Novi infoi od Gamestara.de : "My two days with Geralt were one of the most beautiful, most exciting and overwhelming experiences I have experienced in my 33 years gaming life"Gameplay- There are 4 difficulties (easy, medium, hard and dark) which differ in the skill of the monsters you face. Hitpoints remain the same.- You can bargain for more money after finishing your monster contract through some sort of minigame.- The side quests are extremely well made with great writing and branching.- Potions are a necessity on higher difficulty levels. You only need to craft a potion once and you can refill it if you have enough alcohol present. Potions are upgradeable for stronger effects. Stronger potions will increase your toxicity more- Novigrad and No Man's Land are indeed one single map, much bigger than Skyrim. The isles of Skellige form the other big part of the game. Next to that, there are 5-6 other separated locations, including Kaer Morhen.- No enemy respawning or at the least not very frequently- Best items in the game must be crafted- They were very impressed with the story branching and how it is not always obvious. Correcting 'wrong' choices by saving/reloading will be very difficult if not impossible.- Contrary to BioWare games dialogue options are not good or bad, this you will have to figure out for yourselves.- They really liked the in-game card game Gwent, praising its design.- The game features two really big cities: Novigrad and Oxenfurt, both very lively.- The are of No Man's Land features 25 smaller towns, some of which are the size of Flotsam from The Witcher 2.- Geralt can rob people, although the system is too easy and feels a bit lacking.- Journalist (level 7) was one shotted by a wyvern (level 24). No level scaling.- Ciri sequences will be (in total) 5-10h and feel more like an action-adventure game than an RPG- Extra storage can be made by crafting saddle bags for your horse.- Many small details such as Roach stopping to eat apples from a basket- All equipped items are visible in-game on Geralt- Fist-fighting is back, this time no QTE- World never felt empty- Journalist didn't encounter any simple fetch questsTechnical- The HUD is fully customizable. Icons and quest markers on the map can also be deactivated. Audiovisual hints (e.g. people screaming for help) will be present if you wish to do so.- Journalist encountered no clone NPC's- Controller feels superior to keyboard+mouse.- The extremely annoying doors from The Witcher 2 are gone. Doors are now opened automatically, no button pressing. No loading times for entering buildings either.- Day 1 patch confirmed- Xbox One resolution will stay at 900p- Geralts beard will grow over time- Switching between controller and mouse (for menu's) is easy and fluid- Most impressive dynamic weather system in any game he has ever played- They encountered very few bugs, no crashes of freezes.- Ultra seems to have a big effect on the quality of vegetation and character models[- No slider for LOD- Visual gore more prominent than in The Witcher 2Il ovo : journalist played 10-12 hours, had full access to the game and reached level 7game is already at Sony & MS for admissionresolution on Xbox One will definitely stay at 900p in order to offer a stable performancefluid gameplay on 1080p with everything on maximum +nvidia hairworks on GTX 980 -> looks- Ultra settings are impressive, especially the rich vegetation and character models; there can be scenes where difference between high and ultra won't be that noticeable; lighting is impressive: for instance evening light falling on vast flower fields of a parfum-maker Looks insanely good for an open world gametwo big cities with Novigrad and Oxenfurt (which is really big as well)you cannot enter every house in Novigrad but it's cleverly masked if you can't enter oneNovigrad and No man's land are connected, only seperated maps, only loading time between main land and SkelligeNovigrad+No man's land are much bigger than Skyrim aloneno button for opening doors anymore, all doors are swinging doorsextremely lively interiors, every interior tells a different storyThere are around 25 "villages" in No mans land and Novigradthere are towns in the game of the same size of Flotsamcities have a realistic eco-system and surroundings with real suburb parts in which craftsmen are located like in medieval timeslast active skill-slot (12th) at level 50, level cap could be even higherwhole world feels quite realistic and organicCombat with gamepad very intuitive and fluiddiving is still not optimal in terms of controls, but you can dive everywheregamepad controls are apparently much better than mouse/keyboard according to the journalist (m/k on TW2 level)it's still too easy to rob people, robbing system in general is lackingwhole game is consequently open world so pacing could be difficult for somepassages with Ciri are like a linear action-adventure, not like a RPG, plays differently and more action-fueled than Geralt's passages (no inventory, no skill tree, depending on the scene Ciri has certain skills)side quests are great and each tells its own story with people actually reacting to Geraltsound and subtitles can be combined freely from different available languagesthere will definitely be a day-one patchhigh grade of visual violence with dismemberments with a higher gore-level than TW1 or TW2, but still feels organic and consistentitems can be crafted and decomposedbest items in game must be craftedgame world can change based on your decisionsthere was indeed no slider or adjustment option for the draw distance/LOD but according to the journalist he was happy with itthere is the cleverly constructed illusion of a realistic world but traveling is never boring and there is always something to discovereven if you disable markers for quest givers on the map the game gives you audio-visual hints like people screaming for helpthe journalist never had the feeling that the world is "empty"no sudden changes of environments (e.g. desert to humid regions), organic and consistent world"sandbox elements" and random stuff is limited, so no fights of townpeople against dragons like in Skyrim, you can only influence the world to a certain levelas far as the journalist has experienced it there will be little to no enemy respawning, enemies haven returned during his two days in the gamethe game is open world but actually almost everything is "controlled" and "planned" by the developersThe Quests aren't randomly generated, they appear on the same spotHe did not encounter any simple fetch questsmany things are commented by Geralt e.g. when he tracks down leads with the Witcher sensesmutagens can be very powerful, like 40% damage enhancer for signsvery different enemy types that feel and play differentlyno "clone" NPCs, every NPC in Novigrad for example looks differentlyevery potion and bomb must only brewed/crafted oncepotions have different quality levels, can be improved, e.g. Swallow can offer more healing and more slotscrafting is extensiveyou can for example increase the inventory limitations of your horse by crafting bigger saddle bags but you must actually go to your horse to be able to have access to these bagsevery region has its own color setting and feelMost dynamic/impressive Weather System the reporter has ever seen.clouds cast shadowsbad weather like storms can happen everywheregame loading time is extremely short on the high-end PCsaving and loading times are also extremely shortsome huge buildings and story-relevant special areas have loading times, normal buildings do notstory branching in quests is excessive and impressive with not always "transparent" or easily visible effects, for example one quest had six "decisive" elements that could have gone down in a different way if the journalist behaved differently"it will be impossible to play Witcher 3 two times in exactly the same way"different to Bioware games dialogue options are not "obvious" and every possibility makes kind of sense, no sign whether an answer is "good" or "bad", only quest relevant options are marked (opposite to chatter and non-quest related dialogue options)due to the complex way of story branching it's difficult to find times and locations where "things went wrong" if you want to develop your game in a different wayGhwent is awesome according to the journalist, great design and entertainingfist fighting is without QTEs now, it's just like normal fighting with hard and fast strikes and suchthere are now negotiation minigame for quest rewards like bargaining for a monster hunt (before and after quests?)there are horseraces similar to RDR, biggest focus on stamina management during races, you can even buy better saddles for horseracesevery item you choose is visible on Geralt's ingame modelGeralts beard will grow. You have to go to a barber after a few daysyou can enter and play whatever region you want but you get hints where to start by your main quest (e.g. search Ciri in Novigrad's surroundings) if you want enemies that are on a similar level to yourself, but it's up to the player how he wants to progressLevel 24 Wyvern one-shotted level 7 Geraltsoundtrack was good, but neither really negative nor outstanding, but dynamic and decent, fits to the situation and locationsome reactions from NPCs to things you did, but rather small comments, journalist admitted that he didn't play the game long enough for probably bigger reactionstutorials are integrated into the story/progression and worth the effort due to good dialoguesthe game is really immersive and "drags you in", feels and plays a lot more fluidly than the predecessors without being less complexthere is a chance that they won't be able to hold the level until the end of the game (speculation since two days were surely not enough to get to the end) but the journalist was truly and deeply impressed by what he saw and playedpotions are quite important, especially on harder difficulty settings
