It's a masterpiece!

User Rating: 10 | The Witcher PC
I have been playing in original (Polish) version and I must admit that it's the best RPG I have ever played. It's way beyond what Oblivion had to offer, though I spend many hours playing Oblivion on my PS3.

The reasons why this game impressed me so much is not the graphics, as I am spoiled with PS3 with large screen and surround, but
- Realism: You cannot carry 4 armors, 7 swords and 200 potions (as it was in my beloved Oblivion), you cannot produce potions for sale. The Witcher doesn't have a lot of money and you have to carefully choose what you would like to buy. Killing monsters (Witcher's core business) is not a key revenue driver. You have to fight in bars for money, play dices and sometimes being a dog hunter  everything to get this small extra money you can spend on bloody expensive goodies. You also cannot drink 5 potions in the row to improve your hero – most of them are highly toxic and overdosing is harmful for health.
- Combat: my key reference here would be Ninja Gaiden Sigma. The Witcher is not as complex as NGS, but still he can do beautiful things with the sword. For sure it looks better than Oblivions 4 ways to kill with the sword. You will have 6 fighting styles to choose from, each of them good for different purposes and trained separately. Combined with very basic magic skills that Witcher has and very strong potions (that can largely influence the result of the fight) there are much more ways to kill than in any other game. And in addition sometimes you have to do some thinking and preparation before you start a combat  otherwise your hero will get killed.
- Drinking: this is the first RPG, wher you have reason to get drunk with NPC and combat while being drunk is really funny!
- Sex: lots of opportunities to seduce NPCs, some of them really interested, no pornography.
- Context: I will get the English version to see how this game has been translated, but I agree that cultural context makes this game much more to translate than any other. On the other hand this very context gives me so much joy every day I have time to play it. There are a lot of references to Sapkowski's novels, so normally before playing a game I suggest you to buy a full 5 book cycle and read it. You will find the game even more enjoyable. Of course it's not a must, you can play the game without it.
- Quests and their consequences: Just to give an example: I allowed Elves to take arms from illegal arm dealer. As the result one important person from the next chapter was killed with this weapon. If I didn't allow them, they would have been betrayed by the arm dealer and killed (you will find out about it eventually). This means that once you finish the game you can start playing over again to find out what if I did differently.

Now what I didn't like in this game:
- 1GB and ATI x1600 with Core Duo is not enough. The game doesn't work smoothly on my hardware, loading times are too long. 2GB in my wife's laptop (she's playing this too) makes life a lot easier.

Overall I recommend this game to anyone who likes RPGs – in many areas it is a masterpiece. Even if the English translation is far from perfect (I haven't yet played it) it's still something any RPG player must have.