GB Feature: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Review

Having given CD Projekt RED’s The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt our full attention over the past few weeks, we felt it was time to finally wrangle up a full six-page review of the highly anticipated RPG. Here’s a little something on quest design:

Quests in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt are divided in a few categories. Main quests are related to the main story and necessary for its advancement. Secondary quests are quests that might or might not be related to the main story, but that aren’t necessary for completing the game (quests linked to important NPCs are part of this category, but so are quests that are completely unrelated to the story). Witcher contracts are paid contracts on particularly strong monsters. There are also some treasure hunts, which I don’t think I need to explain.

The main and secondary quests in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt are designed in more or less the same way quests were designed in The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. That’s to say that the quests excel at framing, pacing and very often offer interesting choices. Quests usually involve simple detective work and some combat, but often also make use of the game’s side activities. They do, however, lack opportunities for the players to really feel clever and approach objectives in a non-obvious way.