At least when beating Diablo in Diablo 1+2 while drinking a hectolitre of health or mana potions...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0Gx8hYi0hQ#t=19

I wonder if there actually is a game that makes fun of that.
At least in Fallout you can get addicted to your little chemical helpers. ^^

I know in Witcher 1&2 it's toxic stuff.

Is it ?

The main reason why I haven't played the Witcher yet is because I heard of too much potion/alchemy-reliance (and I don't like my builds to be too dependant on consumables). It's actually the opposite ?

Drinking too many potions without rest in the first Witcher will fill your Witcher with toxicity (not the song sadly), which can be reversed by drinking another potion which negates toxicity. Yo Dawg, I herd you like potions...

I didn't need to use potions way too much (on normal at least), but they were pretty helpful.

It's the ironic twist that the books made up. They are toxic but can be necessary, even on the lower difficulties. On lower difficulties, you can focus more on traditional combat and some potions/alchemy, but it's mostly for really tough encounters. Now, the frequency of tough encounters vary, but battles do require a good bit of preparation. I really recommend them both, they're pretty different (they both handle alchemy and combat pretty differently, I played 2 on a higher difficulty than I did for 1) and can be tough but they're really great games both of them. Yeah, pretty much.

I see. An uncle of mine used to treat his alcoholism the same way. :-/

If I ever decide to replay the Witcher 1 I would do it on hard as a change of pace, for the simple reason that on normal you don't have to concern yourself too much with potions. So it sounds like you would enjoy normal then.

It's loosely related but I'm playing through Deus Ex IW and when my health needs a boost (and I am low on medi-kits) I chomp through 5 candy bars and 5+ cans of soda. My babe character is so rock-hard that it doesn't even cause her to belch,

No but thanks to this post of yours, I think it would be awesome if an RPG included this. Imagine, drinking so many mana potions, you turn into a mutant?

I like to set a self-restricting rule of no consumables in some games, makes it more of — or only then even — a challenge. The option of potion-binging in games is the bane of the correlation between skillful achievement and satisfying gameplay.