I finished the main story yesterday (yeah I know late to the party). And I honestly don't know what to think about it.
In some way this is probably the best game I have ever played. Its probably the best open world game ever built. But I can't help but feel disappointed about the whole main story. I mean everything about it just seems like corners where cut left and right.

I mean the game is called the Wild hunt. Yet the wild hunt has maybe 20 minutes of screentime. And the king of the wild hunt was about 2 minutes on screen, 1 of which he fights a guy I have no idea why he is there. The nilfgaardian ships were supposed to intercept the naglfar, yet there are mostly skelligers. But its not just the final quest. Its almost everything after the isle of mists is feeling half baked. The sabbath with all the invited guests is literally just imlerith? No other guests? Are we really gathering the lodge for 10 seconds of holding the hands into the air? And achieving nothing by it? The companions don't really have much to say either. Just the same lines they said all game. I just killed radovid and saved you from getting killed roche and you don't have a single line of dialog? And after the dust is settled and ciri defeats the white frost with the power of friendship you get an ending that keeps half of the started storylines unresolved.

As someone who played the witcher games mainly for their great story I just can't help but feel horribly disappointed. I find it really hard to believe this story was written from the same guys who wrote the witcher 1 and 2. I don't even want to play the expansions anymore. Maybe in some time but now I am just bitter how this series ended on such a low note. Sorry for the whine just had to get that off my chest.

If they had put everything into the game that you wanted it would still be in development, and would probably cost two or three times the price. Seriously, there is always a limit to what can be crammed into films, games, books etc. I suspect that your expectations are what's making you bitter, not the game or the quality of it.

Hm. Did you maybe skip a lot of the text and miss out on a bunch of side quests? Several of the things you're asking about are at least touched upon if not covered in the lore and side stuff.

The Wild Hunt is the reason Ciri is running(why you have to go to Velen and Novigrad and Skellige), the reason she's sent to the Isle of Mists, the reason Kaer Morhen falls apart. It's a big part of the history of Geralt and Yennefer, as well. The Hunt is the primary antagonist for the plot, but there's so much else to do I can see why they might seem less prominent. And the guy you have no idea why he's there should be Crach an Craite, and the warlike Skellegers weren't having any of the waiting around when there was a fight in their bay. They and the Nilfgaardians both were fighting the Hunt.

Imlerith is the only important guest. The Hunt was desperately trying to find Ciri and was very busy with their colonized worlds getting devoured by the White Frost. It's reasonable to assume that the King was busy doing kingly things, and the Traveller was probably also being put to use. Why not just send one important representative as an envoy?

The Lodge didn't really achieve nothing. Remember that the Hunt had very powerful magic. The Lodge was there to provide support and prevent the Hunt mages from doing much damage. Sort of like a good defense, just because the other guys aren't getting shots on goal doesn't mean you had nothing to do.

The Radovid thing, while important, doesn't really have much effect in the time frame of the game, but it makes a pretty big difference in the epilogue.

Some of the storylines did seem unresolved, but if it seemed like a large number of them were. Maybe there were quests you didn't finish? Some of it was just a way of showing that the world will go on, there will be other stories to tell, but I didn't get the feeling that much was left unresolved after my playthroughs.

Yeah, I felt the same as you. A fair amount of content got cut there; the 2014 leak suggests that the Wild Hunt were originally going to invade Novigrad, and there would have been more endings than the few that currently exist. Didn't pan out for whatever reason, sadly. Hearts of Stone is amazing, though, and has the same kind of smaller scope and tight writing of the earlier games. Blood and Wine, not so much.

That's just my opinion, obviously, but I definitely think HoS is a safe bet for anyone who didn't feel that the base game's story stacked up to those in previous games.

Isn't individual taste wonderful? Just to let you know that you're in the minority there, though. Most people think the opposite.