CD Projekt Red Isn't Afraid of Making The Witcher 3 Too Difficult

[DarkhoIlow]

After playing DArkest Dungeon I say..bring on the difficulty!

 

[freaper]

I really hope this game does well, not just for its own sake, but so it can rub all those demeaning and cowardly statements from other AAA publishers in their faces. If it doesn't, well, we'll just say it was for a niche market.

Still editorializing in the news section without disclosing. Being a 'quirky' news site with a meme-ish forum avatars doesn't exempt this site from basical journalistic principles.

You mean the last line? I don't think that's too much of a problem.

The last couple of lines, I think, are the problem. They aren't necessarily that bad by themselves, but you definitely couldn't call them neutral and objective.

I remember reading somewhere that reporters here are allowed a few lines at the end to express their own sentiments.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

*reeeerrrrrrr*

alot of pessimistic comments in here, plenty of piss in everyone's morning cereal it seems.

personally I don't play the witcher games for brutal difficulty, but I do commend them for making it an option at least.

still excited for this game to finally come out though, all the trailers/demo pieces that have been released have looked great.

 

[Darxide]

I love a game that's unforgivingly difficult. Bonus points for making people cry. Something like IWTBTG! is nice.

 

[Not Lord Atkin]

"Enemies do not scale in The Witcher 3"

This. So much this. I do not know why so many RPG developers thought this was an issue and decided to cock the whole thing up but the enemies not scaling, much like in Morrowind, Gothic and Dark Souls, when used well, can create a natural sense of exploration and progression and almost a zelda-ish style of gameplay where areas aren't inaccessible because you don't have the right tools, but simply because you're not good enough. It actually gives the player a reason to both get better at the game and level up their character.

 

[TristanBelmont]

Considering this is the series that throws you into a melee against like five people in the tutorial, doesn't let you heal in fights, and sorta just throws you to the wolves from moment one.....

Yeah. I can see these guys amping up the difficulty like nuts. AND YEAH WOOO HARD GAMES WOOOOOO

 

[thebobmaster_v1legacy]

I love a game that's unforgivingly difficult. Bonus points for making people cry. Something like IWTBTG! is nice.

Eh, I'd rather have something like Rogue Legacy. The problem with IWTBTG is that the difficulty is all twitch reflexes and trial and error. With a game like Rogue Legacy, it's still hard, quite so, but the difficulty comes from learning strategies, what to level up, what class to use when, that sort of thing.

 

[RJ 17]

Has anyone here ever made it to the kill-screen of the original Donkey Kong? I don't think so. How about Pac-Man? A little easier, but I highly doubt anyone on this site has ever made it to the kill-screen.

No we probably didn't. Because even the people that did spend more time on it as it is worth for me (also every one of them did it by having an own arcade machine at their homes!) And Pac-man basically has no kill-screen it just gets the hell bugged out!
If someone is interested in those crazy people, I recommend "King of Kong":
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0923752/
(and since then everything in this movie has been crushed!)

But I will run you Super Meat Boy Light World in 30min, if you want, so don't tell me that "we" are bad gamers!

First of all: I frickin' love that movie.

Second of all: I wasn't trying to say that all games these days are incredibly easy when compared to retro games, but rather most games are. There's still good challenges to be found out there.

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

But if it's too difficult how will I experience all the sex scenes!?

Let's just say they're going to be quite... hard. One slip-up and you'll find yourself in a tight spot, which if you don't finish quickly enough, could lead you down a slippery slope which you'll cum to regret the next morning.

Spoiler: I'm so sorry

Someone had to do it.

OT: As someone who's still yet to even finish the first one and has had Witcher 2 for ages waiting for a better computer to be installed on, this news doesn't really matter that much to me. I'm not that much of a sucker for overly difficult games (though Dark Souls is one of my favorites of all time), but if this pleases people, then whatever floats your boat I guess. Let's just hope for the sake of the fans that the difficulty is actually done well instead of just bumping enemy HP and damage, and adding insta-death traps everywhere.

 

[pearcinator]

I'm playing through Witcher 2 on Normal mode and I find it challenging. Maybe it's because the combat is tricky, I don't know how parry works. I hold the parry button but I still take damage and the 'insta-kill icon' doesn't show up. I've managed to pull it off probably 2 or 3 times without knowing what I just did.

So I'll play Witcher 3 on Normal if it's as challenging as Witcher 2. I like a challenge but I don't like too much difficulty. Perma-death sounds like a phony way of making games harder and insta-death traps/enemies are so annoying (Banshee 'vacuum-pull' and Phantom 'Invisi-stab' in ME3 for example).

 

[Imre Csete]

I'm all fine with challenge and whatnot, I would had been all over that permadead stuff a good 6-8 years ago, but I'm not a highschooler anymore. I guess it's nice for those who can afford to waste countless hours of gameplay because of that. Or for those who get paid by the hour to playtest that stuff.

 

[The Madman]

Also willing to bet that "dark mode" is going to be cheap as hell(wooo you added a 400% multiplier to monster health and damage, such skill, much game design), but still be praised to high heaven because Souls ushered in a grand new era of people wanting games to play like they are trying to drain you of quarters

Not sure that would be a wise bet to make. Witcher 2's Dark Mode was pretty fair in how it dealt out its damage, Geralt would die within only a few blows but so would most enemies making most fights more about avoidance and timing than anything. Dark Mode was also neat in that it introduced a few unique sets of armor and challenges to the game to reward players that powered through it.

If Witcher 3 does something similar with its Dark Mode then you'll find no complaints from me.

 

[Magmarock]

Hey CDPR every time I hear a story about you I just smile. It's like you guys come from a simpler time when games were less political and all about the fun. Rather ironic considering that the Witcher is political in story.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Ok fine, but can they make the game hard because of a well structured difficulty curve and not because the combat is shit?

Indeed, that's the only reason I never went higher than normal; as it was, I was already fighting the controls as much as the enemies.

I think I quit about an hour and a half in because of the controls (and because the first "sex scene" was ridiculous to the point of hilarity). Great that other people enjoy it, sure, but there'll never be a Witcher game on my hard drive again; I despise artificial difficulty.

 

[V4Viewtiful]

I can't be the only one who snickered at this, I mean the could have just let the internet put the knife in EA but they went in for the castration XD

(too graphic?)

 

[ecoho]

honestly if they put in another 2 hour fucking prologue I wont play Witcher 3. im sorry I like good story telling but if your game takes up 2 hours of my time and explains fuck all in way of plot till the last 3 mins then you have not done your job right! more importantly making games difficult for the sake of difficulty is just complete bull shit, that said Dark souls did it right, DS2 did it wrong. were are my FF6, chrono trigger, and ninja gaidians? you know games that were challenging but not fucking arcade game hard!

 

[JarinArenos]

I'll agree that "easy" is a joke in most games. However, I find that "normal" provides just the right amount of challenge for ME in most games, so I do hope that there's an equivalent "easy" setting for TW3.

 

[Jake Martinez]

I'm a fan of increased difficulty. Even on the hardest settings these days most games are childishly easy.

I really love the idea of permadeath (with no save even). I think if you go this route that obviously should you not only get an achievement, but you should be rewarded with an alternate extended ending (and maybe some additional content along the way). I think this would be fantastic.

 

[JET1971]

And there are players like myself who play RPG games like The Witcher, Skyrim, Mass Effect 1-3 for the story and not the combat. I do enjoy challenging combat but really not in an RPG. Easy mode should be just that easy. Medium shouldn't make anyone sweat and boss fights should be survivable without a dozen healing potions. hard or harder is where challenge should be at for those that want it, easy for those that aren't playing for the combat, and medium for everyone else. That's why there are those three modes to begin with. Games too easy? fix the hard mode!

For challenging combat I want it in my FPS games, 1-3 shot = 1 kill with no auto health regen rather than the 1 magazine = 1 kill or hide until health refills in todays FPS games.

But CD Projekt Red is probably going to add more QTE's in Witcher 3 than there ever was in Witcher 1 and call that challenge. Witcher 1's combat was absurd with the QTE system in normal combat much less the idiotic boxing BS. Note to game developers, QTE's do not belong in FPS or RPG games!

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Permadeath in a free roaming game. There's just something really scary about it. It's too much like real life.