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The team felt it missed the huge freedom of open-world games like Skyrim
Proper mounted combat still being tested
Currently not a definite part of the game
Horses will be in, though, since they’re important for navigation
Ships float on the water in true physics interactions
Team has doubled in size
No chapters, acts, or any artificial break-points
Geralt can seamlessly cross from one end of the world to the other thanks to REDengine 3
No loading screens while traveling in the open world
Can explore on foot, by horseback, and via boat
Pursue yor long-lost love, play the game of empires on behalf of the northern kingdoms that still claim independence, and thwart the nefarious Wild Hunt
Fast travel: instantly revisit any discovered location
Director Konrad Tomaszkiewicz: “A huge goal is to keep the high quality o four quests, with all the cinematics and impressive events and moments.”
Point of interest will always be in sight
Players will be beckoned to explore dank caves, embattled villages, decaying ruins, etc.
Over 100 hours of hand-scripted quests
Quests: help villagers, engineer the succession of the Skellige kings, etc.
Use monster hunting for adventure, incoming, and unique rewards
There are mini-games based on the area of the world
Ex: Skellige has knife-throwing
Gain exclusive rewards from mini-games
Don’t have to complete mini-games to proceed in the story
Monsters, bandits, traders, animals, and more will attack anyone they deem hostile
Enemies don’t scale to the player’s level
Slaying monsters, fighting hostile humans in the different forms they come in, collecting items, leveling up are in the game
World 40 times larger than the last game
Three different aspects to narration
Lowest level: free-form activities like monster hunting, crafting, individual standalone quests
Second step: political situation and Nilfgaardian invasion is resolved through the core plotline of the major areas (Skellige, Novigrad, No Man’s Land)
Each land has its own storyline
Can abandon the storyline, but will have repercussions later
Not doing a plotline is a choice the player has
Main narrative: search for Geralt’s loved ones and conflict with the Wild Hunt
Multiple branches of narratives that feed into each other
Don’t have to do anything outside the main storyline to beat the game
Could have help in a main-line encounter from an ally you gained in the Skellige archipelago if you’ve completed certain quests in certain ways
Major events in the main storyline are “gates” for the state of the world
Ex: village threatened by bandits might be abandoned after certain events if the player doesn’t help
Weather effects are dynamically generated and fully modeled as real volumetric clouds rather than being simply painted on the skybox
In contrast to the last game, Geralt encounters communities and individuals with monster-related problems that need solving
There aren’t contract-like assignments this time
Press the left trigger to turn on Geralt’s witcher senses
Can glean information from a crime scene upon discovering it
Within range of a scene of interest, the mechanic conveys clues to the player through the witcher muttering to himself and/or visual depictions of past events that represent Geralt’s reasoning
Time of day and other conditions determine where monsters appear and their abilities
Can strike critical areas in combat based on how much you learn about monster anatomy and tactics
The team is deciding between using a handful of in-combat special moves for particular attacks and a slow-motion quick-time event style
Monsters you defeat leave otherwise unobtainable alchemical and crafting ingrediants needed for making of unique items, potions, mutagens
These allow Geralt to gain special powers and upgrades in the new mutation development tree
These kills serve as the witcher’s primary method of income
Moving more toward romance and away from shallow sexual encounters
“We want to treat it maturely like we did in The Witcher 2. We are not bringing sex cards back.”
Witcher 3 doesn’t have completely different environments based on singular choices due to the open world, but there are similarly impactful decisions
You’ll be involved with mutually exclusive storylines and situations based on certain momentous choices
Won’t be on the same level as Witcher 2, however
Game mechanics based on previous games, but the team is revisiting many details
Backward difficulty curve being addressed
Rewroking the flow of combat
96 animations for Geralt’s combat moves (last game had 20)
Game has a “weighting” system for the camera to help keep the biggest threats in frame at all times
Combat system: three big changes to solve the problem of being locked into long animations
Every button prss mapped to a single strike
Each move takes a roughly equivalent time to perforom
Can always interrupt your current action to immediately dodge or block
Can block/dodge when out of stamina, but you’ll be staggered
Team wants to make the combat “more intimate”
“You don’t run – in the Witcher 2 you were running constantly. You walk, but your attacks are very fast. Your opponents also walk but they have charges and things like that.”
Geralt’s dodge roll replaced by a pivot move
It retains its defensive utility without game-breaking mobility
Attacks faster than in The Witcher 2
Enemy AI completely rebuilt
No scripted boss encounters
One boss: ice giant
Roughly a dozen types of interactive objects
Ex: Can irritate a wasp with the telekinetic Aard sign to make a damaging distraction for his foes and disperse the swarm with the fiery Igni sign once the wasp swarm becomes a problem
Magical signs are retooled
Each of the five signs has a basic form such as Igni’s new flamethrower effect
If the player advances down the magic tree as Geralt levels up, can unlock a second form of the sign
For Igni, would unlock a 360-degree blast that immolates anything close
Yrdren’s small trap can be changed into a bigger field that slows enemies
Player retains the use of the basic form
Other two trees are based on swordsmanship and alchemy
Swordfighting: can unlock new strikes and boosts such as improved stanima and parrying
Alchemy: mutation mechanic moved off to a separate development path, independent of the level-up process
Alchemy specialization is based more on potions
Improvements available for the horse and boat
These aspects are still in development
One idea: players could access their long-term storage stash from their horse as well as from inns
Team knows about frustrating inventory management in Witcher 2
Crafting still important for enhancing Geralt’s capabilities
Can customize crafted items
Some components are can be substituted for similar things
Ex: monster scales instead of leather in a piece of armor
This affects the properties of the final item
Can find unique components as part of monster hunts or questlines
Combine these with special recipes to make artifacts of immense power
Each armor piece has a unique appearance
Armor has improved presentation and new cloth simulation
Can visit a barber to change Geralt’s hairstyle
