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The Witcher 3 controls like shit

I actually like the original movement option.
Felt like Geralt had weight and momentum, and I enjoy walking in these sort of games.

Sure it was definitely a little clunky but nothing unbearable for me *shrugs*
 
I completely agree. It is the reason why I haven't bothered to finish the game yet. Yes, everything else is extremely high quality, but if the game feels bad to actually play I'm not going to play it.

And yes I already switched to alternate controls, doesn't help much.
 

pmj

Member
I love TW3, but how it controls is absolutely the low point.

Did the quest where you have to climb a mountain to prove you're a badass or something last night. Halfway up I get attacked by sirens, while I am on a small ledge and can't go anywhere because if you are in combat you can't jump, and if you do any combat moves you risk sliding off the ledge because the animation is all over the place. Had to wait until the sirens attacked, perfectly time a bolt or sign to knock them out of the sky, hope that my attack didn't lunge me off the cliff toward certain death, and then repeat it five times before I was allowed to move to a better position. It's honestly the most frustrated I've been with the game.

I've also had instances where I've gone into combat stance when behind obstacles, and have had to resort to crossbowing a mob to death because jumping in combat is illegal.

An open world filled with trash mob encounters. Trying to run away from that crap? Eventually Geralt stops running and turns around and you're basically stuck until all enemies are dead, unless you repeatedly roll away from them. Roll, Geralt stops and turns around on landing, roll, Geralt stops and turns around, roll...
 
They took their sweet time to give us a better camera control, I only noticed when I bought the dlc many patches after the game released. I'm assuming most people missed that option.

Don't know about other people but I absolutely hate when the game tries to control the camera for you, like when you are only moving the left analog stick and the game forces the camera to always be focused on your character's back turning by itself even if you want to be focusing on something else. Taking away that kind of control from the player is awful.

Other games also do this by default (Persona 5 and Kingdom Hearts 2 come to mind) but they have an option to disable it thankfully (which I immediately searched for as soon as I started the games). Wonder why it took them so long.
 

Zojirushi

Member
Everything about the game seems to have an intense input lag to it. Even the menus.

I noticed this too (even in Witcher 2) to a point where I feel like it's even entirely missing input commands sometimes. It acts as if everything runs at a super low framerate although it clearly doesn't (on PC). What's up with that?
 

Greedings

Member
I love the game, but yeah...it REALLY controls like shit.

My parter who's new to games gave up really quick because it took her like 70 seconds to stand next to a ladder to climb it.
 

John Dunbar

correct about everything
I love TW3, but how it controls is absolutely the low point.

Did the quest where you have to climb a mountain to prove you're a badass or something last night. Halfway up I get attacked by sirens, while I am on a small ledge and can't go anywhere because if you are in combat you can't jump, and if you do any combat moves you risk sliding off the ledge because the animation is all over the place. Had to wait until the sirens attacked, perfectly time a bolt or sign to knock them out of the sky, hope that my attack didn't lunge me off the cliff toward certain death, and then repeat it five times before I was allowed to move to a better position. It's honestly the most frustrated I've been with the game.

that exact same thing happened to me. shit was ridiculous.
 
MGSV has an offensively terrible story and stagnant open world elevated by incredible gameplay mechanics that were unfortunately held back by archaic, dated controls.

Triggered
et9aaoG.gif

But seriously I have no clue what you're talking about. IMO the story in PP has it's flaws but it's still pretty good... Controls are amazing to me, the best out of all TPS games even.
 

Kazuhira

Member
MGSV has an offensively terrible story and stagnant open world elevated by incredible gameplay mechanics that were unfortunately held back by archaic, dated controls.

Better explain that because it makes no sense,how can you have incredible gameplay and archaic,dated controls at the same time?
 
Alternate control scheme is fine. They'd already patched it in when I first played, and upon noticing how shitty the default controls are, wasn't exactly a hard decision to change to the alternate setting.
MGSV has an offensively terrible story and stagnant open world elevated by incredible gameplay mechanics that were unfortunately held back by archaic, dated controls.
Did you play MGS3 by mistake or something?
 

Hyun Sai

Member
Yeah, it was really bad. I couldn't manage to finish the game because the thought of spending 20+ hours with this shit was depressing.

Too bad, it would have been my best RPG ever otherwise...
 

Ralemont

not me
I pretty sure it's mosty praised for its writing, quest design, and gameplay?

What game are you even taking about?

The first, yes, the second two no.

I'd say Witcher 3 does a good job dispersing interesting vignettes across its world, and that therefore on a macro level it has good quest design. The actual quests, in terms of how they play, are very uninteresting. The stories are good, though, which makes them well worth it.

I think Witcher 3's action gameplay is actually the only thing its gameplay has going for it. So many of its "RPG" systems just don't work out that well. Character progression is pretty boring. Ditto with the unbalanced crafting. No level scaling does more harm than good as you spent most of the game either underpowered or overpowered with a sweet spot in between. Loot is boring because the game insists on throwing a crapton of bad weapons and armor at you, bloating your inventory which sucks because navigating your inventory is kind of a pain. Pausing to oil and reoil swords is a real oversight; they couldn't think of ANY way to implement this to be usable in real time, even through a pause wheel?

Despite all this, Witcher 3 is one of my favorite open worlds because it's one of the only ones that rewards exploration with gameplay. DAI rewards you with environment and lore porn, others throw gameplay/combat/loot at you to spur exploration, but Witcher 3 lets you stumble onto interesting stories buried in the middle of the forest or in a cave on a coast, and this does a lot to promote the "fairy-tale esque" tone of its world.
 

teokrazia

Member
Especially after playing open world games like Horizon Zero Dawn and Metal Gear Solid 5, which controls like heaven, The Witcher 3 feels like a fucking chore.

Just walking around is a suffering activity. And the animations are so poor. Not even going to discuss combat, but you can be sure it is not highly regarded for the most part because of the terrible controls.

It is such a pitty, because I want to experience the world and the story, but Jesus Christ, everytime I have to walk it is so slugish and bad.

Sorry to hear, with mouse and keyboard I had a very good experience.
In some regards better than MGSV and Horizon.


OléGunner;248810876 said:
I actually like the original movement option.
Felt like Geralt had weight and momentum,

Definitely.
 
OléGunner;248810876 said:
I actually like the original movement option.
Felt like Geralt had weight and momentum, and I enjoy walking in these sort of games.

Sure it was definitely a little clunky but nothing unbearable for me *shrugs*

Yes, me too.

I dislike how Aloy in Horizon feels like a floaty snowflake when travelling around. Jumping and turning direction in the air, who the heck is she supposed to be? Aang?
 

nachum00

Member
Yeah not a fan either. So I just put it on the easiest difficulty and tried to endure the gameplay and enjoy the story. But having never played the other games the story didn't grab me either. Stopped playing after about 60 hours.
 
I finished all of Witcher 3 and it was ok, but the controls were always a pain for me (even after the update). It's one of a number of issue the game has that holds it back from greatness in my view, though most people aren't bothered by it anyway.
 

RK9039

Member
I don't mind the controls tbh, it's no Dragon's Dogma but it gets the job done. I've played more of this game than any of the well controlled games mentioned here. And I started all over again recently.

TPP was trash outside of gameplay mechanics imo, couldn't even be bothered to finish that game. I just watched the ending on youtube.
 

Tovarisc

Member
OléGunner;248810876 said:
I actually like the original movement option.
Felt like Geralt had weight and momentum, and I enjoy walking in these sort of games.

Sure it was definitely a little clunky but nothing unbearable for me *shrugs*

Same. I love it how Geralt looks in movement and controls like person with muscle and gear mass that he has on him. Also like you I walked a lot during playthrough, taking in that world and scenery :D

Also once I learned to pan camera along with wanted turn and movement direction(s) even sprinting around on foot and on horse became actually good. Makes turns quite a bit tighter. If you don't pan camera along with movement direction input it's like turning on rigid rails.

TPP was trash outside of gameplay mechanics imo, couldn't even be bothered to finish that game. I just watched the ending on youtube.

Only good thing in TPP is TPS controls and gameplay, if we ignore graphics. You can go Sam Fisher in that shit quite well. Rest is such drivel.
 

Mephala

Member
Did you try the alternative movement mode?

Of course. I was actually somewhat devastated as I had really hoped it would be what allowed the game to stick with me but where as I could not tolerate it for more than 5 hours before I couldn't go much further than 30 now. I tried all sorts of tricks too like, ignoring combat and focusing on other things or focusing on story and gwent or playing on harder difficulties so I need to be better prepared and more careful with my combat/movements or even easier difficulties where I just whack things to death without effort. It was ultimately the controls, which is near constant part of the gameplay that slowly chews at me. It slowly kills my enjoyment of it. I wish I was exaggerating. If it was a single glaring thing I might be able to ignore it or find some workaround but I'm pretty much at the end of my rope with this. I'm thinking perhaps I'll try the PC version with mods at some later date.
 
Definitely.

Yes, me too.

I dislike how Aloy in Horizon feels like a floaty snowflake when travelling around. Jumping and turning direction in the air, who the heck is she supposed to be? Aang?

Glad I'm not alone then!

I thought Aloy's controls for HZD were very well done as well on the other hand.

She's a nifty little character who has to dodge and jump a lot so her fluid movement system felt perfectly accurate for a world in this context of large machine predators with lasers lol

Same. I love it how Geralt looks in movement and controls like person with muscle and gear mass that he has on him. Also like you I walked a lot during playthrough, taking in that world and scenery :D

Also once I learned to pan camera along with wanted turn and movement direction(s) even sprinting around on foot and on horse became actually good. Makes turns quite a bit tighter. If you don't pan camera along with movement direction input it's like turning on rigid rails.

Yeah this is what CDPR wanted to convey (I guess it's the animation build up to run) but unfortunately it wasn't suitable for some people.

I tried the alternate movement option after a few hours and it just didn't fit the world for me.
Geralt felt like a slippery eel even if the movement controls were a little more responsive.
 

Big_Al

Unconfirmed Member
Control and combat complaints are the complaints with Witcher 3 I've never honestly understood. I went back to it after a year or so break a few months ago to play the expansions (which are honestly some of the best expansions I've ever played) and thought it was superb and had no issues with either. I will say though I do prefer the alternative control scheme overall.

But then everyone has different preferences, for example I know a lot of folk loved Killzone 2 and I thought that was one of the worst controlling games I've ever played with some utterly terrible controller lag, so I'm not going to point fingers and go 'YOU WOT MATE!', i just personally don't get it.

Maybe playing on PC with a controller at 60fps helps alleviate any issues though.
 

Servbot24

Banned
I would argue that in terms of gameplay that Witcher isn't even open world.

I mean Ass creed has some vertical traversing and parcour, but the combat could be implemented in any straight forward action game.

Uncharted 4 is more open world in terms of gameplay than both games.

Could you elaborate on this? Witcher 3 is clearly more open world than Uncharted so I'm not sure what you mean.
 
It's not great, but 60fps sure helps make it feel better.

I did not enjoy playing it on console, but when I built my new PC, the experience was so much better.
 

Lunar15

Member
Every time I start it up after not playing it for a while, it's really jarring. Once I play it for an hour or so, I'm back into it and have zero issues.

It ain't great, but it's not a deal breaker in any way shape or form.
 
As far as major AAA games go over the last 5 years, TW3 might actually feel the worst to play. At least on console the movement & traversal feels sluggish (yes, using alternative mode).

Also the way Geralt strafes in combat never felt perfectly connected to my controller inputs. The movement path of his strafe when you circle a targeted enemy is different from most action RPGs and I never got used to it.
 
Same, I've spent many, many hours, like you, playing this fantastic game and the DLC, something which I definitely wouldn't do if the controls were terrible.

I just find some gamers have weird hangups on certain things these days. It's like when they play a game like Bloodborne or MGS V with super tight controls, they can't adapt to something that's not quite as good, even though it's still far terrible, like some people claim.

Maybe it's because I'm in my mid 30's now and grew up with old games, which sometimes had very clunky controls, compared to modern games, so I have no problem adapting to different controls. But all the people claiming they quit after a few hours because they didn't like the controls, well that's their loss, it didn't stop us from loving this amazing game.

When you see the sheer number of people who hate TW3 controls, and you don't see the same number of people complaining about the controls in any other game (that I can think of) these past couple years, it might just be that the controls are actually pretty shitty.

I mean, clearly CDPR realized that many players hated the controls. I can't think of another game that;s patched in alternative controls.
 
I agree. Everything about the controls and combat in this game made me incapable of finishing it, even though everything else is top notched.
 

DemWalls

Member
I mean, clearly CDPR realized that many players hated the controls. I can't think of another game that;s patched in alternative controls.

I feel like this is also due to CDPR usually being good guys that tend to really take feedback at heart. If more developers had their policies I think we'd see more of this kind of adjustments.
 

c0Zm1c

Member
When you see the sheer number of people who hate TW3 controls, and you don't see the same number of people complaining about the controls in any other game (that I can think of) these past couple years, it might just be that the controls are actually pretty shitty.

I mean, clearly CDPR realized that many players hated the controls. I can't think of another game that;s patched in alternative controls.

You also have to consider that because many people do like the controls (and indeed the combat) it might be that there isn't anything inherently wrong with it, it's just different. After all, they did patch an optional alternate control, and not just patch it in replacing the existing (and because I do like the original controls I'm glad they did it that way, and not just assume everyone would want it).

I've always had the impression that Geralt's somewhat lumbering movement was intentional, and I like that, and the thought never crossed my mind that others would think it's bad design (until seeing that they unfortunately do).
 

Neith

Banned
It's not great, but 60fps sure helps make it feel better.

I did not enjoy playing it on console, but when I built my new PC, the experience was so much better.

Yeah, I don't have any problems with the game in this way. It controls fine for me.

I am playing at less than 60 FPS for better graphics and it still controls fine on alternative.

The original controls are hot garbage though.
 

Neith

Banned
If I'm going to be perfectly honest...

Horizon: ZD had little but stunning visuals and presentation. Otherwise, it was full to the brim with poor crafting/loot mechanics and mediocre combat.

Witcher 3 is a sprawling, unbelievably detailed and alive open world but controls poorly and has basic and uninteresting combat mechanics.

BoTW is one of my favorite games of the generation but is filled with obscene open world bloat and the weapon degradation and stamina systems are a joke.

MGSV has an offensively terrible story and stagnant open world elevated by incredible gameplay mechanics that were unfortunately held back by archaic, dated controls.

I love all of these games to pieces but yeah, they have flaws. Some of those flaws are pretty damn big. Doesn't make the games any less spectacular to me though. Nothing is perfect, everything you love has massive flaws, that's the nature of things. Witcher 3 was absolutely worth the trouble of dealing with bad combat and controls.

Horizon in no way shape or form has mediocre combat on the hardest setting. You are insane for even suggesting that, and no game in this genre will ever satisfy you. As you are one of the very small minority that thinks this well....

Witcher 3's skill system was also garbage. 99% of players did not use half of the system.

that exact same thing happened to me. shit was ridiculous.

Come on dudes. This part was not that bad lol. Even on Deathmarch. Stating this is the most frustrated you have been with a game... well it's good you have only played 4 games in your life sonny!
 

Packy

Member
I agree with OP in a huge way. I wanted to enjoy the Witcher 3, but the controls, especially traversal and combat really made the game a chore. I did make it to the end eventually. The story was decent enough, but I can't help but think that the game would have been so much better with a few design tweaks.
 

Neith

Banned
I agree with OP in a huge way. I wanted to enjoy the Witcher 3, but the controls, especially traversal and combat really made the game a chore. I did make it to the end eventually. The story was decent enough, but I can't help but think that the game would have been so much better with a few design tweaks.

Where is traversal in this game ever that hard though?

I mean I hope they improve everything for their next game, but you really aren't expected to climb all that much in this game.

As for combat I have never though it was that bad in Witcher 3 on Deathmarch. I've always had some fun with it.
 
Could you elaborate on this? Witcher 3 is clearly more open world than Uncharted so I'm not sure what you mean.

Visually there is no contest. Witcher 3 is alongside GTAV probably the most elaborate ''open world'' in the industry. I have never made a secret about that fact on this forum.

In terms of everything else, both Ass Creed and Witcher 3 is very contained. Ass Creed has at least some free parcours, tower climbing and stealth to reiterate it's ''openworldness''. It's combat is straight forward and could be not more open world than any other simple action game. The sea battles in Ass4 was decent, but pretty simple, boring and repitative after awhile.

Witcher 3 combat is a bit more elaborate than Ass Creed. There are some cool bosses that use the air and ground. But that combat could have easily worked in a straight forward 3d action game, like God of War, Darksiders or whatever. Half assed horse riding and boat riding/combat is fuckking whack. Never felt so restricted (anti open world) ever in a videogame during those mechanics, since the 8bit era.

Uncharted 4 has open area stealth, terrain dynamic, multiple paths to tackle, vertical climbing, rope takedowns/traversing, vehicle action, underwater stealth with some decent physics and collision, all combined in a nice little 'free flowing' sandbox style gameplay.

''True'' open world game in MY definition:

-GTA, Just Cause, Far Cry, Crysis. MGSV.
 

Skyr

Member
Actually the combat movement felt fine to me and I really enjoyed fighting mobs.

My main issue was how clunky the movement felt when simply exploring the world and particularly inside smaller buildings.

I'm redownloading it on steam right now and will try out the "Immersive Motion" mod someone suggested here.
Will report how it plays with it.
 

Nezacant

Member
I would argue that in terms of gameplay that Witcher isn't even open world.

I mean Ass creed has some vertical traversing and parcour, but the combat could be implemented in any straight forward action game.

Uncharted 4 is more open world in terms of gameplay than both games.

w8wut.gif
 

KageMaru

Member
The controls could be clunky at times, especially when trying to move to a specific spot, but I thought they were fine. I think both control options are fine and cater to you whether you want more responsive controls or something with more weight behind your movement.
 

John Dunbar

correct about everything
Come on dudes. This part was not that bad lol. Even on Deathmarch. Stating this is the most frustrated you have been with a game... well it's good you have only played 4 games in your life sonny!

while i don't agree with the bit about it being the most frustrating thing in a game (i've played games since commodore 64, sonny), it was a notably awful moment in a game full of annoying movement, or lack thereof. just the mention of it was enough to bring back painful memories.
 
I feel like this is also due to CDPR usually being good guys that tend to really take feedback at heart. If more developers had their policies I think we'd see more of this kind of adjustments.

Could be, but name another game that has received so many complaints about it's controls. A lot of the complaints, maybe most, are coming from people who love the game as well. You could say GTA V or something, maybe, and my response would be that it's because GTA V has shitty controls, too.
 
I love TW3, but how it controls is absolutely the low point.

Did the quest where you have to climb a mountain to prove you're a badass or something last night. Halfway up I get attacked by sirens, while I am on a small ledge and can't go anywhere because if you are in combat you can't jump, and if you do any combat moves you risk sliding off the ledge because the animation is all over the place. Had to wait until the sirens attacked, perfectly time a bolt or sign to knock them out of the sky, hope that my attack didn't lunge me off the cliff toward certain death, and then repeat it five times before I was allowed to move to a better position. It's honestly the most frustrated I've been with the game.

I've also had instances where I've gone into combat stance when behind obstacles, and have had to resort to crossbowing a mob to death because jumping in combat is illegal.

Try fighting Sirens on a fucking boat man. Fuck me.
 

Gsnap

Member
It is a little weird when such a high profile developer has trouble making walking around feel decent. Like, yeah I don't enjoy the combat much either, but combat is much more complex, so it's easier to give them slack for that. Walking/running around shouldn't have been such an issue that they had to release alternate controls. It's such a basic thing that the player is doing 100% of the time that it should be prioritized the first time around. And it shouldn't be something they have trouble with in the first place seeing as how thousands of games since the dawn of 3D haven't had problems with it. So it does stand out a lot more, and it does feel more "like shit" because relative to other problems it's so simple that the fact it's a problem in the first place just confuses a lot of us.

Visually there is no contest. Witcher 3 is alongside GTAV probably the most elaborate ''open world'' in the industry. I have never made a secret about that fact on this forum.

In terms of everything else, both Ass Creed and Witcher 3 is very contained. Ass Creed has at least some free parcours, tower climbing and stealth to reiterate it's ''openworldness''. It's combat is straight forward and could be not more open world than any other simple action game. The sea battles in Ass4 was decent, but pretty simple, boring and repitative after awhile.

Witcher 3 combat is a bit more elaborate than Ass Creed. There are some cool bosses that use the air and ground. But that combat could have easily worked in a straight forward 3d action game, like God of War, Darksiders or whatever. Half assed horse riding and boat riding/combat is fuckking whack. Never felt so restricted (anti open world) ever in a videogame during those mechanics, since the 8bit era.

Uncharted 4 has open area stealth, terrain dynamic, multiple paths to tackle, vertical climbing, rope takedowns/traversing, vehicle action, underwater stealth with some decent physics and collision, all combined in a nice little 'free flowing' sandbox style gameplay.

''True'' open world game in MY definition:

-GTA, Just Cause, Far Cry, Crysis. MGSV.

I mean, I get what you're saying, but if you keep saying it like that people are going to constantly ignore it or have over-reactionary posts to it. You'd prefer more open world games to have more sandbox options for their core gameplay loop (usually their combat). Something a linear game like Uncharted 4 is able to accomplish, but many other open world games don't.
 
It is a little weird when such a high profile developer has trouble making walking around feel decent. Like, yeah I don't enjoy the combat much either, but combat is much more complex, so it's easier to give them slack for that. Walking/running around shouldn't have been such an issue that they had to release alternate controls. It's such a basic thing that the player is doing 100% of the time that it should be prioritized the first time around. And it shouldn't be something they have trouble with in the first place seeing as how thousands of games since the dawn of 3D haven't had problems with it. So it does stand out a lot more, and it does feel more "like shit" because relative to other problems it's so simple that the fact it's a problem in the first place just confuses a lot of us.



I mean, I get what you're saying, but if you keep saying it like that people are going to constantly ignore it or have over-reactionary posts to it. You'd prefer more open world games to have more sandbox options for their core gameplay loop (usually their combat). Something a linear game like Uncharted 4 is able to accomplish, but many other open world games don't.

Open world areas for the sake of open world pisses me off the more I see it.

Even in linear games like the Madagascar bit in Uncharted 4 pissed me off. Although the lineair path vehicle mud offroad are cool. The open valleys to me serve absolutely no point. That is why I like to oust this perspective whenever I can.
 
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