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The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - CDPR on open world gaming, and comparing to Skyrim

injurai

Banned
If The Witcher 2 is of any indication, armor and weapon design should be the last concerns in this sequel.
The previous chapter is just *unmatched* in that sense.

No, I agree. They have handled medieval weapons than anyone else IMO. I'm more contrasting the issues that exist in the TES series.

Bethesda needs to completely redefine what it means to be a TES game like they did with Morrowind. They have become too comfortable with mechanics and design choice that are feeling really dated and unrealistic.
 

Stark

Banned
I'm trying to temper my expectations on just how open the world. I've learned that there are big differences between the Bethesda open world games and every other developer's open world game.

Still, I'm liking what I'm reading here.

In the sense that other developer open world games are much better than Bethesda's? then I agree.
 

Sentenza

Member
Funny, for me, Bethesda makes the worst open world RPGs. I hope CDPR follows Pirhana Bytes and does the following:

- No quest markers, the world building should be distinguishable enough for the player to the point where NPCs can give a description to the player of where to go and the player can explore on his own without having to follow a marker. The player should be able to buy maps and guide himself in the world with landmarks and sign posts.

- Improve the atrocious UI of the witcher 2. I think Witcher 1 had a great UI they should either revert back to that or make it even simpler, like Gothic 2 for example.

- No random loot, everything should be hand placed.

- No level scaling, already confirmed.

- Ability to scale the world vertically, similar to gothic 2 or thief. Climbing is always a fun way to find hidden locations.

- Improved combat system with no button mashing.

- Skills should be unique and never percentage increases; Sneak, Back stab, evading roll, sign upgrade that changes the behavior of a sign are good examples. Bad examples: 10% increase to weapon damage, 50% chance increase to lockpick a chest, 20% to block more damage.

You will notice that all the above points are either missing from Bethesda rpgs or in the case of the bad examples, all are present.
I like your way of thinking.
 

GreekWolf

Member
Sadly, they've been studying the wrong Bethesda games. If they're truly interested in creating a memorable open-word RPG, they need to lock themselves in a room with Morrowind for a year or two.
 

Complistic

Member
I'm so happy to hear they really know what's wrong with the games they want to be like.

Though I'll say it now, people are going to be pissed if they remove the map markers. Most everyone wants someone to hold their hands on their way through a game.
 

FACE

Banned
Funny, for me, Bethesda makes the worst open world RPGs. I hope CDPR follows Pirhana Bytes and does the following:

- No quest markers, the world building should be distinguishable enough for the player to the point where NPCs can give a description to the player of where to go and the player can explore on his own without having to follow a marker. The player should be able to buy maps and guide himself in the world with landmarks and sign posts.

- Improve the atrocious UI of the witcher 2. I think Witcher 1 had a great UI they should either revert back to that or make it even simpler, like Gothic 2 for example.

- No random loot, everything should be hand placed.

- No level scaling, already confirmed.

- Ability to scale the world vertically, similar to gothic 2 or thief. Climbing is always a fun way to find hidden locations.

- Improved combat system with no button mashing.

- Skills should be unique and never percentage increases; Sneak, Back stab, evading roll, sign upgrade that changes the behavior of a sign are good examples. Bad examples: 10% increase to weapon damage, 50% chance increase to lockpick a chest, 20% to block more damage.

You will notice that all the above points are either missing from Bethesda rpgs or in the case of the bad examples, all are present.

Damn good stuff.
 

Derrick01

Banned
Funny, for me, Bethesda makes the worst open world RPGs. I hope CDPR follows Pirhana Bytes and does the following:

- No quest markers, the world building should be distinguishable enough for the player to the point where NPCs can give a description to the player of where to go and the player can explore on his own without having to follow a marker. The player should be able to buy maps and guide himself in the world with landmarks and sign posts.

- Improve the atrocious UI of the witcher 2. I think Witcher 1 had a great UI they should either revert back to that or make it even simpler, like Gothic 2 for example.

- No random loot, everything should be hand placed.

- No level scaling, already confirmed.

- Ability to scale the world vertically, similar to gothic 2 or thief. Climbing is always a fun way to find hidden locations.

- Improved combat system with no button mashing.

- Skills should be unique and never percentage increases; Sneak, Back stab, evading roll, sign upgrade that changes the behavior of a sign are good examples. Bad examples: 10% increase to weapon damage, 50% chance increase to lockpick a chest, 20% to block more damage.

You will notice that all the above points are either missing from Bethesda rpgs or in the case of the bad examples, all are present.

This person gets it.
 

Sentenza

Member
Sadly, they've been studying the wrong Bethesda games. If they're truly interested in creating a memorable open-word RPG, they need to lock themselves in a room with Morrowind for a year or two.
Fuck Morrowind, seriously.
It's every bit as bad as Skyrim gameplay-wise, and even worse at places (duller, more copy-pasted dungeons, for a start, and even more lifeless NPCs).
The only upper hand it has, in the end, is being far more original and exotic as a setting.

Do you want to "study a proper open world for a year or two"? go with Gothic 2, Risen (on a smaller scale) or any Ultima game between V and Serpent Isle.
 

cj_iwakura

Member
I think Witcher 2 already handles quests better than anyone, so to improve on that is even better.

I loathe The Elder Scrolls games. They all felt dead and uninvolved, like you're just on auto-pilot, Witcher games integrate the player.
 

injurai

Banned
I think Witcher 2 already handles quests better than anyone, so to improve on that is even better.

I loathe The Elder Scrolls games. They all felt dead and uninvolved, like you're just on auto-pilot, Witcher games integrate the player.

Well they actually did a pretty good job of bringing new quests to you at various towns that you would explore.

I would say the first 20 hours it was pretty nice. Eventually though you started to realize how similar they all were.
 

ezekial45

Banned
Wow, a lot of hate for Bethesda here. Personally, I really dig the sheer volume and how it's designed in a way that allows for people to wander around and still feel like they're getting stuff done. I haven't seen that many games match them, and most others that say they're open world end up feeling restrictive by comparison.

Funny, for me, Bethesda makes the worst open world RPGs. I hope CDPR follows Pirhana Bytes and does the following:

- No quest markers, the world building should be distinguishable enough for the player to the point where NPCs can give a description to the player of where to go and the player can explore on his own without having to follow a marker. The player should be able to buy maps and guide himself in the world with landmarks and sign posts.

- Improve the atrocious UI of the witcher 2. I think Witcher 1 had a great UI they should either revert back to that or make it even simpler, like Gothic 2 for example.

- No random loot, everything should be hand placed.

- No level scaling, already confirmed.

- Ability to scale the world vertically, similar to gothic 2 or thief. Climbing is always a fun way to find hidden locations.

- Improved combat system with no button mashing.

- Skills should be unique and never percentage increases; Sneak, Back stab, evading roll, sign upgrade that changes the behavior of a sign are good examples. Bad examples: 10% increase to weapon damage, 50% chance increase to lockpick a chest, 20% to block more damage.

You will notice that all the above points are either missing from Bethesda rpgs or in the case of the bad examples, all are present.

In those aspects, I can agree with you. Though I still think it does actual exploration very well.
 

Stark

Banned
I think Witcher 2 already handles quests better than anyone, so to improve on that is even better.

I loathe The Elder Scrolls games. They all felt dead and uninvolved, like you're just on auto-pilot, Witcher games integrate the player.

Skyrim's the one with hand crafted and random generated quests, right?

I think it was GameTrailers and what a great point if it was that the hand crafted Bethesda quests are indistinguishable from the random generated ones. Even if it was a positive remark, lol. But so true.
 

kurahador

Member
Heh...CD Projekt pretty much describe why I hate bethesda games.

I'm still in the middle of Witcher 1, if they can make that kind of characters scenario and involvement in an open world environment, Witcher 3 might be the kind of rpg I've been waiting for.
 

Sentenza

Member
Wow, a lot of hate for Bethesda here. Personally, I really dig the sheer volume and how it's designed in a way that allows for people to wander around and still feel like they're getting stuff done.
That's the thing for me: I don't feel I'm getting anything done playing any TES.
Everything is half-assed and unsatisfying.

Dungeons are just paths to follow slaying stuff; the whole ruleset is broken, unbalanced and exploitable to ridiculous degrees; the combat system is taken straight from Minecraft, level scaling and loot scaling take away any sense of progression and reward; the world looks pretty but feels dull to interact with; quests are dull and unimaginative...

I could go on for a lot more, but I don't see the point.

Though I still think it does actual exploration very well.
How? What's enjoyable about exploring in Skyrim, exactly?
Is there a moment I missed when you finally accomplish something? When you find a lost, precious treasure? When you cross some cool secret? When you fight an amazing opponent and gain access to something new? Does the terrain ever change the way you fight or navigate?
Because all the good I have to say about Skyrim's exploration is "the scenery sometimes looks very pretty", which is not exactly my idea of stunning achievement in game design.
 

Stark

Banned
Wow, a lot of hate for Bethesda here. Personally, I really dig the sheer volume and how it's designed in a way that allows for people to wander around and still feel like they're getting stuff done. I haven't seen that many games match them, and most others that say they're open world end up feeling restrictive by comparison.

Problem is, there's no point to that volume if you're going to be lazy about it. The world at times felt too static and lifeless. I thought it would be fitting if it was smaller. Variety in environments was also a big issue. Of course, I'm not expecting everything to be hand crafted, but a much better job on the dungeons and differentiating the fields and such would've been nice.
 

Deuterium

Member
My biggest problem with Skyrim was the eventual dilution of any challenge. Once your character gets so powerful that he is killing everything with little to no effort, the game loses all interest for me. And for the record, I was not intentionally exploiting the broken crafting system. I just sort of evolved into this uber powerful stealth archer.
 

Sentenza

Member
My biggest problem with Skyrim was the eventual dilution of any challenge. Once your character gets so powerful that he is killing everything with little to no effort, the game loses all interest for me. And for the record, I was not intentionally exploiting the broken crafting system. I just sort of evolved into this uber powerful stealth archer.
And i think it should be pointed that this keeps happening in every TES since Morrowind.
Even in that game once you reached level 20 or so you were a virtually immortal demigod capable of slaying entire cities (guards and major NPCs included) with little or no effort.
 

Deuterium

Member
And i think it should be pointed that this keeps happening in every TES since Morrowind.
Even in that game once you reached level 20 or so you were a virtually immortal demigod capable of slaying entire cities (guards and major NPCs included) with little or no effort.

And I don't know what the optimum solution for this problem is, except the old tried and true methods established in games like Zelda. There should be areas/regions that are so challenging, and require you to be at such a high level character, that if you try to go into these places too early, you just get your ass handed to you.

I don't think these super difficult levels should be arbitrarily closed off to your character, until he/she reaches a certain Experience Level. Rather, you should still be allowed to try to explore these regions...but if designed right, you just will not be able to make any progress and headway until you gain more experience.
 

friday

Member
I like everything those guys are saying. Their point about unmemorable characters in Skyrim was spot on. If I think back to The Witcher series and New Vegas I can remember many great characters, especially The Witcher 2. I also appreciate that they enjoyed Skyrim for the same reason I did, the sheer scale and grandeur of the world.

At some point I gotta go on media blackout on with this game. I went into The Witcher 2 knowing almost nothing besides having played the first 2 acts of the original. It blew me away.
 

Sentenza

Member
And I don't know what the optimum solution for this problem is, except the old tried and true methods established in games like Zelda. There should be areas/regions that are so challenging, and require you to be at such a high level character, that if you try to go into these places too early, you just get your ass handed to you.
Plenty of potential solutions, really.
Yours is one, another would be a skill system built around horizontal, incremental growth instead of a vertical, exponential one, like mount & Blade, where you become definitely better over time, but never to a degree where you can simply ignore an enemy hitting you with his sword.
Look at Dark Souls as another example: nothing is actually *out of reach* for a low level character, but things surely can be a lot more challenging if you don't follow the suggested order of progression.

Or you could follow Ultima's example and build your world as what I like to describe as "leopard skin model", where you can travel in relative safety across the world where there is all this "yellow fur", but then every time you try to go deeper into those "black spots" where there are dungeons or dangerous areas, things become a lot harder.
You can also have these few but huge dungeons that go deeper and deeper and you often need to retreat and go back when you're ready.

And honestly, this idea Bethesda advocate for, that "if it's an open world you need to be able to visit any area in any order and capable to deal with it just fine", it's some gigantic bullshit.
 

Perkel

Banned
Pretty sure that was confirmed to be in already, sadly.

At same time there is poll on witcher forums which states that people want fast travel but not like Skyrim. Morrowind/Witcher style is leading meaning carefuly placed portals or some other means like carriage system.
 
I guess they weren't joking about taking influence from Skyrim. I think it's great. I'm hyped for The Witcher 3, but even moreso for Cyberpunk.
 

Derrick01

Banned

Grief.exe

Member
These interviews are kind of worrying me. Objectivity Skyrim wasn't that great of a game, and could barely be called an RPG since it was so dumbed down and streamlined.

I hope they are just looking at Skyrim from an open-world perspective, but not taking too much inspiration from the title.

Funny, for me, Bethesda makes the worst open world RPGs. I hope CDPR follows Pirhana Bytes and does the following:

- No quest markers, the world building should be distinguishable enough for the player to the point where NPCs can give a description to the player of where to go and the player can explore on his own without having to follow a marker. The player should be able to buy maps and guide himself in the world with landmarks and sign posts.

- Improve the atrocious UI of the witcher 2. I think Witcher 1 had a great UI they should either revert back to that or make it even simpler, like Gothic 2 for example.

- No random loot, everything should be hand placed.

- No level scaling, already confirmed.

- Ability to scale the world vertically, similar to gothic 2 or thief. Climbing is always a fun way to find hidden locations.

- Improved combat system with no button mashing.

- Skills should be unique and never percentage increases; Sneak, Back stab, evading roll, sign upgrade that changes the behavior of a sign are good examples. Bad examples: 10% increase to weapon damage, 50% chance increase to lockpick a chest, 20% to block more damage.

You will notice that all the above points are either missing from Bethesda rpgs or in the case of the bad examples, all are present.

Good list.

Hopefully there's no fast travel.

I personally don't use fast travel in a game. I've noticed it destroys my immersion and overall enjoyment of a title.

It is a nice convenience to have in some instances though, if you have a poorly designed quest system that backtracks you across the world, then I will use fast travel.
 

JDSN

Banned
The fact that they can see what is so fundamentally bad about two of the biggest RPGs of this gen is good enough for me, I hope the world is relatively small, CDPR can make great NPCs with awesome voice acting and dialog, but theres a good chance that the quality can go down with a bigger scope.
 

Hzoltan69

Member
- No quest markers, the world building should be distinguishable enough for the player to the point where NPCs can give a description to the player of where to go and the player can explore on his own without having to follow a marker. The player should be able to buy maps and guide himself in the world with landmarks and sign posts.

This.

If in addition to that they also implemented a mapping system along the lines of Miasmata's, that would be gaming heaven for me.
 
I love SKyrim but I agree that the writing and characters were forgettable, not that previous Elder Scrolls games writing were better but still, I really hope they'll bring something special for this game.
 

Tacitus_

Member
Renting space from a horse carriage would be pretty much perfect. Gonna go vote on that option.

I don't see the point. Unfortunately they seem to have a more mainstream goal for this game and releasing on consoles around the same time. I can't see them removing fast travel for the console audience and just removing it for us or refusing to use it doesn't work. The game has to be built around no fast travel.

Well at least you can continue to bitch at everything if you don't even attempt to give feedback where it could be heard.
 

Stark

Banned
I love SKyrim but I agree that the writing and characters were forgettable, not that previous Elder Scrolls games writing were better but still, I really hope they'll bring something special for this game.

What writing and characters?
 

Derrick01

Banned
Well at least you can continue to bitch at everything if you don't even attempt to give feedback where it could be heard.

Thankfully we have at least 1 member of the team who comes here who can read all the complaints he sees. No need for me to sign up for yet another forum just to make 1 complaint that in the end likely won't matter.
 

Tacitus_

Member
That would be a completely valid statement, though.

How come? Surely you see the advantages of taking a trip where you don't have to focus on the steering. For example, working. Geralt could read monster lore, prepare potions or meditate during the trip instead of spending his attention on riding the horse.
 

Sentenza

Member
I don't see the point. .
Aren't you the annoying Negative Nancy?

P.S.
I can't see them removing fast travel for the console audience and just removing it for us or refusing to use it doesn't work. The game has to be built around no fast travel.
Did you read the thread I linked to you? At all? And I mean even just those options in the poll or the OP.
 

injurai

Banned
Thankfully we have at least 1 member of the team who comes here who can read all the complaints he sees. No need for me to sign up for yet another forum just to make 1 complaint that in the end likely won't matter.

Good. He can also see my opinion that fast travel completely breaks up and weight that traversing and exploring an open world game has.

A way point system would be okay, but it would have to be very limited.
 
No mention if how horrible the combat in Skyrim was?  Witcher 2 combat was infinitely deeper, but didn't feel a whole lot better to me in most encounters.

Other than that, their heads are definitely in the right place. Just hope they can deliver.
 

EdmondD

Member
CDPR should play the Gothic or Risen games if they want to see how to do exploration and open world gaming right. Some of my favorites games. The player is always rewarded for exploring.
At least they realize the faults of Skyrim and are trying to avoid making those same mistakes.
 

FACE

Banned
CDPR should play the Gothic or Risen games if they want to see how to do exploration and open world gaming right. Some of my favorites games. The player is always rewarded for exploring.
At least they realize the faults of Skyrim and are trying to avoid making those same mistakes.

One of the CDPR guys name-dropped Gothic 2 in one of those videos.
 

RedSwirl

Junior Member
CDPR should play the Gothic or Risen games if they want to see how to do exploration and open world gaming right. Some of my favorites games. The player is always rewarded for exploring.
At least they realize the faults of Skyrim and are trying to avoid making those same mistakes.

Didn't they namedrop Gothic in an interview or something?
 

hellclerk

Everything is tsundere to me
Funny, for me, Bethesda makes the worst open world RPGs. I hope CDPR follows Pirhana Bytes and does the following:
Alright, I get that there are some aspects to open world RPGs that people like and can identify with, but there are reasons behind all of it. Part of what make Skyrim great is how accessible it all is, how you can just hop in and save the world and don't need to understand anything before it. I'll engage this in detail and give the pros and cons to each of these.

- No quest markers, the world building should be distinguishable enough for the player to the point where NPCs can give a description to the player of where to go and the player can explore on his own without having to follow a marker. The player should be able to buy maps and guide himself in the world with landmarks and sign posts.
I don't think I've ever played a game where I HAD to follow quest markers or had the option to turn those markers off. If anything, quest markers are a powerful player tool for determining priorities and direction, and can help a player lost or a player who wants to revisit a quest he left in favor of more interesting quests get back on their feet and go where they need.

- Improve the atrocious UI of the witcher 2. I think Witcher 1 had a great UI they should either revert back to that or make it even simpler, like Gothic 2 for example.
While the UI in 2 definitely needed some streamlining, bring it back to 1's level wouldn't really fit with the kind of inventory system they put into place. In order to streamline the UI, they must also streamline the systems to a certain extent. Skyrim does this by a clean sub-menu based inventory setup. I certainly prefer the PC's SkyUI mod, but its in the same spirit.

- No random loot, everything should be hand placed.
While hand-placed loot might sometimes FEEL more personal and immersive, it also makes the world boringly predictable. Sure, having fifty iron swords of enervating which you'll never use is kind of obnoxious, but random loot also has to do with the little things: money, crafting materials, consumables, junk. By having a random loot system where hand-placed loot doesn't mean anything, you can get players the items they need in volume easily without having to regulate scarcity manually. Basically, it's easier and provides the same outcome. The issue is choosing where that random loot goes and where you handpick your loot.

- No level scaling, already confirmed.
I always hear people rag on level scaling, and I never understand it. Level scaling prevents punishing players for exploring new, mysterious areas. The previous Witcher titles managed scaling by making sure players were at a certain combat effectiveness before throwing harder creatures at them via linear story progression, but in an open world system, you don't have that ability short locking areas until you get a certain power. However, if you do that, you risk the player not ever going there again anyway. Similarly, if you make a dungeon that the player has early game access to, but is meant to be completed by late level players, they're going to give up and quit because they think the game is too hard. Level scaling allows the player to access all the content he can possibly find through exploration without punishing him for poking his nose into places the developers may not have "intended" earlier on. No matter how "unrealistic" it may be, it provides a positive outcome and enables most of the open-world aspects we take for granted in games like Skyrim.

- Ability to scale the world vertically, similar to gothic 2 or thief. Climbing is always a fun way to find hidden locations.
Yes, climbing is fun, as long as you have control over it and it's not too slow. See the Assassin's Creed climbing mechanics. There are occasionally new ways to approach and explore the same vertical thing. However, you also need good climbing mechanics to do this. Once again, see AC. The question becomes more "can the developers implement such a system in a practical and satisfying way." If the answer is no, then I would rather they do not.

- Improved combat system with no button mashing.
No matter what you do, you're going to have button mashing in games. The trick is to not make button mashing ineffective, but rather inefficient. I'd say that while you can spam attack buttons in the Witcher games and even TES, They're rarely the best way to go about combat. If you're button mashing in TW1, you're either doing it wrong or trying to dodge. If you're button mashing in TW2, then you're not getting the most you can out of your combat abilities, simple as that.

This is of course assuming you're not talking about QTEs. If it is about the QTEs, yeah, I'm with you. Fuck those things.

- Skills should be unique and never percentage increases; Sneak, Back stab, evading roll, sign upgrade that changes the behavior of a sign are good examples. Bad examples: 10% increase to weapon damage, 50% chance increase to lockpick a chest, 20% to block more damage.
While you might like the idea of having unique abilities for every skill/perk, choosing to increase the effectiveness of a skill or ability is an active effort to specialize. If you choose to use one of your finite skill points for your sword over a sign, you're making an active choice to depend on your sword more often. Certainly, all abilities should scale up with level, but you're going to focus on improving some abilities over others no matter what, so perks that improve the effectiveness of some things over others are certainly an important aspect of any RPG. Hell, character builds are a whole part of the game. Conditional power-ups are highly contextual and of questionable use unless a player really knows how to use them. For example, I didn't ever bother upgrading the evading roll because the distance it covered was just fine for me, but being rather sword heavy, I chose sword ability upgrades so that I didn't have to depend on signs and potions when going into battle if I could help it.

You will notice that all the above points are either missing from Bethesda rpgs or in the case of the bad examples, all are present.
That's completely false. Perks in Fallout games are at least half-way unique and interesting, and perks in Skryrim fall in the same gambit. I've just explained why random loot and level scaling are useful design decisions, and I don't think I've ever button mashed in Skyrim either. I agree with CDPR that Skyrim and Fallout don't give the idea that you're actually doing anything with consequences, and that Skyrim in particular depends on alot of very generic quests to give the players something to do in the world, but the complaints here, while understandable, I'm not sure are warranted within their contexts.

That said, I hope CDPR succeeds and gives Bethesda something hard to think about for the next Elder Scrolls game. It would be refreshing for a story where you feel like you have some impact. I mean, you know, you DO kill a God at the end of Skyrim's main quest after all.
 

v1oz

Member
The Witcher developers were going in quite hard in their criticisms of Skyrim in that video. I wonder how the devs at Bethesda would feel about someone saying their characters are forgettable and the quests are too generic. It's quite unusual in this industry for developers to criticize the work of other devs. They normally say nice things.
 
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