Gameplay

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings is a multiplatform CRPG developed by Polish Developers CDProjekt, as a full-fledged sequel to the critically acclaimed Witcher 1. Currently, the game is 60% finished and is slanted for release in the first half of 2011.

The game offers everything that its predecessor did and more – morally ambiguous setting, dark reality of usually naiively understood elven/dwarven fantasy, bloody and engaging real-time combat and numerous adult scenes. It heavily improves on the many aspects of the original at the same time – the game’s locations are much more grand and open, there’s little to no loading times within any location (entering houses or smaller sub-locations doesn’t require loading either). In addition, the game runs on an in-house built next-gen platform that allows seamless creation of the game in all three major next-gen destinations, namely Xbox 360, PC and Playstation 3. Geralt – the protagonist of the first game – is still very much the same monster-slayer as he was, only choices that are ahead of him are twice as deadly and everything he (the player) does in the game will have far-reaching consequences.

Hallmark of the series – perfectly voice-acted, deep and emotionally valid character interactions get an incredible overhaul in Witcher 2 as all custcenes of the game are now fully interactive and in-game based. Dialogues, on the other hand, are now seamlessly vowen into the fabric of regular action, as most of the time witcher may be interrupted by passers-by, joined by new characters in dialogue, or even forced to make dialogue decisions right there and then (game doesn’t pause for dialogues).

The events in the game may pan out differently not only on the basis of Witcher’s own choices during the quests and conversations, but also via independent reactions and events that his companions undergo. New engine was created not only to support the eyecandy, but also to enable CD-Projekt RED creation of more multi-branched, decision-based RPG environments, possibly also to be used in other RPGs of the studio later on. Non-linear plots full of intrigue and multi-focal events are so vast that game may be replayed different many times over; there’s a lot of endings possible, and even though there’s 5 acts to play through (Prologue, 1,2,3, Epilogue), players will discover that a lot of the game changes depending on their (and their companions) choices each time.

Unlike in Witcher 1, most of the time someone will be at our side, and deciding who of the companions does what has a bearing on the plot and Geralt’s own fate. Intricate character development stories bear fruit in terms of sensual side of the Witcher. Instead of random sexual encounters where simple ‘gifts’ resulted in intimate moments with some of the female NPCs, this time the story and plot are deciding factors. Collecting sexually explicit cards, that somehow resembled ‘scoring’ off the conquests, is also the thing of the past.