Monday, January 4, 2016

My Game of the Year for 2015: The Witcher 3




            2015 was a great year for games, but this spring and summer I mostly sat out as I wrapped up graduate school work (while working full-time). The only 2015 game I played in the spring and summer was The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D. It is a solid remake, but a remake still. This fall I had to play catch up.
            I gave the vast majority of my gaming time to The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. It is my kind of game: open-world, CRPG, and high fantasy. I also had played and loved, both gameplay and lore, the first two Witcher titles. So I was bound to love this one (and I did).
            Before I fly full-sail into Witcher 3 praise, I’ll note the other 2015 titles I have played.
Wolfenstein: The Old Blood is a mostly solid stealth and shooter mix. I loved the humor (such as B.J.’s cheesy one-liners) and the throwbacks to Return to Castle Wolfenstein (see my “Thoughts On” post on Old Blood below). Majora’s Mask 3D is a highly enjoyable remake of a great Nintendo title, more so for me as I have always particularly loved Majora’s Mask as a unique Zelda title. Super Mario Maker is a fun, accessible level editor, and a gateway into hundreds of Super Mario levels. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is an excellent open-world game, finally allowing me to enjoy the gameplay that Metal Gear Solid has teased while crazy stories and lengthy cutscenes took the mainstage (playing MGS3, I always wanted more of that gameplay. MGSV gives it to me in spades). Next to Witcher 3, I’ve put the most time into MGSV, and would rank it second if I were to do a list.
But Witcher 3 is number one. There’s so much in this game, gameplay and story wise, that I feel overwhelmed by the prospect of writing about it as much as I did at times while playing it. (And this is ‘feeling overwhelmed’ in a good way; a very good way.) Witcher 3 has topped Skyrim as my favorite open-world RPG, and for me, those are fighting words. You just can’t have a more delicious entertainment package than what CD Projekt Red has put together here.
The gameplay can be accessible hack-and-slash or daunting CRPG. It depends on what difficulty level you choose and how much you invest in exploring the games’ alchemy, crafting, inventory and bestiary components. Tackling witcher-contract quests can be a game unto itself, if you’re playing on hard (“Blood and Broken Bones”). Killing monsters, or non-friendly humans and non-humans, requires the use of oils, potions, bombs, and signs.
An oil for each class of enemy exists. If you’re fighting a cyclops, you would use an Ogroid oil, for example; if fighting a wraith, a necrophage oil; and so on. These give your weapons a slight buff over the enemy the oil is made for. Potions can be used during the middle of a battle, though you could also use one just before. These can aid health or stamina regeneration, reduce your toxicity level, or do many other things that help in combat.
Signs are secondary magical powers that can be cast in battle. There are just five signs to use in Witcher 3. One, “Aard”, is a forceful kinetic push (think Force Push from the Jedi Knight series). Another, Axii, slows and stops an enemy, briefly. “Igni” shoots forth fire. And so on.
The short is that in combat, in addition to donning the appropriate armor and wielding the correct sword, you must make and use the appropriate oils, potions, and bombs, and cast signs to effect. Knowing which of these to use against a certain enemy can be gleaned from the game’s bestiary. Found in the game’s menu, this is an easy to navigate encyclopedia of the monsters you’ll encounter, listing their weaknesses and giving an interesting description of each. The monsters you will encounter range from standard-looking fare (“Drowners”; think amphibious humanoid monsters) to scary, mythical nightmares (“Leshens”; think ancient tree beasts with deer skulls). In all, Witcher 3’s monsters are the most memorable for me in a game to date. Griffin, cockatrice, and basilisk encounters are my most recent “wow” moments from a video game.

Aside from encountering monsters in the primary and secondary quests, you can also take them on with witcher contracts. These are notices posted for any witcher, such as Geralt, to take on a specific monster that has been terrorizing a certain person, town, or trade route. These make for some exciting monster hunting moments, and even if the game were comprised only of these I may give it game of the year. I did many a fist-pump as I brought down monsters for witcher-contracts.
            The enjoyment you get out of the combat—or, whether or not you find yourself fist-pumping like me—depends, as I noted earlier, on the difficulty level you choose and on how much you invest in the game’s combat systems. If you play on “Just the Story” difficulty, combat is easy hack-and-slash fare. I recommend you at least play on “Sword and Story” (normal). Though you may neglect oils and bombs on that difficulty, you’d still need to use potions and signs.
            So I love the gameplay. I did play it using a keyboard and mouse, too, and though it is not tailored for that setup, most of the time I was fine with it.
            I also love the story. First off, I love me some Witcher lore. If I could choose to hang out with any game characters, I’d pick slugging some mead and sharing tales with Geralt, Zoltan, Dandelion, Triss, and all the other characters you’ll become familiar with in the Witcher games. But you don’t have to be a nerd for Witcher lore like me to love the narrative in this game. The primary and secondary quests have some of the finest characters and story bits in any game yet. You’ll fall in love with a lot of the characters, and enjoy much adventure, romance, and horror all the while. I won’t spoil anything here, but suffice it to say, do not just follow the main quest. Dive into secondary quests as well; there is high quality stuff there.

            The visuals are phenomenal. I played on a PC with, on average, medium settings, and even still, Witcher 3 is the prettiest game I’ve seen. If you love high fantasy visuals, Witcher 3 has you covered. The game’s world is huge and has distinct environments throughout, such as a swampland and rocky, cold islands. There’s plenty of sight-seeing to do. I took screenshots galore.
The soundtrack is beautiful, too. It’s among the best in any role-playing game.
A large world, great characters, great visuals, beautiful soundtrack, and solid gameplay make for my game of the year in 2015. Congrats CD Projekt and Witcher 3! You definitely earned it.



~My impressions of Metal Gear Solid V
            I noted above that, were I to make a list of my top games from 2015, MGSV would rank second. It’s open-world, a trait that always draws me in, and it’s stealth-based, another characteristic I will always be interested in. I’m not a Metal Gear fanatic, but I do like the series. So, like Witcher 3, I was bound to love this game from the outset.
I have not completed MGSV, nor have I gotten deep into it. I didn’t get around to it until this past December. I have played a chunk of it, and love running around, coming upon bases, scoping them out with my binoculars, sneaking in and nabbing loot, popping off head shots with the tranquilizer gun in reflex mode when I get caught, tying hot air balloons to things, riding around on my horse, upgrading items as needed, and, recently, having my dog with me to help mark enemies, plants, and animals. 

I also really loved encountering a bear, tranquilizing it and tying a hot air balloon to it, and finally hearing its bear howl as it shot up into the air. Not that I would do this in real life—I mean, I would never tie a hot air balloon to anything in real life, much less a bear—but suddenly, first of all, seeing a bear in this game, and, then, being able to do to it what I had been doing to dudes, was satisfying. This conveys, in microcosm, what makes open-ended games like MGSV great—chance discovery. I know I can stun and hot-air-balloon soldiers, but then I find a bear—and lo, I can do this to the bear as well.

Bears aside, freedom of movement coupled with MGS’ stealth-action gameplay is just shy of a dream come true. This coupling isn’t an endless well of joy. I’m a sneak-only guy (unless the mission calls for other items, I will only use the tranquilizer gun, and that sparingly). Sometimes the base-after-base gameplay can tire me. (I never tired of Witcher 3, for comparison. I wish there had been more witcher contracts and secondary quests.) And, being a rabid consumer of fan creations from the Thief community at TTLG.com, I’m used to great open-ended stealth experiences, so I’m a bit more blasé with MGSV than the non-Thief fan-mission connoisseur would be. Still, I haven’t dug deep into MGSV, so maybe I’ll uncover plenty of new things that will change my mind on it. My final verdict, then, will be in my review of it, when I’ve played much more of it.

But it’s good enough that it’s my second favorite game of 2015.

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