How The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt changes open worlds forever

Gaming Trend Editor in Chief Ron Burke takes a deeper look at The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt's open world, and the implication that it has on other open world titles in this Editorial.

[BigBosss]

Game is going to be fantastic!

[starchild]

Yeah, and this was a nice article.

[Palitera]

The whole article in one word: choices.

And it is not related at all to "open world". Much more to RPGs. Which will not change that much, since choices have been here for a long time, specially on Bethesda games.

I agree that CDPR does it right, but you can't say it is new.

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PS: House interiors without loading is not even relevant enough to be addressed in a comment.

[Knightshade]

I'd say it's new as no other (other than maybe the Gothic series) open world game has this level of depth. Most open world games have an incredible amount of mindless repetition.

[Kane22]

this game better be freaking good with all this hype its getting.

[thekhurg]

Blame the websites if it doesn't live up to your expectations. CDPR have been very transparent about their game, websites are the ones billing it as the greatest game ever.

[Knightshade]

Lol. It's true - we are very aboard the hype train. :)

[Kane22]

it has nothing to do with me. im just tired of seeing these damn articles or headlines making it seem like this the second coming of jesus or something like it.

[nveenio]

I have been very interested in this game's world but have never played a Witcher game before. So I started playing The Witcher 2 and was immediately put off by three things.

First, the combat is not very fluid. It is hard to get properly "aimed" at enemies until you develop a skill around the clunky mechanic. I hope 3 improves on this.

Second, picking up items is hit and miss, with the game never quite knowing what it is you're after, especially in narrow halls with torches on the walls. This is another spotty mechanic that could have used some polish.

Finally, cut scenes and dialog are long and boring, with the characters standing in a semicircle for half an hour it seems. Hopefully number three adds a little character and camera movement to these so that I'm not bored.

As it is, I'm just holding off on The Witcher 3 so that I can see how these things are handled. If it's more of the same, then the game isn't for me. That doesn't mean it's not a great game, just that I like things to be a little better paced and fluid due to personal preference.

[starchild]

Ignore the hype for this game and any other game. Make up your own mind.

Every big game gets a bunch of articles written about them. Just ignore them if it bothers you.

[pivotplease]

I'm following the logic that this game does most things better than DA:I, which won numerous GoTY awards. It was a mediocre year for gaming but still... sometimes you have to use faulty logic to have hope. I think I'm on the hype train. Let's see if it crashes, keeps rolling or gets Spider-Man 2'd.

[Kingscorpion71]

Taking a vacation just to play this game!! ☺

[BigGamersSmallTalk]

Played through The Witcher 2 on Xbox 360 again just in time for this. Have had it pre-loaded on my Xbox One forever! May 19th needs to get here already! Been dying to play a new RPG since I beat Dragon Age Inquisition twice already.

[Clown_Syndr0me]

Bit off topic but does DA:I get better?
I mean I've had it since just after release but only done the hinterlands, im a completionist so I did all the side quests there, but was left feeling bored and unaccomplished so I never went back to the game.
I absolutely loved origins.

[ArchangelMike]

Yeah, if you just focus on the story it does get better. You don't need to get bogged down with the side quests, they're just rinse repeat fetch quests.

[BigGamersSmallTalk]

The Hinterlands are boring. The game gets much, much better if you can tough out those side quests and level up quests.

[MrCherry]

Im hopeing this lives up to the hype, but when I close my eyes and all I see is GOTY lol.

[kingeliran]

i have no doubt this will be the best open world RPG game ever made.

after this, those games got ALLOT to prove:

Fallout 4
Mass effect 4
Deus Ex: mankind divided

and since E3 is a month after the witcher 3 release, people will still be playing the witcher while those games gets offically revealed, so they got do some mind blowing things to impress gamers :)

[Kane22]

how about you play the game first before making that kind of statement....

[Dawknight316]

GTA 6

[stormswrath]

Deus ex human revolution wasn't really open world to me. I hope the new one is.

[DARK_FOX]

THIS WILL BE THE BEST GAME EVER.

[Nerdmaster]

The game is looking good. But so did the first two games, and I didn't like any of them. So I'll wait for a big price drop before I decide to buy it.

[Knightshade]

I'll certainly agree that 1 and 2 were both rife with some issues. Witcher 1 with "you can't rest until you find a fire" stuff, and the super-constricted world of Witcher 2 were problematic. This looks like they've taken, at least, both of those shackles off. I've got high hopes for the parts of the game we've not seen yet...

[goldwyncq]

Will I be able to understand the story without playing the first two games?

[feraldrgn]

A question for anyone in the know, is there a lock-on for combat?

[feraldrgn]

A disagree for asking a question is less helpful than trying to answer the question you know.

[dota2champion]

"There's no going back... You've changed things... forever!"

[Tex117]

The hype for this game is getting a little out of hand. I hope it lives up to it.

They keep touting that the world is huge. And thats great, but they not only have to give us something to do in that world, they have to show us that what we are doing is changing things.

They say they have accomplished that...But that IMO is where Witcher 3 will be a "really great open world RPG" to "This is now the gold standard in which all open world games are compared."

(Strangely, the amount of freedom of choice and effecting of the world was stronger in older games...ie Ultima...having done almost everything we talk about as revolutionary before...Morrowind...Daggerfal l).