Welcome to my Gaming Blog, special mentions go to Dave Wyatt, Kyle Barratt and Lee ‘Jimmy’ Chesnalavage for helping with the name and of course to Ross Miller for hosting and setting it up! I hope you all enjoy! Constructive criticism, sarcastic comments and praise are all welcome!
SPOILER ALERT FOR THE WITCHER 3 AND DRAGON AGE: INQUISITION
I want to start off by saying I love these games, I’ve spent roughly 100 hours playing each of them. They are Masterpieces of gaming on so many levels but for me, Dragon Age still comes out on top… just. My personal score for Dragon Age is 9.9 and I’d give The Witcher 3 a 9.7. Masterpieces but not quite perfect.
Both have a few problems here and there but they are very different ones.
In Dragon Age the 2 problems I had are fairly minor and I’m sure one of them isn’t even the devlopers fault but still worth mentioning. The first problem is the ridiculous design of the hair… I mean it’s utterly stupid to look at, I spent a good 15 minutes laughing at the character building screen while I searched through all the moustache and beard combos etc. The second thing is the required internet connection for single player… I bought a PS4 over an Xbone partly because of that argument and then EA went and caused immense frustration for me. When PSN went down during the DDoS attack over Christmas I was locked out of the best game I’d ever played for days… I doubt very much Bioware decided to do that themselves but it still annoys me.
Now the Witcher 3 does not suffer from either of these problems, but it does have 1 much more fundamental one that I found myself grappling with throughout my time playing so far and that’s how the Main story quests and side quests interact. They don’t compliment one another very well, the main story revolves around Geralts need to find his adoptive daughter Ciri and save her from The Wild Hunt. The main story tries to create a sense of urgency and almost frantic search while you play catch up, she’s always so close and yet so far. And every single side quest is a distraction you feel like you shouldn’t be able to afford because time is of the essence.
Now would be a good time for me to explain that I do not have a problem with any of the quests in themselves, I enjoyed all of them they may be basically the same monster hunting or fetch quests which was mentioned as a minor complaint in the IGN review but they are well designed and distinct enough to be rewarding and enjoyable in their own right.
But when I compare that to Dragon Age, the initial act of the story is to stop the breach which is fairly linear and focused… then the game opens out into the building of the Inquisition and making a difference in a world facing catastrophe, on several occasions I set out with my team to an area with a mission to complete and only 10 hours later realised I still hadn’t actually done that task and yet my time was not wasted, as Inquisitor I was closing the rips in the fade, killing monsters, feeding villagers and making the Inquisition a force to be reckoned with that could not be ignored.
The point of all this is that, Dragon Age: Inquisition is a brilliant example of how to tie the main story and side quests together in a massive RPG game. An example I wish The Witcher had followed in its own way maybe they could have found a way to facilitate the side quests without it feeling like someone had pulled the handbrake on your car while your driving along the motorway.
Now while I start my second play through of the Witcher 3 I’ll be thinking about how amazing the world is and now that I know the story I can go back and do all the side stories and visit all the places I missed out last time while in search of the stories end. And I’ll be looking forward to returning to the DLC soon and waiting for the Expansions to arrive… needless to say Witcher Geralts story is only beginning.
Let me know what you think; agree, disagree, tell me if I’m playing the games wrong or if you simply think I’m an idiot haha. I’m looking forward to it.
Thanks for reading my blog, my name is Adam Thomas.
And…
DUCKHUNT!
