultural views, OR you can embrace it, and tell a modern, compelling story that also encapsulates those not-so-perfect themes of the time.
May 13, 2015 | 10:15 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
What bothers me, is that this review focuses on things that are not specific to my needs. It’s not like I have other alternatives, Polygon is the only place that does reviews.
For us gamers who care about the number, or just the features, where are we supposed to go? Metacritic, IGN, Gamespot? It’s not like we have alternatives for what we’re looking for.
May 13, 2015 | 8:33 PM Reply
Nettacki
Polygon actually spent the majority of the review focusing on stuff other than the way it portrays gender and race. It was really only the last few paragraphs that talked about it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:52 PM Reply
Symphony Man
Symphony Man
Assistant to the Community Overlord
I’m almost positive he’s being sarcastic.
May 13, 2015 | 9:33 PM Reply
DodoEgg
DodoEgg
8/10 from Polygon on a game they consider sexist, the conversion to actual video game score without social commentary translates to 12/10, so I’ll definitely be getting it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:36 PM Reply
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
This whole complaining about sexism and racism in games that take place somewhere based on an era known for racism and sexism is getting really annoying.
May 13, 2015 | 8:39 PM Reply
Kirielson
Kirielson
Moderator, Polygon
Why?
May 13, 2015 | 8:54 PM Reply
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
Because if we keep changing everything controversial politically or culturally in games, then they’ll just end up devoid of personality or identity and feel the same as any other game.
If you removed everything controversial about GTA 5, you’d have a very tame, average game.
I’m all for equal rights or whatever, but I’d be even more for a game that switches the roles around. It might even be more entertaining.
May 13, 2015 | 10:26 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
What has been removed from GTAV? What has been removed from The Witcher 3?
Also, do we include in this, changes like Mass Effect 3’s ending?
May 13, 2015 | 10:29 PM Reply
DisgruntledGoat
DisgruntledGoat
The whole "two swords" thing drives me crazy.
It makes zero sense that the finely crafted sword I was just using to cut a griffin in half turns into a wet noodle when I try to use it on a human bandit.
May 13, 2015 | 8:40 PM Reply
Tom Nerva
Tom Nerva
I thought we were able to kill humans with the silver sword in TW2, it just wasn’t as effective as the steel sword. However, I could be wrong since it’s been awhile since I’ve last played TW2. Either way, I can see how it’s annoying. But to be fair, they did have to implement some way of forcing us to use different swords on different enemies for the sake of keeping true to the books.
May 13, 2015 | 9:30 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Are you sure about that? Pretty sure it killed enemies in TW2, and I expect it will in TW3.
The logic is from the books, and the logic seemed to me that Silver was effective against monsters. Using swords, in real life, degrades the sharpness…So, the sense of it seemed to be to not degrade the Silver, and more expensive sword, used for monsters by using it against humans when you can use a cheaper, and less degradable, sword against them. So, if you think about it, it would make sense in trying to save that Silver sword for things like Trolls and Vampires.
Also, it does look pretty cool. Witcher have the strength to carry it around, so there’s no problem with pulling your back muscles either.
May 13, 2015 | 9:35 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
In TW2, it does, but it’s not that effective. So I expect that’d be the case with 3.
May 13, 2015 | 9:43 PM Reply
derek tomek
derek tomek
Well, silver isn’t the most durable metal to be using to cleave through armor. Apparently it’s pretty top notch for the supernatural though. Plus, it looks cool and sticks to the source. So there’s that too.
May 13, 2015 | 9:49 PM Reply
TheAshenVictor
As somehow who hasn’t had the oppurtunity to play any of the previous witcher games I’d like to know if there’s some sort of prelude allowing you to influence or gain understanding of earlier events? I thought I heard rumors about a feature like that for ps4 players. If it’s mentioned in the text I apologize, I skimmed some sections because I didn’t want spoilers.
Nice review anyway, looking forward to this game.
May 13, 2015 | 8:44 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
YES!
Many of the key scenes from the first games are expertly summarizes as you go through The Witcher 3. Also, some of the key decisions can be made by choosing "how you acted" while telling the story (I think only if it doesn’t find a game file with those decisions).
May 13, 2015 | 8:49 PM Reply
TheAshenVictor
Thanks, that sounds great :blush:
May 13, 2015 | 9:14 PM Reply
AvianIsTheTerm
Of course people are going to be up in arms about the sexism stuff, as usual. Sigh.
Reviews are ultimately an opinion, and clearly Arthur is of the opinion that the way the setting treats women and POCs detracted from the experience. I don’t really agree, but I think it’s patently ridiculous to go around complaining about how TW3 was robbed of its ‘rightful’ score based on teh political correctness. Reviews are opinion, and I mean he gave the game an 8/10; that’s a damn good score.
As to the actual content, I’m not sure I agree totally. I don’t agree on the count of there being a lack of people of colour. CDPR are creating a game within an existing world where racial characteristics are mostly of the height and ear-pointiness variety. The criticism that it doesn’t reflect real world diversity is fair, but it’s not something that in my opinion is cause for alarm.
On the treatment of women I’m more ambivalent. I feel like there is a place for creating a world that is oppressive; as a ‘gritty low fantasy’ that trope is a core part of The Witcher’s DNA. However, I do feel like the series does often give female characters (who are not poorly written or ‘damseled’ by any means) outfits that are over-sexualised, and in the past games there were times where I felt portrayal of sexuality and of violence strayed into the gratuitous.
My views don’t make Arthur’s criticisms ‘wrong’, because once again, reviews are opinion, and art is subjective. I do feel like it’s a point worth discussing, and I don’t like that so many in the wider gaming community have the paranoid fear that if we start talking about issues of diversity, we’re going to end up with an authoritarian politically correct police state.
May 13, 2015 | 8:51 PM Reply
Nettacki
Whether we agree with his assessments or not is kinda moot at this point, because from what I can tell, no one except some reviewers has played the game yet. So maybe in a week or so many other people will be able to give their takes on it and decide for themselves if it’s sexist or not.
May 13, 2015 | 8:55 PM Reply
AvianIsTheTerm
That is true; as I obviously haven’t played the game yet I can’t comment on specific situations in it. All I can go off is a combination of PR material, the reviews, and my experiences in the rest of the series.
May 13, 2015 | 9:56 PM Reply
Vesuvium
Vesuvium
I generally applaud Polygon’s reviewers for calling games out for sexist bullshit, but in this case… I’m a bit confused. Look at these quotes:
"CD Projekt has done work to make for more interesting, influential women that feel just a bit more fleshed out than they’ve been previously. This includes a number of powerful women with complicated motivations and goals of their own."
"That said, the world CD Projekt has created is oppressively misogynist. In some ways, the game deals directly with this — characters acknowledge again and again that it’s hard to be a woman there, that it’s a place of violence and terror and that women must work harder to be recognized and respected."
To me they imply that this game takes place in a terrible world, but the storytelling itself treats women well: as real characters, that exist on their own merits. It sounds like the game hasn’t internalized misogyny or sexual violence, although it does depict characters that have. That almost sounds laudable to me. Approaching the subject of sexism without endorsing is often worthwhile, and not something we should be condemning. The ability to portray a subject like this is a necessary and powerful artistic tool.
So I have the following question for the reviewer:
Are those two quotes misleading? Or is my interpretation of your words – that any portrayal of misogyny is inherently bad – accurate? Or somewhere in between?
I am not trying to attack the review or the score; just trying to understand where the reviewer draws the line, and why. Does he want a completely sanitized industry, or do those quotes simply misrepresent the quality of the depiction of female characters?
May 13, 2015 | 8:53 PM Reply
AvianIsTheTerm
I think the key issue here is that the line between depicting an oppressive world and ‘internalising’ that oppression (for lack of a better word) is blurred and ultimately pretty subjective.
From past games, at least, I do think the Witcher does try to depict that world moreso than accept that world – clearly racial and sexual issues are in there on purpose a lot of the time. Does it always succeed? Probably not, but that’s a subjective thing and personally I find it’s usually thoughtfully written enough to work for me.
May 13, 2015 | 9:59 PM Reply
Symphony Man
Symphony Man
Assistant to the Community Overlord
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The good news is that we have our META forum for these discussions where you can talk about the things above to your heart’s content.
That being said, any off-topic comment will be removed. Please bring those comments and concerns to our META forum and be sure to follow our Community Guidelines, thanks!
May 13, 2015 | 9:00 PM Reply
vorazan
Was anyone actually looking to Witcher, of all games, to be a shining beacon of feminism?
You collected explicit nude cards of chicks you slept with in the first game, for pete’s sake. And by lord, you had more cards at the end of the game than Yugioh.
May 13, 2015 | 9:03 PM Reply
Nettacki
No, but they did expect some degree of improvement in the way female characters are portrayed compared to the last. And the game series had a bit of a history with slowly improving the way they’re portrayed, like how 2 dropped the sex card thing and had far fewer sexual encounters, yet whatever was there actually managed to be a bit more meaningful than the predecessor.
And speaking of improvement, they did mention that they have "done work to make for more interesting, influential women that feel just a bit more fleshed out than they’ve been previously. This includes a number of powerful women with complicated motivations and goals of their own."
May 13, 2015 | 9:13 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
I expected it because books on which the game is based are quite feminist.
May 13, 2015 | 9:20 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
True, but misogyny is a theme that is also covered in the novels. There’s a lot of dark issues about the treatment of women by a patriarchal-monarchy society covered in those books, as is in the games.
May 13, 2015 | 9:25 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
Sure, but for example in Witcher 2 I have this notion that women were treated more badly than men. For example Triss was kidnapped and held like some damsel in distress waiting for Geralt to save her. This would never happen in novels, where character like Triss would always act independently, trying to get out of this situation on her own. Or that mother in the first act, which was murdered just for the sake of depicting the darkness of the world. But yes, I generally agree that this, what is described in the review, could be easily another hysteria caused by hypersensitive american media.
May 13, 2015 | 9:36 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
She wasn’t really a damsel in distress when you saw the outcome of not saving her at the end, though. I think the brunt of her kidnapping wasn’t as bad as the trope because she was ultimately kidnapped by another female character.
I don’t remember the mother from the first act. I do remember a female Elf being accused by soldiers, though. I thought that was a great subversion of female damsels in distress tropes in games, by actually showing she had been the perpetrator. It played into the subverting that trope in games nicely, I thought.
I do think that there’s a general case of misunderstanding whenever any subject matter is covered in storytelling. I’ve seen too many times that just because a film, for example 12 Years A Slave, covers a subject matter…that it makes it a proponent in that subject matter, which isn’t true- but it’s believe by people. I think mileage varies on these things and what you’re comfortable with.
May 13, 2015 | 9:47 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
This diversity is actually mostly post-colonial. Before that Europe was much more homogeneous, with people of color living mostly in harbors in Spain and Greece. Middle Europe was actually 99,9% white. In the books there isn’t much describing of ethnicity, so it is hard to say whether there were some poc, however considering the fact that the world depicted in the books and games was based on medieval North and Central Europe where population was almost only white, it is quite obvious why CD Project do it this way. And this arise another question which people don’t usually see. If you add some poc to the game, how the rest of the inhabitants will behave toward them? Because in game like Witcher you can’t just reskin them and check the box on the list of inclusiveness. To stay true to the realistic depiction of the world there will be racism and xenophobia among white majority, another thing you need to handle somehow. However I still thing those are American measures applied on the Eastern European game. You shall respect the culture from which the game is coming from. I would wonder whether you would criticize game from Ghana to have no white people at all or game from India to have only Indian people in it.
May 13, 2015 | 9:17 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Context matters, and I would have wished that Arthur had provided some in mentioning the lack of people of color in the game. I wasn’t sure, too, about Arthur’s view on the game covering misogyny therefore made the game misogynistic? I don’t know, seemed like it could go either way.
The review made for an interesting read, though.
May 13, 2015 | 9:21 PM Reply
ApeinaSuite
ApeinaSuite
Meanwhile on Game of Thrones…the crowd is loving it!
May 13, 2015 | 9:22 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Well, to be fair, I have seen the same critiques leveled against Game of Thrones/ A Song of Ice and Fire as well. Pushback on it is constant, though.
May 13, 2015 | 9:50 PM Reply
Dragon Mage Drake
Dragon Mage Drake
Game of Thrones has some of the same problems, but there is a fair bit of male D&A so it is closer to equality in sexualisation than other shows/films. A fair way to go still though…
May 13, 2015 | 9:53 PM Reply
scrumtrelescent7
Cersei, Dani, Arya, Sansa, Melisandre, Shireen, Olenna, Margeary, Ellaria Sand…
They’re doing fine for strong, well-developed female characters.
And that’s just the ones who are alive!
And there isn’t nearly as much gratuitous nudity as the first two seasons. I can’t actually think of any so far in season 5.
May 13, 2015 | 10:09 PM Reply
althaz
Don’t think you can label Shireen as strong (same goes for Sansa) or Olenna or Ellaria as well-developed, but your point still stands. The show and books have strong female characters, even though they live in an extremely sexist world.
May 13, 2015 | 10:46 PM Reply
Dragon Mage Drake
Dragon Mage Drake
I was worried about the way the game would treat women after seeing a few demos of the game over the last year or two where the devs made jokes about how there are lots of naked women to look at… It seems those worries were valid. Alas! As the books do not treat women in that way at all. If Geralt’s sexuality was portrayed as it was in the books, or like BJB’s in the new Wolfenstein, it would have been praised heavily for it. As mature representations of sexuality are needed in games, as opposed to the more immature/misogynist sexuality that is in most games.
On the race issue I am not that worried. Race is represented by Dwarves and Elves in this universe. Which is based on a medieval Europe. Though that same argument can be made on the sexism front as well so I can see if it will be a problem for some people.
I do think I will really enjoy this game though. Challenging DS style combat, that is a bit faster, with a lot of hunting and looting, with funny and intelligent characters, story, and lore, in a beautifully rendered fantasy open world. Almost my dream game right there. I can’t wait to play it.
Good review Arthur. Your sacrifice is appreciated.
May 13, 2015 | 10:03 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Geralt’s sexuality…? He’s pretty faithful to his novel counterpart.
The games are very faithful to the books, really. That’s undisputed. I think mileage varies on nudity and sex, as has been the case with the books themselves.
And, hey it’s Poland. They are not nearly as conservative about sex and nudity over in Europe as we are here in the U.S. There’s still alot of conservatism here in the U.S. over that stuff.
May 13, 2015 | 10:20 PM Reply
althaz
One thing I didn’t see mentioned, was the quality of the writing?
One thing that’s stopped me getting really into the last two Witcher games, despite seemingly being aimed right at a me-like audience is the extremely poor writing. Generally, the plot itself has been solid at worst and fantastic at best. The world is positively fascinating…but the writing and to a lesser extent the voice-acting have really let the last couple of games down.
They are obviously better executed than something like The Elder Scrolls games, but worlds behind Bioware’s RPGs (the pinnacle of writing in games, IMO).
Sadly the gameplay hasn’t been enough to keep be engaged enough to make it to the end of the game enjoyably (unlike The Elder Scrolls games) which means I’ve got one finished playthrough of the last two games from dozens of attempts.
If the writing is better or the gameplay is stellar (the quality of which isn’t discussed much either), I’ll give this a go…otherwise I’ll wait for the bargain bin sale on Steam and probably give up halfway through again.
May 13, 2015 | 10:43 PM Reply
NotLordAtkin
I’ve seen many people criticise the mature themes of this series in particular in that it tries a bit too hard with needless shock-value violence and rampant misogyny and… for the most part, they are right. I can see where arthur is coming from when he criticises the treatment of female characters.
That said, Sapkowski was kind of a lot worse. I suppose it would be hard to make the game respectful if you’re basing it on the work of a misogynist drunk while also trying to stay true to the source material.
I have to say, while I can’t get enough of the world and the characters, I hated the writing style of the Witcher books. More often than not, Sapkowski went for shock value with all the gore and blood and tits, mostly in places where it served no purpose other than being there. His writing is incredibly childish. I actually feel that CD Projekt has done a very good job of handling the world better than Sapkowski himself ever did.
I suppose this raises an interesting issue for debate. Can poor handling of female characters be excused in a game based of a book that does the same thing? Is misogyny ok if it is an integral part of the world that has existed in fiction for decades and the game at least tries to be self aware about it? Is inclusivity more important than respecting the surce material, and by the same token, does criticism of the original work carry over to the adaptation? Should CD project even be criticised for world building decisions that ultimately weren’t theirs? If so, would it have been better if they changed the world to be more inclusive and at the same time diverted from the source material they are building on?
Anyone?
Been waiting for this game. Liked the Witcher 2 and could not for the life of me get into Dragon Age. Once I finish Bloodborne I’ll be picking this up.
Thanks for the good review
May 13, 2015 | 7:33 PM Reply
JohnnyRockets
I’ve been waiting for this review! I was wondering what happened when Polygon didn’t have their review up yesterday but good it’s here.
But…
No Quality Control???
The first thing I looked for was Quality Control so I could listen on my drive home. Audio > *. Any plans for a W3 QC?
May 13, 2015 | 8:25 PM Reply
Kirielson
Kirielson
Moderator, Polygon
I don’t know, but you better send in your questions ASAP to the email.
May 13, 2015 | 8:26 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
Reviewers have been busting their butts (at most major outlets) to play the game these last few days. I would rather the review on any given site reflect as much of the game experience as possible, and be written by an author that has had time to collect their thoughts. What’s the rush? It isn’t like the game drops a few hours from now. Even if you wanted pre-order whatevers, you still have plenty of time.
May 13, 2015 | 8:28 PM Reply
ewokskick
ewokskick
I really don’t see how making the Witcher 3 more open world is a "terrifying risk." Maybe it would have been 6 years ago, but by now most AAA games are open world. It would have been risky for them to stick to their guns with linear storytelling as the invested more into the game. Going open-world minimizes their risk. I actually can’t believe the review thinks otherwise.
May 13, 2015 | 7:41 PM Reply
Arthur Gies
Polygon Reviews Overlord
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
May 13, 2015 | 7:43 PM Reply
Barnsley Pal
Barnsley Pal
Yeah, but they’re already GOG damned rich!
May 13, 2015 | 10:21 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
It’s the studio’s first open world game, and they didn’t have the financial resources from a major publisher like Activision or EA. So yeah, in a sense I see where Arthur is coming from. Yeah, the market wants (and probably even expects) an open world Witcher game in this day and age, but that doesn’t mean CDPR was necessarily going to hit it out of the park when it came to execution. Pile on the studio’s ambitious attempt at making the world feel life like with weather, choices affecting villages later down the line, general fidelity, and the combat overhaul and it becomes pretty apparent that they were aiming high. Fortunately for everyone, they seem to have succeeded for the most part. Hopefully the day one patch cleans up the game’s performance issues.
May 13, 2015 | 7:49 PM Reply
coil
coil
A technical/design risk, not a marketing one.
May 13, 2015 | 8:04 PM Reply
Gmr_Leon
Gmr_Leon
Exactly. Open worlds, as Ubisoft has aptly proven, are a nightmare to get right and easily slip into unstable tedious messes of collectibles and uninteresting side events when done wrong.
…And yes, I’m suggesting that almost all of Ubisoft’s open world games are mostly subpar, because for them it’s a standard marketing tick-off box at this point.
May 13, 2015 | 9:07 PM Reply
DrownedAmmet
DrownedAmmet
Dragon Age Inquisition went for an open-er world and it made that game a lot worse
May 13, 2015 | 9:38 PM Reply
talhak91
And I would say otherwise. Opinions are great!
May 13, 2015 | 10:20 PM Reply
Boss Kowbel
Boss Kowbel
inb4 "8 is too low."
But holy fuck, if 70 hours is a rushed playthrough, it seems claims of 200+ hours of content was not just usual PR spiel. Good on the developers, bugs or questionable portrayals of women otherwise.
May 13, 2015 | 7:43 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
I want to ask something very seriously and I really hope my comment won’t be deleted. Is the way a game treats women one of the criteria by which you rate the games in your reviews?
May 13, 2015 | 7:44 PM Reply
Mantis6
And lack of people of colour. I thought those 2 things were odd to point out since they shouldn’t have anything to do with the review.
May 13, 2015 | 7:45 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
Why not? Reviews are about subjective criticism of the medium, not objective things like "graphics are technically impressive". If there was a heavily-misogynist movie with only white characters, then it would certainly be mentioned by many reviewers. Gaming shouldn’t be immune to this sort of criticisms just because they’re video games and not movies or novels – not if we want the art form to be taken seriously.
Now, if you want to have a serious discussion about whether or not the game is truly misogynistic, then sure! The reviewer clearly thinks so, and it obviously impacted his experience, but that’s where the point of discussion should be – not whether or not we should even talk about it.
May 13, 2015 | 7:53 PM Reply
Mantis6
Alright, good point. I guess maybe it should more so be a part of the review that shouldn’t affect the overall score. Like, the reviewer addresses the issues he/she has with the portrayal of a group, keeping it in the review but as a separate section.
Maybe I just have an odd view of the whole "X character is displayed in a very Y way"
May 13, 2015 | 7:58 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
I’m not sure why people stress so much over specific scores, and what should or shouldn’t go into determining a score. While I’m not a huge fan of scoring things in general, if you are going to do it, I think it makes sense to include anything that impacted your play through in that score. After all, if the reviewer found aspects of the game’s setting distracting enough to impact his enjoyment, shouldn’t that also impact the score?
May 13, 2015 | 8:01 PM Reply
Ingsoc
Yes, absolutely. Excluding key elements that affect the enjoyment of the game experience from the score seems like a ridiculous proposal to me. A game’s score – to the extent that we even need them – _should _capture the overall impression that the game left on the player including all aspects of that impression.
Also, a game review – in my opinion – should not be some kind of robotic listing of attributes like "gameplay", "graphics", etc…
And even if it were a bland list of this kind, it would still fail to be "objective" in the sense some expect.
So, I guess I’m saying that I think a lot of people don’t actually know what a "review" is.
May 13, 2015 | 9:21 PM Reply
Rttu
Well if it does affect the score the reviewer gave it, but it’s not a factor for you, you can probably count 1+1 and understand that you will probably give the game a higher score yourself. That’s why it’s good to read the reviews and not just the scores, because you get insight on how high you think you might score it yourself.
May 13, 2015 | 8:06 PM Reply
Boss Kowbel
Boss Kowbel
The final score should be dictated by the review’s overall text, pros and cons, warts and all. If an editor only concentrates on the game’s strengths and omits the blemishes, he or she does a disservice to the readers.
May 13, 2015 | 8:08 PM Reply
Symphony Man
Symphony Man
Assistant to the Community Overlord
This is why a group of editors assign the score, not the reviewer. Brilliant way to do it in my opinion.
May 13, 2015 | 8:12 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
a game that often feels like a stunningly confident, competent shot across the bow of the open world genre, folding in an incredibly strong narrative and a good sense of consequence to the decisions that present themselves throughout, presenting a fun bit of combat creativity into a genre that desperately needs it. With that going for it, The Witcher 3 is a great game though it isn’t a classic — and it can carry a somewhat qualified recommendation.
That sounds exactly like an "8". Scale that up or down depending on how heavily you want to consider the "qualified" (like a big "but …") portion. Racism and sexism don’t look like they factor into the number.
May 13, 2015 | 8:22 PM Reply
HMRr0cks
HMRr0cks
One thing you have to remember is that the reviewers do not assign the score to the review. Arthur stated his opinion and then another individual and or a group decided the score based off of the text.
May 13, 2015 | 8:23 PM Reply
DrownedAmmet
DrownedAmmet
I don’t see why that shouldn’t be reflected in the score. Games are a sum of all their parts, if those parts affected the reviewer enough it should be reflected in the score
May 13, 2015 | 10:43 PM Reply
Kagero
The world setting of Witcher was created by a Polish guy, so I can’t imagine his sensitivity for persons of color is comparable to those who grew up in some parts of the United States. As for gender, the game looks very western middle ages to me, which makes powerful female leads a little unrealistic.
Of course, we’re in a fantasy world so why not have it all, but I don’t think it deserves so much focus in a short review. I wouldn’t expect this in a Mario game, where a third of the review is about the lack of a powerful unsexualized female lead. I’d rather see it in an opinion piece, but that’s just my… opinion :wink:
May 13, 2015 | 8:01 PM Reply
NitroFrost
You’re not allowed to have those around these parts buddy.
May 13, 2015 | 8:02 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
That’s pretty funny, considering this thread is already full of people criticizing Arthur for his opinion. Because, you know, that’s what a review is, right? An opinion on something?
May 13, 2015 | 8:02 PM Reply
Kagero
I wish it was in a separate opinion piece since the comments section just became a flame war. But that’s just my opinion.
May 13, 2015 | 8:19 PM Reply
Ingsoc
I wish the audience would be mature enough to understand the nature of the review, and to intelligently comment on it without the flame war happening. I wouldn’t want to see this stuff spun off into an opinion piece simply because the audience can’t be trusted to behave themselves in the comments.
May 13, 2015 | 9:18 PM Reply
Drew Besse
Drew Besse
The fact that its a fantasy world is part of what makes it a problem.
If they were going for some historical piece… sure, I can understand some of the decisions. But its a fantasy world. If your "fantasy" is that black people don’t exist and women are little more than sex objects then yikes.
May 13, 2015 | 9:31 PM Reply
dunnetg
This game was made in Poland, by a Polish dev team, and based on novels written by a Polish author. Demographically, Poland is about 98% ethnic Poles, a fair-skinned Slavic people. With the origins of the game firmly in mind, I doubt anyone even took into consideration the concerns of Americans and their expectations of a globally representative multiracial melting pot.
May 13, 2015 | 9:58 PM Reply
Ingsoc
That’s a reasonable point, but nevertheless, I don’t think it negates how the game will be received by various audiences. The game may be received differently in different parts of the world, for example.
May 13, 2015 | 10:00 PM Reply
Rineocerous
Yeah like how everyone outside of China hates those Kung-Fu movies because they typically only hire Chinese actors and in the rare cases where white people are depicted they are nefarious villains who are looking to exploit the Chinese.
Personally I had a hard time enjoying Robin Hood as a child because there were no South American tribes.
May 13, 2015 | 10:34 PM Reply
docmars
docmars
This. Exactly this. I’m digging the sass :wink:
May 13, 2015 | 10:39 PM Reply
Rineocerous
The Witcher 3 is a mixed bag. The gameplay is fun, the graphics are nice, the story is deep and interesting but it’s almost as if the developers went out of their way not to depict any automobiles. Sure you could argue that the game takes place in a time before such technological advancements but it’s a fantasy game depicting magic and all sorts of unrealistic beasts so there is really no excuse why there couldn’t be cars or at least a motorbike. Also there is a wide variety of food items available to restore your vitality but most of these items are forms of meat dishes.. making the game unnecessarily difficult for vegans on higher difficulties. The writers of The Witcher 3 also failed to address the social and financial difficulties of being a single father which I found distracting and unfortunate. Ultimately The Witcher 3 is a good game that falls short in a few key areas and may only be worth your time if you are a bachelor who prefers the outdated transportation method of enslaving horses and who feasts on an abundance of meat.
May 13, 2015 | 10:24 PM Reply
lilkwarrior
lilkwarrior
I wholeheartedly agree with Silellak. The reviewer had every right to point out his views on these aspects of how the game made him feel overall. It’s an experience after all.
That said, I think the reviewer could have criticized the game portrayal of women & etc. with more context regarding such criticism with how it compares to previous games in the series and the how such portrayals compare to other efforts from Polish.
For example, Americans sensitivities to sex & race (perceived often as being immature or hypocritical by European countries) is very distinct from the culture the developers of this game call home.
Did the segments of Ciri allowed the serendipity of freedom you’d expect playing as a female protagonist?
It’ll be very interesting what Phillip Kollar thinks of this game during the upcoming Quality Control related to this game.
Personally, as far as previous blockbusters in the genre this game has shown extensive promise of being warrantable of being superior than Dragon Age: Inquisition—which I expected (while having a fantastic time playing that game)—the last AAA game with the aims of being a open-world & having heavy investment behind it.
Based on the added complexity it brings to the established gameplay systems of the series that warranted it having high media & preorder attention, it sounds like the game has overwhelmingly succeeded providing a distinct, worthwhile experience warrantable of purchasing this new entry of the series.
May 13, 2015 | 10:31 PM Reply
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
No, but for this game in special, it shouldn’t, as the game is based on a book that started in 1986, so those things are expected.
May 13, 2015 | 7:50 PM Reply
coil
coil
Keep in mind that the score is one agreed upon by the author and the site editors after the review itself has been written, and is intended to reflect the review as a whole but is not (strictly speaking) defined by it. There’s no "-0.5 points for no PoC" or anything, but if the game stumbles in one respect or another that would be considered.
Personally I appreciate that Polygon is interested in looking beyond the simple technical aspects of the game, and considering more diverse points of view in its review process.
May 13, 2015 | 8:11 PM Reply
DisgruntledGoat
DisgruntledGoat
The "mature" themes of the Witcher series feel very much like the juvenile wank fantasies of a 14-year-old boy.
I was hoping that the devs would have matured after the laughable sexuality of Witcher 2, but it looks like that didn’t happen.
May 13, 2015 | 8:36 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
Sexist portrayals aside, many reviews (including this one) say that the story is actually much more mature and respectful of an adult intelligence than many recent games. So it sounds like it gets things very right, and very wrong, on the same front.
May 13, 2015 | 8:38 PM Reply
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
People have sex, why shouldn’t have in a game like this?
May 13, 2015 | 9:46 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
I… I don’t think anyone has said they shouldn’t…
May 13, 2015 | 9:52 PM Reply
Seneschal
Seneschal
The Witcher series has, so far, had a core theme of the issues of marginalized minorities and prejudice in society, and TW2 did a great job of fleshing out its nonhuman/nonmale/nonstraight characters – let’s remember that the actual plot revolves around an all-female cabal having internal schisms and secret machinations about ruling the world; Geralt is just the boy-toy of one of them, so he gets caught up.
So, whether the sequel lives up to the series previously established thematic undertones is kinda relevant. Much like ME2 was criticized for having a "filler plot" that lacked the first one’s wonder and focused storytelling. That doesn’t mean that it didn’t have great writing (particularly the characters) and peerless gameplay at the time, just that it diverged from the tone of the series enough to be a deal-breaker for some.
May 13, 2015 | 8:52 PM Reply
PEREGRINVS
PEREGRINVS
For a progressive website who purports to care about how culture, gender, and race are used or not used in video games and media, they seem to never take the second step in their research. First of all, the game is based on a twenty five year old Polish High Fantasy novel. So it helps to reflect on the time and place where that was written. Second, I think as a United States website it’s ethnocentric to judge foreign games by anglo-american values and criticize people from another culture with another history. Polygon is especially harsh when talking about Japanese games. I’d enjoy reading an opinion piece lampooning the portrayal of women and people of color in Japanese or European games, written however by a Japanese or European.
May 13, 2015 | 9:31 PM Reply
snphillips0
snphillips0
There are a few problems with this line of thinking. First, the game is based on the books, but is not an adaptation of any of them; this is an entirely original story, written this decade. Second, issues of representation are not bound by cultural borders. While they may be there because of prevailing culture in their nation of origin, it does not affect whether or not they are problematic in their depictions of historically underrepresented and persecuted minorities; and if anything, it demonstrates an even greater importance in discussing these issues if they are fundamental to a culture, because it demonstrates how that culture might itself have a fundamental problem.
May 13, 2015 | 10:00 PM Reply
PEREGRINVS
PEREGRINVS
"demonstrates how that culture might itself have a fundamental problem."
What criteria are you using to discern what facet of a culture is problematic?
"While they may be there because of prevailing culture in their nation of origin, it does not affect whether or not they are problematic in their depictions of historically underrepresented and persecuted minorities"
Underrepresented and persecuted minorities in Poland were the Polish for most of the 21st century. This is the ethnocentrism I’m talking about. Everything is through this American lens. It’s the egocentric predicament specifically for people living in the United States.
May 13, 2015 | 10:11 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
Arthur seems to have encountered more technical issues than the other reviews I’ve read. Most of them have only complained about occasional frame rate drops. Maybe they’re just glossing things over on the assumption that the patch will take care of it all? Still, not a terrible score by any means, and I’m looking forward to this game.
May 13, 2015 | 7:44 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
Giant Bomb hasn’t posted a review yet, but on the Bombcast, they definitely mentioned some major technical problems.
May 13, 2015 | 7:57 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
It makes sense. Polygon and Giantbomb normally do seem to be more forthright with these sorts of issues.
May 13, 2015 | 8:00 PM Reply
_txf_
They won’t be posting a review.
May 13, 2015 | 8:02 PM Reply
mosespippy
Is that a result of having a broken build or the length of the game? Ever since the back to back of FFXIII and Red Dead taking up three weeks of Brad’s time I don’t think they’ve allocated the sort of resources necessary for reviews of long games, which is why I find their editorial content has a massive blind spot.
May 13, 2015 | 8:13 PM Reply
_txf_
GB doesn’t review RPGs, they have no interest in it. They barely review anything any more. shrug, it isn’t why people go to that site.
Note that is is a supposition, but seems likely.
May 13, 2015 | 8:14 PM Reply
Kharn_
I didn’t know that, damn, it’s unthinkable to me to be a gamer and not play RPG.
May 13, 2015 | 8:57 PM Reply
mosespippy
Oh they play them. They all played Dark Souls II, they all played Bloodborne, Jeffs been talking about FFX/X-2 and Diablo 3 for a while now. They just don’t review any of them because they don’t see the point if they can’t get a review up in a timely manner. That’s why their Red Dead review is finished but was never published; it was a week late because of FFXIII.
May 13, 2015 | 9:29 PM Reply
Friendly Neighborhood Dissenter-Man
Some reviewers were playing on debug PS4 consoles that already had the day one patch applied.
May 13, 2015 | 9:54 PM Reply
JBarAUS
JBarAUS
This review is lower than the average it seems – I’m fine with that though. Its nice to get some actual disclosure on the technical issues.
May 13, 2015 | 7:45 PM Reply
Mantis6
I don’t exactly get the point of addressing Ciri’s "revealing" clothing. Does it really matter for a review? Shouldn’t the main focus be the stability of the game, how well the characters interact with each other, and the story? I get the lack of ethnicity. That just seems odd that you found only white people. But for Ciri’s design choice, does that TRULY have a major role in how you see the game?
May 13, 2015 | 7:49 PM Reply
Kagero
I get the lack of ethnicity. That just seems odd that you found only white people.
The Witcher world’s setting was created by a Polish guy after all, I don’t think he is as sensitive to race as us Americans are. And treatment of gender, maybe the author was shooting for a little realism in this fantasy land (by realism, I mean mimicking the structure of the middle ages).
May 13, 2015 | 7:55 PM Reply
Philip Kollar
Philip Kollar
Senior Editor, Polygon
Oh! I thought by realism you meant the dragons and griffins and shit. Good to clear that up.
May 13, 2015 | 7:58 PM Reply
Average Gamer
Average Gamer
So I have been keeping an eye on this game over the last couple of days. It has gained my attention, I just have one concern: Can someone who hasn’t played any Witcher games be able to grasp the story and game play mechanics? I never played any and I’m considering picking this up.
Thank you for any advice given!
May 13, 2015 | 7:51 PM Reply
Mantis6
Jesse Cox on youtube just recently released a video about the game and thats one thing he mentioned. Apparently it will be very accessible to people who havent touched 1 and 2. And my memory could be wrong but he said you can choose the transfer events if you dont have 1 and 2 due to the consoles.
May 13, 2015 | 7:53 PM Reply
Gokart Mozart
Gokart Mozart
Both Game Informer and IGN are claiming that it’s accessible to new players.
May 13, 2015 | 7:59 PM Reply
ASEdouard
Videogame sequels are ALWAYS accessible to new players. Not being so would destroy sales.
May 13, 2015 | 8:12 PM Reply
Sanunes
I am going to have to find more reviews to see what people think of the controls for if it does have the same weakness as Assassin’s Creed games, I will have to take a pass for I don’t want to have my memories of this game be filled with rage like Assassin’s Creed.
May 13, 2015 | 7:59 PM Reply
Xicon329
Xicon329
Bummed to hear about the game’s treatment of women. Have been super looking forward to this game after loving the first two, perhaps naively hoping that it’d be less gross about it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:04 PM Reply
LordCrash
LordCrash
The game doesn’t treat women in any way. Characters in the game treat women in certain ways, fitting to the setting, story and characters. When will reviewers and gamers finally learn the difference…
May 13, 2015 | 8:07 PM Reply
epicmaster
Wait, but didn’t the game developers, who created the game, create also the Characters? It’s a choice made by the devs.
May 13, 2015 | 8:10 PM Reply
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Helder Jefferson Ferreira da Luz
Not that simple, there are 8 books that already created and defined the boundaries of the world, and the developers have to respect that.
May 13, 2015 | 9:44 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
The games are still built around the lore and world that the books created, and it’s definitely not a fair-minded world. People treat others unfairly, including the guy you play.
May 13, 2015 | 10:16 PM Reply
Brill
I stayed away from the first game because of this crap. I think it was the first game I really consciously decided to skip because of it. I’m not even remotely surprised that it hasn’t gotten better.
May 13, 2015 | 8:07 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
It has gotten considerably better since the first game, by a huge degree.
Looking back on the 2nd game, women were the ones pulling the strings for most of Geralt’s journey, and vying for power as greedily as other men in leadership roles. Certainly the game never did anything like the trading card stuff again.
May 13, 2015 | 10:19 PM Reply
hypermog
I just wanna say, the design of this site is great. Love the layout.
May 13, 2015 | 8:08 PM Reply
Damienduerst
Hey good read Arthur. Obviously most of these comments are going to be on Arthur’s continuing crusade of sexism and racism which is w/e. But I think the bigger thing we should talk about is the possible stability issues on PS4. Giant Bomb was having troubles with it on PS4 also which is worrying.
If you guys want to get up in arms over Arthur’s quirks go ahead but I feel like we should be able to read his point on Women and race and ask ourselves does it matter? If it doesn’t to you ignore it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:08 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
Well stability should be talked about after the day one patch hits, because that will have some effect.
May 13, 2015 | 10:20 PM Reply
Gaming_L8
I am glad Arthur raised how women and ethnicities are represented in the game. It is why I sought out this review, knowing that he would bring up the issue if it was needed. My wife was interested in the game but hates sexism in all forms. Now I know not to recommend it to her. It is too bad. I would like the rest of the experience, but like interacting with a sexist inlaw, the good does not outweigh the bad.
May 13, 2015 | 8:12 PM Reply
NitroFrost
How is the game being sexist?
May 13, 2015 | 8:13 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Please for god’s sake. The game is not sexist. Have you ever watched a movie based in medieval Europe? Well, chances are it was a lot more sexist than this game.
Please. Check the game, it’s totally worth anyone’s time. I really can’t wrap my head around the closemindedness towards different cultures that’s displayed here.
Just see it for yourslef.
May 13, 2015 | 8:21 PM Reply
Xicon329
Xicon329
The existence of more sexist things does not make this game "not sexist."
May 13, 2015 | 8:22 PM Reply
Rttu
If his wife hates "sexism in all forms", then she probably didn’t like the sexist medieval movies either. It’s okay to say that sexism in a video game doesn’t bother you, but please don’t claim it’s not sexist like it’s a fact – especially when you haven’t even played the game.
May 13, 2015 | 8:26 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
I’ve read all the books and played the previous two games bro. I think I’m qualified to speak about this game even without playing it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:28 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
I think I’m qualified to speak about this game even without playing it.
This is just…the single best sentence ever. Hilarious.
May 13, 2015 | 8:30 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
He did graciously omit a word. "Intelligently".
May 13, 2015 | 8:32 PM Reply
Rttu
Okay whatever, but what you are not qualified to speak about, is what other people should deem sexist and what not – especially when you’re using arguments like "at least it’s less sexist than X or Y".
May 13, 2015 | 8:33 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Point taken. But what I meant is the following: I have never ever in my life watched a medieval movie at the end of which I thought "What a goddamn sexist movie this was, just horrible". I take it as a historical reference. It’s just the way it was back then. And I have no issues with this. It’s history. I just can’t comprehend how it can be offending to someone and how can it stop anyone from enjoying the movie/game/book/whatever.
I’m sorry if I offended someone, it’s probably coming from our cultural differences. As an eastern european maybe I just don’t understand your mentality concerning sexism and racism. They were never an issue in my country.
P.S. When I said I felt qualified to speak about the game, I meant about it’s setting and portrayal of charecters, not about it’s mechanics.
May 13, 2015 | 8:41 PM Reply
Rttu
The difference here is: The Witcher is not based on reality – it’s a fantasy novel. It’s not supposed to portray any historical era. Or do you recall an era in human history where there were dragons and griffins? I’m also from Northern Europe, and I can say for certain that racism and sexism has been and is a problem in every European country. It’s still a problem, but saying it has "never been an issue" is just a bold lie.
May 13, 2015 | 8:45 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
I’m not from Northern Europe. I come from a post socialist country. 50 years of communism eradicated sexism here. At least in the sense it’s used by americans.
May 13, 2015 | 8:51 PM Reply
Rttu
Allow me to laugh. Name me one Easter European country that is free of sexism? I come from one of the most gender equal countries in the world, (can you guess already?) but even I wouldn’t dare to say that sexism has been eradicated here – not even close.
May 13, 2015 | 8:55 PM Reply
Boss Kowbel
Boss Kowbel
Speak about preview coverage and trailers, yes. Speak to the final product of the game "without playing it," no.
May 13, 2015 | 8:59 PM Reply
Drew Besse
Drew Besse
If you aren’t a woman, you aren’t really qualified to speak about the game not being sexist towards women.
May 13, 2015 | 9:35 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Wow. I rest my case, I don’t see how I could fit in with people with your mindset.
May 13, 2015 | 9:49 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
Although what Drew Besse isn’t entirely true, you do need to consider the fact that even though you understand what sexism is, there’s a nuance you won’t fully understand or appreciate unless you are a woman. Keep that in mind.
May 13, 2015 | 9:54 PM Reply
Ingsoc
That’s a valid point, but I think Drew was basically making a false statement earlier on. Men can – and should – have an appreciation and understanding of the nature of sexism. Many of the comments against this very review suggest that there’s still a really long way to go before men as a whole do have that fuller understanding.
May 13, 2015 | 9:58 PM Reply
Ingsoc
How does that make sense?
May 13, 2015 | 9:54 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
Have you ever watched a movie based in medieval Europe?
If only we had a chance to re-imagine a similar time period with new, modern ideas. You know, like…some sort of…fantasy.
May 13, 2015 | 8:31 PM Reply
Rttu
Wait.. that sounds amazing! Then we might even add other non-realistic things.. Like.. Umm.. Dragons? Maybe some monsters called Drowners? And Griffins? Can we have Griffins?
May 13, 2015 | 8:35 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
Yes, but not succubi. Too much bewbs.
May 13, 2015 | 8:36 PM Reply
ouroborus
ouroborus
Well, that’s your oppinion. For example, as a guy who lives in Eastern Europe, I enjoy the Witcher games because they are based in a setting I can feel somehow connected to and I didn’t enjoy the Dragon Age series because their setting is a bit of a mish-mash that I don’t find very convincing.
May 13, 2015 | 8:47 PM Reply
lilkwarrior
lilkwarrior
I agree the industry needs more scrutiny in the fantasy lands it creates; but this is an adaption that had pretty well-defined characters with certain attitudes—some deliberately perverse—regarding woman.
Arguably a trope of depicting medieval times is the blatant sexism possible in those times; this is especially true with villians / corrupt people in those times.
It’s definitely noble to change an established entity with more "corrected" or "balanced" portrayals of different kinds of people, but that can dilute the core themes of the series.
There’s a reason scenes like the woman obviously being mistreated by guards that was going to hanged during a Witcher 3 trailer or how witches seem to be treated throughout the actual game are so moving.
May 13, 2015 | 10:45 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
Well, if I understand it well, it isn’t criticized for depicting misogynistic patriarchal world where women need to work harder, but for using too much violence against women to stress how dark this world is. Original novels are taking place in the same world, but Sapkowski didn’t have the need to prove it by murdering women specifically.
May 13, 2015 | 8:35 PM Reply
Swiller
The original books have the exact same tone. People should know what they are getting into and either decide if it’s for them or not.
Besides I would rather have a woman’s take on these issues. Between this review and Bayonetta 2, it seems like Arthur’s big play to be a serious jornalist and putting too much gravtis in a industry that has always been hopelessly immature and violent. I really like how indie games are giving games a new voice and welcome it. But this is a Witcher game dude, and very much like the source material! The video game audience will eat it up.
May 13, 2015 | 8:19 PM Reply
silellak
silellak
People should know what they are getting into and either decide if it’s for them or not.
…isn’t that exactly what a review is for?
May 13, 2015 | 8:32 PM Reply
Rathorial
Rathorial
Knowing what you’re getting into, goes beyond the review of one person. Others might will see the game differently.
May 13, 2015 | 10:23 PM Reply
gamer1234cv
gamer1234cv
Only a 8 not a 10.
May 13, 2015 | 8:26 PM Reply
Ofx360
Ofx360
I went to a Renaissance Fair once, I was the one of two black people there (or at least, as far as I could tell). The women there wore very thin, very revealing clothing, with various ornaments and jewelry that enhanced there naughty bits! Also, a lot of sexual jokes…I mean, jeez! A lot of jokes around gender and sexual orientations.
I’m pretty sure the Renaissance Fair is an appreciation of a specific romanticized time and this game seems to be focused on themes around it. So maybe the point of this game’s world is to, in a way, faithfully represent that theme.
I’m not sure if Arthur’s enjoyment is really being slain because of the lack of colored people and/or because of the sexist ideas a relatively faithfully recreated medieval setting might have, but I would guess as a reviewer, you should know that going in? Maybe not.
I guess as a reader, you guys should know Arthur is a really sensitive dude when it comes to this stuff and maybe you should just expect it from him and ignore it?
I’m just reading the comments here and responding to that, though. I’ve skipped reading the review as I want a fresh experience going into this game. The 8s, 9s, and 10s are making me pretty confident in the purchase.
But man…hopefully they fix all the bugs I’m hearing about at launch. Apparently Jeff Gertsman had it hard crash on him twice in 3 hours >___> That’s rough… And the bug report at the base of this review makes it sound more like an unplayable game than an 8/10
May 13, 2015 | 8:31 PM Reply
Drew Besse
Drew Besse
"I went to a Renaissance fair and it was sexist, racist and homophobic so its okay that this is too"
May 13, 2015 | 9:34 PM Reply
Ofx360
Ofx360
Yeah, pretty much, right?
I mean, if you’re recreating themes from a certain era or style, does it not make sense that those themes be apart of it? Say you’re making a game about the deep south in the 1950s? You CAN erase all of racism as a way to white-wash history to support your current cultural views, OR you can embrace it, and tell a modern, compelling story that also encapsulates those not-so-perfect themes of the time.
May 13, 2015 | 10:15 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
What bothers me, is that this review focuses on things that are not specific to my needs. It’s not like I have other alternatives, Polygon is the only place that does reviews.
For us gamers who care about the number, or just the features, where are we supposed to go? Metacritic, IGN, Gamespot? It’s not like we have alternatives for what we’re looking for.
May 13, 2015 | 8:33 PM Reply
Nettacki
Polygon actually spent the majority of the review focusing on stuff other than the way it portrays gender and race. It was really only the last few paragraphs that talked about it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:52 PM Reply
Symphony Man
Symphony Man
Assistant to the Community Overlord
I’m almost positive he’s being sarcastic.
May 13, 2015 | 9:33 PM Reply
DodoEgg
DodoEgg
8/10 from Polygon on a game they consider sexist, the conversion to actual video game score without social commentary translates to 12/10, so I’ll definitely be getting it.
May 13, 2015 | 8:36 PM Reply
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
This whole complaining about sexism and racism in games that take place somewhere based on an era known for racism and sexism is getting really annoying.
May 13, 2015 | 8:39 PM Reply
Kirielson
Kirielson
Moderator, Polygon
Why?
May 13, 2015 | 8:54 PM Reply
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
Xaoc_Kanadskiy
Because if we keep changing everything controversial politically or culturally in games, then they’ll just end up devoid of personality or identity and feel the same as any other game.
If you removed everything controversial about GTA 5, you’d have a very tame, average game.
I’m all for equal rights or whatever, but I’d be even more for a game that switches the roles around. It might even be more entertaining.
May 13, 2015 | 10:26 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
What has been removed from GTAV? What has been removed from The Witcher 3?
Also, do we include in this, changes like Mass Effect 3’s ending?
May 13, 2015 | 10:29 PM Reply
DisgruntledGoat
DisgruntledGoat
The whole "two swords" thing drives me crazy.
It makes zero sense that the finely crafted sword I was just using to cut a griffin in half turns into a wet noodle when I try to use it on a human bandit.
May 13, 2015 | 8:40 PM Reply
Tom Nerva
Tom Nerva
I thought we were able to kill humans with the silver sword in TW2, it just wasn’t as effective as the steel sword. However, I could be wrong since it’s been awhile since I’ve last played TW2. Either way, I can see how it’s annoying. But to be fair, they did have to implement some way of forcing us to use different swords on different enemies for the sake of keeping true to the books.
May 13, 2015 | 9:30 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Are you sure about that? Pretty sure it killed enemies in TW2, and I expect it will in TW3.
The logic is from the books, and the logic seemed to me that Silver was effective against monsters. Using swords, in real life, degrades the sharpness…So, the sense of it seemed to be to not degrade the Silver, and more expensive sword, used for monsters by using it against humans when you can use a cheaper, and less degradable, sword against them. So, if you think about it, it would make sense in trying to save that Silver sword for things like Trolls and Vampires.
Also, it does look pretty cool. Witcher have the strength to carry it around, so there’s no problem with pulling your back muscles either.
May 13, 2015 | 9:35 PM Reply
GunFlame
GunFlame
In TW2, it does, but it’s not that effective. So I expect that’d be the case with 3.
May 13, 2015 | 9:43 PM Reply
derek tomek
derek tomek
Well, silver isn’t the most durable metal to be using to cleave through armor. Apparently it’s pretty top notch for the supernatural though. Plus, it looks cool and sticks to the source. So there’s that too.
May 13, 2015 | 9:49 PM Reply
TheAshenVictor
As somehow who hasn’t had the oppurtunity to play any of the previous witcher games I’d like to know if there’s some sort of prelude allowing you to influence or gain understanding of earlier events? I thought I heard rumors about a feature like that for ps4 players. If it’s mentioned in the text I apologize, I skimmed some sections because I didn’t want spoilers.
Nice review anyway, looking forward to this game.
May 13, 2015 | 8:44 PM Reply
Sabre IS Sabre
Sabre IS Sabre
YES!
Many of the key scenes from the first games are expertly summarizes as you go through The Witcher 3. Also, some of the key decisions can be made by choosing "how you acted" while telling the story (I think only if it doesn’t find a game file with those decisions).
May 13, 2015 | 8:49 PM Reply
TheAshenVictor
Thanks, that sounds great :blush:
May 13, 2015 | 9:14 PM Reply
AvianIsTheTerm
Of course people are going to be up in arms about the sexism stuff, as usual. Sigh.
Reviews are ultimately an opinion, and clearly Arthur is of the opinion that the way the setting treats women and POCs detracted from the experience. I don’t really agree, but I think it’s patently ridiculous to go around complaining about how TW3 was robbed of its ‘rightful’ score based on teh political correctness. Reviews are opinion, and I mean he gave the game an 8/10; that’s a damn good score.
As to the actual content, I’m not sure I agree totally. I don’t agree on the count of there being a lack of people of colour. CDPR are creating a game within an existing world where racial characteristics are mostly of the height and ear-pointiness variety. The criticism that it doesn’t reflect real world diversity is fair, but it’s not something that in my opinion is cause for alarm.
On the treatment of women I’m more ambivalent. I feel like there is a place for creating a world that is oppressive; as a ‘gritty low fantasy’ that trope is a core part of The Witcher’s DNA. However, I do feel like the series does often give female characters (who are not poorly written or ‘damseled’ by any means) outfits that are over-sexualised, and in the past games there were times where I felt portrayal of sexuality and of violence strayed into the gratuitous.
My views don’t make Arthur’s criticisms ‘wrong’, because once again, reviews are opinion, and art is subjective. I do feel like it’s a point worth discussing, and I don’t like that so many in the wider gaming community have the paranoid fear that if we start talking about issues of diversity, we’re going to end up with an authoritarian politically correct police state.
May 13, 2015 | 8:51 PM Reply
Nettacki
Whether we agree with his assessments or not is kinda moot at this point, because from what I can tell, no one except some reviewers has played the game yet. So maybe in a week or so many other people will be able to give their takes on it and decide for themselves if it’s sexist or not.
May 13, 2015 | 8:55 PM Reply
AvianIsTheTerm
That is true; as I obviously haven’t played the game yet I can’t comment on specific situations in it. All I can go off is a combination of PR material, the reviews, and my experiences in the rest of the series.
May 13, 2015 | 9:56 PM Reply
Vesuvium
Vesuvium
I generally applaud Polygon’s reviewers for calling games out for sexist bullshit, but in this case… I’m a bit confused. Look at these quotes:
"CD Projekt has done work to make for more interesting, influential women that feel just a bit more fleshed out than they’ve been previously. This includes a number of powerful women with complicated motivations and goals of their own."
"That said, the world CD Projekt has created is oppressively misogynist. In some ways, the game deals directly with this — characters acknowledge again and again that it’s hard to be a woman there, that it’s a place of violence and terror and that women must work harder to be recognized and respected."
To me they imply that this game takes place in a terrible world, but the storytelling itself treats women well: as real characters, that exist on their own merits. It sounds like the game hasn’t internalized misogyny or sexual violence, although it does depict characters that have. That almost sounds laudable to me. Approaching the subject of sexism without endorsing is often worthwhile, and not something we should be condemning. The ability to portray a subject like this is a necessary and powerful artistic tool.
So I have the following question for the reviewer:
Are those two quotes misleading? Or is my interpretation of your words – that any portrayal of misogyny is inherently bad – accurate? Or somewhere in between?
I am not trying to attack the review or the score; just trying to understand where the reviewer draws the line, and why. Does he want a completely sanitized industry, or do those quotes simply misrepresent the quality of the depiction of female characters?
May 13, 2015 | 8:53 PM Reply
AvianIsTheTerm
I think the key issue here is that the line between depicting an oppressive world and ‘internalising’ that oppression (for lack of a better word) is blurred and ultimately pretty subjective.
From past games, at least, I do think the Witcher does try to depict that world moreso than accept that world – clearly racial and sexual issues are in there on purpose a lot of the time. Does it always succeed? Probably not, but that’s a subjective thing and personally I find it’s usually thoughtfully written enough to work for me.
May 13, 2015 | 9:59 PM Reply
Symphony Man
Symphony Man
Assistant to the Community Overlord
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May 13, 2015 | 9:00 PM Reply
vorazan
Was anyone actually looking to Witcher, of all games, to be a shining beacon of feminism?
You collected explicit nude cards of chicks you slept with in the first game, for pete’s sake. And by lord, you had more cards at the end of the game than Yugioh.
May 13, 2015 | 9:03 PM Reply
Nettacki
No, but they did expect some degree of improvement in the way female characters are portrayed compared to the last. And the game series had a bit of a history with slowly improving the way they’re portrayed, like how 2 dropped the sex card thing and had far fewer sexual encounters, yet whatever was there actually managed to be a bit more meaningful than the predecessor.
And speaking of improvement, they did mention that they have "done work to make for more interesting, influential women that feel just a bit more fleshed out than they’ve been previously. This includes a number of powerful women with complicated motivations and goals of their own."
May 13, 2015 | 9:13 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
I expected it because books on which the game is based are quite feminist.
May 13, 2015 | 9:20 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
True, but misogyny is a theme that is also covered in the novels. There’s a lot of dark issues about the treatment of women by a patriarchal-monarchy society covered in those books, as is in the games.
May 13, 2015 | 9:25 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
Sure, but for example in Witcher 2 I have this notion that women were treated more badly than men. For example Triss was kidnapped and held like some damsel in distress waiting for Geralt to save her. This would never happen in novels, where character like Triss would always act independently, trying to get out of this situation on her own. Or that mother in the first act, which was murdered just for the sake of depicting the darkness of the world. But yes, I generally agree that this, what is described in the review, could be easily another hysteria caused by hypersensitive american media.
May 13, 2015 | 9:36 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
She wasn’t really a damsel in distress when you saw the outcome of not saving her at the end, though. I think the brunt of her kidnapping wasn’t as bad as the trope because she was ultimately kidnapped by another female character.
I don’t remember the mother from the first act. I do remember a female Elf being accused by soldiers, though. I thought that was a great subversion of female damsels in distress tropes in games, by actually showing she had been the perpetrator. It played into the subverting that trope in games nicely, I thought.
I do think that there’s a general case of misunderstanding whenever any subject matter is covered in storytelling. I’ve seen too many times that just because a film, for example 12 Years A Slave, covers a subject matter…that it makes it a proponent in that subject matter, which isn’t true- but it’s believe by people. I think mileage varies on these things and what you’re comfortable with.
May 13, 2015 | 9:47 PM Reply
OmarTheBest
OmarTheBest
This diversity is actually mostly post-colonial. Before that Europe was much more homogeneous, with people of color living mostly in harbors in Spain and Greece. Middle Europe was actually 99,9% white. In the books there isn’t much describing of ethnicity, so it is hard to say whether there were some poc, however considering the fact that the world depicted in the books and games was based on medieval North and Central Europe where population was almost only white, it is quite obvious why CD Project do it this way. And this arise another question which people don’t usually see. If you add some poc to the game, how the rest of the inhabitants will behave toward them? Because in game like Witcher you can’t just reskin them and check the box on the list of inclusiveness. To stay true to the realistic depiction of the world there will be racism and xenophobia among white majority, another thing you need to handle somehow. However I still thing those are American measures applied on the Eastern European game. You shall respect the culture from which the game is coming from. I would wonder whether you would criticize game from Ghana to have no white people at all or game from India to have only Indian people in it.
May 13, 2015 | 9:17 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Context matters, and I would have wished that Arthur had provided some in mentioning the lack of people of color in the game. I wasn’t sure, too, about Arthur’s view on the game covering misogyny therefore made the game misogynistic? I don’t know, seemed like it could go either way.
The review made for an interesting read, though.
May 13, 2015 | 9:21 PM Reply
ApeinaSuite
ApeinaSuite
Meanwhile on Game of Thrones…the crowd is loving it!
May 13, 2015 | 9:22 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Well, to be fair, I have seen the same critiques leveled against Game of Thrones/ A Song of Ice and Fire as well. Pushback on it is constant, though.
May 13, 2015 | 9:50 PM Reply
Dragon Mage Drake
Dragon Mage Drake
Game of Thrones has some of the same problems, but there is a fair bit of male D&A so it is closer to equality in sexualisation than other shows/films. A fair way to go still though…
May 13, 2015 | 9:53 PM Reply
scrumtrelescent7
Cersei, Dani, Arya, Sansa, Melisandre, Shireen, Olenna, Margeary, Ellaria Sand…
They’re doing fine for strong, well-developed female characters.
And that’s just the ones who are alive!
And there isn’t nearly as much gratuitous nudity as the first two seasons. I can’t actually think of any so far in season 5.
May 13, 2015 | 10:09 PM Reply
althaz
Don’t think you can label Shireen as strong (same goes for Sansa) or Olenna or Ellaria as well-developed, but your point still stands. The show and books have strong female characters, even though they live in an extremely sexist world.
May 13, 2015 | 10:46 PM Reply
Dragon Mage Drake
Dragon Mage Drake
I was worried about the way the game would treat women after seeing a few demos of the game over the last year or two where the devs made jokes about how there are lots of naked women to look at… It seems those worries were valid. Alas! As the books do not treat women in that way at all. If Geralt’s sexuality was portrayed as it was in the books, or like BJB’s in the new Wolfenstein, it would have been praised heavily for it. As mature representations of sexuality are needed in games, as opposed to the more immature/misogynist sexuality that is in most games.
On the race issue I am not that worried. Race is represented by Dwarves and Elves in this universe. Which is based on a medieval Europe. Though that same argument can be made on the sexism front as well so I can see if it will be a problem for some people.
I do think I will really enjoy this game though. Challenging DS style combat, that is a bit faster, with a lot of hunting and looting, with funny and intelligent characters, story, and lore, in a beautifully rendered fantasy open world. Almost my dream game right there. I can’t wait to play it.
Good review Arthur. Your sacrifice is appreciated.
May 13, 2015 | 10:03 PM Reply
Firecracker22
Firecracker22
Geralt’s sexuality…? He’s pretty faithful to his novel counterpart.
The games are very faithful to the books, really. That’s undisputed. I think mileage varies on nudity and sex, as has been the case with the books themselves.
And, hey it’s Poland. They are not nearly as conservative about sex and nudity over in Europe as we are here in the U.S. There’s still alot of conservatism here in the U.S. over that stuff.
May 13, 2015 | 10:20 PM Reply
althaz
One thing I didn’t see mentioned, was the quality of the writing?
One thing that’s stopped me getting really into the last two Witcher games, despite seemingly being aimed right at a me-like audience is the extremely poor writing. Generally, the plot itself has been solid at worst and fantastic at best. The world is positively fascinating…but the writing and to a lesser extent the voice-acting have really let the last couple of games down.
They are obviously better executed than something like The Elder Scrolls games, but worlds behind Bioware’s RPGs (the pinnacle of writing in games, IMO).
Sadly the gameplay hasn’t been enough to keep be engaged enough to make it to the end of the game enjoyably (unlike The Elder Scrolls games) which means I’ve got one finished playthrough of the last two games from dozens of attempts.
If the writing is better or the gameplay is stellar (the quality of which isn’t discussed much either), I’ll give this a go…otherwise I’ll wait for the bargain bin sale on Steam and probably give up halfway through again.
May 13, 2015 | 10:43 PM Reply
NotLordAtkin
I’ve seen many people criticise the mature themes of this series in particular in that it tries a bit too hard with needless shock-value violence and rampant misogyny and… for the most part, they are right. I can see where arthur is coming from when he criticises the treatment of female characters.
That said, Sapkowski was kind of a lot worse. I suppose it would be hard to make the game respectful if you’re basing it on the work of a misogynist drunk while also trying to stay true to the source material.
I have to say, while I can’t get enough of the world and the characters, I hated the writing style of the Witcher books. More often than not, Sapkowski went for shock value with all the gore and blood and tits, mostly in places where it served no purpose other than being there. His writing is incredibly childish. I actually feel that CD Projekt has done a very good job of handling the world better than Sapkowski himself ever did.
I suppose this raises an interesting issue for debate. Can poor handling of female characters be excused in a game based of a book that does the same thing? Is misogyny ok if it is an integral part of the world that has existed in fiction for decades and the game at least tries to be self aware about it? Is inclusivity more important than respecting the surce material, and by the same token, does criticism of the original work carry over to the adaptation? Should CD project even be criticised for world building decisions that ultimately weren’t theirs? If so, would it have been better if they changed the world to be more inclusive and at the same time diverted from the source material they are building on?
Anyone?
Immortal
Arcane
Reading.. Reading... Reading..
Discussions on Open world trends, discussion on ratings..
and then
Only a matter of time. Always one to shit in the pot.. Time to get the popcorn and watch the pile up.
INB4 Merging this to SJW thread.
EDIT:
No Seriously, which one of you was it?
Hegel
Arcane
- Joined
- May 12, 2009
- Messages
- 3,274
Those people are retarded. You can check CDP's resources on their site, their stock is listed. Had they required more resources then they could have raised some by issuing a bond (they possess a decent credit rating), that would have been the most sensible choice as interest rates are at a record low. But that's a pointless argument anyway, they could have used preorders money, they could have seeked a private investor for another round of financing, they could have issued more shares, the founders could have pledged some of their stocks in a secured loan. By the way, shares are up by 20%.
Last edited:
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I was here to seriously bitch about CDP's dishonesty.
I read the quote of that retarded SJW-review.
Now I'm here to stand by CDPR, no matter what it takes! Shut up and take my money!
Thank you Polygon.
I read the quote of that retarded SJW-review.
Now I'm here to stand by CDPR, no matter what it takes! Shut up and take my money!
Thank you Polygon.
Comrade Goby
Magister
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2011
- Messages
- 1,236
CDPJ is just 10 polish guys in a shack. Eastern Europeans are all barbarians who believe in things like national heritage and don't love immigration
How civilized a people can they really be? They need more cultural diversity then they can be true savants of gaming like Bioware
So many graphic whores on Codex 
; as For Kommissars he is glad His old looted SS 20 launch console will be able to run it. 
; as For Kommissars he is glad His old looted SS 20 launch console will be able to run it. 
Watches Twitch during lunch hour...
PS4 Stream... http://www.twitch.tv/hamoood909
Corvus: that loading time
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RK47: fuck sake
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Corvus: you'd think after 4 iterations sony could improve that
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PS4 Stream... http://www.twitch.tv/hamoood909
Corvus: that loading time
Corvus: some things never change for playstation
RK47: fuck sake
RK47: the loading time
RK47: HAHAHAHA
RK47: i can make coffee by now
RK47: fuck
RK47: brb
Corvus: you'd think after 4 iterations sony could improve that
Corvus: or maybe I haven't played consoles in so long they're all like that
RK47: ok im back
RK47: AHAHAHAHHAHA
RK47: WHAT
RK47: THE
RK47: FUCK
Corvus: amazing
Corvus: i'm gonna get a twix
fizzelopeguss
Arcane
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