Clutch8: I am disappointed. The engine was amazing, but graphics can never replace a good storyline. There were too many branches of the story that felt they were only discussed and not lived. The choices and consequences are a great element, but they need to be balanced with a narrative that makes sense and rewards the audience for the journey. I felt that this game, which is still a must play, lost some of the essence that made the Witcher 1 phenomenal. The voice acting and heavy story elements, along with tough combat are the games strengths, but this story that created so much interest in the Witcher 1 fizzled out into kingly debauchery that was hard to watch. Case in point - no Alvin, no Dryads, no Adda, and no Kalkstein. It's as if the first game didn't happen except for the very end with the attempt on Foltest's life (and that's not even addressed by Letho on who it was that failed, and what he meant when he declared Geralt was one of them). So much missing plot wise!

Nyeen: I'm looking through Google for any info on a expansion. Does anybody know something?

Corylea: I loved TW2 but not as much as TW1. And yes, I was disappointed in the ending.

Having the whole thing be a Nilfgardian plot seemed sort of obvious. Oh, the bad guys from the books are the bad guys here, too? The bad guys are still bad? How ... predictable.

Also, Letho's motivation didn't make much sense to me. I can see where restarting a witcher school could be a big motivator, but starting a witcher school in order to make mutant assassins for Nilfgard -- and why else would Nilfgard be interested in starting a witcher school -- seems like it should be anathema to any witcher. Letho isn't stupid, naive, or unskilled in double-dealing, yet he seems to take Nilfgard's plan to restart the Viper school at face value. Huh? I don't buy it.

And I didn't feel as if I got as full an explanation as I wanted of Geralt's return to life and his amnesia. Whenever you leave the Wild Hunt, you have amnesia because ... well, just because. Or was there an actual reason in there that I managed to miss?

It seemed to me that the events in TW1 were wrapped around Geralt. In TW2, it seemed like Geralt played a significant role in events that weren't about him at all. From what I hear, that IS true to Sapkowski's books ... but that doesn't make it a fun game to play.

I think the game is stunningly beautiful, and some of the cutscenes are just WOW. But that's not the same as the game's being fun; I actually enjoyed The Witcher 1 more.

I think for me the main drawback of TW2, as compared with TW1, is that so few of the people in TW2 are actually likeable. In TW1, I liked both Siegfried and Yaevinn. I liked Thaler. I liked Vincent Meiss. I liked and admired Shani. I'm not sure that I liked Vaska, but I thought she was interesting. Sure, we hate Javed and the Professor, but there were a lot of likeable people to ally with or even just to talk to.

In TW2, I don't really like anyone except for the characters who are repeating from TW1. I don't care that much for Vernon Roche, nor do I like Iorveth all that much. Henselt is an @sshole, and I despise Dethmold. I haven't met anyone as good-hearted as Vincent Meiss or as entertaining as Thaler, no one as interesting as Yaevinn. Being with all these horrible people left a bad taste in my mouth.

I really just wanted to kill the lot of them, take Zoltan, Dandelion and Triss, and go far, far away.

Snarfinator: Did you play the Iorveth path yet? it has more likable characters by far compared to the Roche path. Also if you played the Roche path how can you not like Vess?

AutomaticMeat: Overall, like you I enjoyed the Witcher 1 more than the sequel. It felt more 'folky' to me. Lots of different monsters types and interesting background lore concerning pretty much everything.

AutomaticMeat: I would have enjoyed more dialogue with the 'core group' of Geralt's friends (especially Triss, I felt dialogue with her was altogether far too sparse).

AutomaticMeat: No doubt repeating many others, I was disappointed with the brevity of chapter 3 and the epilogue. I don't feel that it did the game justice, especially when compared with the excellent first two chapters. I still thought it was an excellent game, just a little lacking when compared with the first when it came to the small things.

Snarfinator: Some of the "I like Witcher 1 better" feelings come from the fact that the first game was such a huge surprise. It was made by a developer that until TW1 nobody had ever heard of, and was such a good game, by a small, unknown developer that people were wowed. That is a tough act to follow, no matter how good the second game is.