(logo trills) - [Falcon] Well, the news
many have been waiting a long time to hear has dropped, there is a new "Witcher"
game in development. We could probably talk all day about things we wanna see in it, but let's try to agree on
some stuff that we don't. Hi, folks, it's Falcon
and today on Gameranx, 10 things we don't want in "Witcher 4." Starting out with Number 10, and this is an obvious one, but yeah, for it to run terribly on the previous generation of consoles whenever it comes out. We don't want another
"Cyberpunk" situation. We've talked endlessly about
all the problems that game had when it first launched
back on November 9th, 2020, and one of the biggest and
most embarrassing problems was how the game performed
on the PS4 and Xbox One. Keep in mind too, those were the target console
platforms for the game. There wasn't a PS5, Xbox
Series X version of the game available when it launched. Now, the game performed much better when those powerful consoles
became the target consoles, but it took until February 15th, 2022 for an actual next gen version of the game to be made available. Basically, they released a game that was meant to be
a graphical powerhouse and a showcase for next
generation hardware, but yeah, the PS4 isn't that. You can't fully take
advice of that hardware. So for "Witcher 4," just to be clear, whatever they end up calling it, we just hope that the game is made with next gen hardware in mind. It's entirely possible,
maybe even somewhat likely, PlayStation 6 and whatever
Xbox thing comes next will be releasing around the time this game actually comes out. If that sounds far-fetched, remember that "Cyberpunk"
was first announced in 2013, firmly in the late PS3, Xbox 360 era. There's part of the game
that alludes to Ciri being in the "Cyberpunk" world, so we kind of just hope "The Witcher 4" whenever it actually does come out, runs well on every console
they release it for. At the end of the day it's
a development planning issue and hopefully CD Projekt Red, over the next however many years, is able to sort itself out for this. At number nine, this is in a similar
vein to the first point, but we hope you don't need
a beast of a PC to run it. We'd actually like it if the
game managed to scale well on whatever hardware it comes out for. We don't a "Crysis" situation, where a huge chunk of
the PC gaming market's just unable to play the game
because of steep requirements. Obviously, yes, we want
the game to look good. In fact, we'd love it if it
was one of the best looking games of all time. "The Witcher 3," back when it came out, was an absolute stunner. Honestly, it's still is. For a game that old it's
stunning to look at. And even though "Cyberpunk"
was really buggy, the art direction was fantastic
pretty much all the time. So we kind of really wanna see
what they do with "Witcher" with a true upgrade in the graphics. We do know that they're
ditching their in-house engine and moving to Unreal 5, which is both a good sign and
perhaps a cause for concern. Now it's good because Unreal Engine 5 is a well-documented
engine that a lot of people in the industry already know about and have used extensively. It's also incredibly powerful and capable of putting out
some truly next gen stuff. We've talked about Nanite and
Lumen about a hundred times on this channel at this point. The way that it's concerning
is how much CD Projekt Red has pumped monetarily into
its in-house development tools over the years and they
really understand that stuff. I'm hoping they can adapt to
a new engine quickly enough to spend the amount of time that they need to on the next game, because we know Unreal's
capable of doing anything they want to throw at it. It's kind of just up to
CD Projekt Red's staff to move over to the new engine. They're incredibly talented in
terms of everything they do. It's just engine stuff. And if I'm honest, I think
it'll probably work out. They got a long time to do it, and this is a decision
Bethesda should have made about a decade ago. It's good that CD Projekt
Red understands that, hey if we move over to
a well documented engine that is just out-the-box
capable of doing everything we could possibly want it to do, and there's a development team making it, so that it can handle next gen stuff, so we don't have to
actually be doing that, we just have to be making a game. Keep in mind that's exactly what they had to do with "Cyberpunk." They had to update their engine at the very same time
they were making a game. "Cyberpunk" development
was also CD Project Red's internal engine development. And if you want my complete take, I think this is gonna be
a positive development. I'm a big proponent of the Unreal Engine. It's super capable. We know it can be adjusted to
work on just about anything. But once again, it's up to
the developers to step up and give PC gamers the
tools to properly adjust their graphic settings so
basically anyone can run the game, not just people with the
newest and shiniest GPUs. At number eight, we really hope there's no
console exclusive content. This sort of thing's always annoying. Just something we don't
like seeing, like at all. It doesn't really matter what game it is, or why certain content is
exclusive to whatever console, it just sucks when a game's sliced up and given out to gamers piecemeal. Nobody likes a compromised game, and when you drop 60 or
so, 70 bucks on a new game, you don't wanna find out you can't play certain parts of it because you bought it
on the wrong console. That's dumb. It's annoying. It forces people to tediously research what version of the game has all the parts they actually want. And in the end, it's basically
up to the businessmen, and not people who actually
care about the game. Recent examples of this sort of thing includes the Spider-Man DLC
for "Marvel's Avengers," the timed exclusive for
"Destiny" on PlayStation, and the exclusive mode
that nobody played on "Call Duty: Modern Warfare." None of these things are well liked, and, in fact, it killed a
lot of players' enthusiasm. I don't think we even need to get into why making a multiplayer mode
console exclusive is dumb. It seems to self evidently
be a terrible idea, I think. Even when console
exclusive stuff is limited to a few cosmetics or
random weapon or whatever, and it's not that intrusive,
it's still annoying. Do you remember retail exclusives? At least that seems to
be pretty much dead, but I hope console exclusive content ends up going that direction. At number seven, no Geralt. At this point we know pretty much nothing about the next "Witcher" game. They've made a few statements
about what to expect from the franchise in the past, like how Geralt won't be the star of new "Witcher" properties made by them. And that the game won't
be called "The Witcher 4." But all those statements
are at least five years old at this point. And that "Cyberpunk 2077"
launch may have changed a lot of minds as to
making fan-pleasing stuff. Still, it's probably safe
to assume that Geralt won't be the star of this game though. If that ends up being wrong, huge bonus, but don't set yourself
up for disappointment. The tagline on the teaser
says, "A new saga begins." The medallion they've shown is clearly not Geralt's
Wolf School Medallion. We assume that he's not going
to be the main character of this game, but he should
not be completely absent. This is what they need to listen to, Geralt is kind of central to
the story of "The Witcher." He's the protagonist of all
the books and short stories. And he's our viewpoint
character into this world. He's been a huge part of
the entire "Witcher" story and it'd be strange for
him not to appear at all. Of course, do we actually think
he would be completely gone from the next game? No, he'll probably have an important role, possibly not as the
player character though. Or maybe it's a new Geralt saga. I don't know. I would be perfectly fine with that. But a lot of people speculate
that instead of Geralt you'll be playing Ciri in this game, which seems pretty plausible. CD Projekt Red confirmed to Eurogamer it's not necessarily a
Cat School Medallion. It's actually a lynx. So the Lynx School then. Now where exactly that leads, and if Ciri has anything to
do with that, we're not sure, but at least we know something
about this new medallion now. It's pretty unlikely that
there's gonna be a "Witcher" game without Geralt, and that
wouldn't feel right, would it? It's definitely something
we don't want to see. At number six, a "Cyberpunk" style launch. The last thing anyone wants. When "Cyberpunk" first came out it was savaged online for
how poorly it performed. This thing was sluggish, it was buggy, it was everything you could throw at it, in terms of negative words
regarding its performance. There was still a lot to like about it, but it was, again, it
had so many problems, that it actually did some damage to CD Projekt Red's reputation. So for "The Witcher 4" another
bad launch is pretty much the last thing we want to see. The funny thing is, and I kind of think a lot
of people have forgotten, but "Witcher 3" had a
pretty fair share of bugs when it first came out as well. Now it was nowhere near the state that "Cyberpunk" was in at
launch, but it wasn't great. And there was some backlash
in the community at the time. I think there was a big
difference in expectations. "Witcher" didn't have the
same kind of expectations that "Cyberpunk" did, and they also managed
to retain the goodwill by fixing those things quick. It took them a long time to
do that with "Cyberpunk." We're not really hoping for
a bug free "Witcher 4" launch to be honest. That's not a realistic hope. We'd love to see it, but this is not a CD
Projekt Red specific issue. Games are complicated as hell to make. That's pretty much impossible
to squash every bug before release because
everybody has to eventually ship the game that they're
spending money on working on. There is a difference though. "Cyberpunk" was just well past
the line of being acceptable. It was rough. And that was especially if you
were playing it on consoles. The engine switch, I think,
really makes it seem like the game's gonna gonna turn out better. It's obviously up to
planners and studio heads with a clear vision and
also a clear release plan, but the last thing we
want to see is "Witcher 4" with blurry box people in it. Number five, I would not
like to see this game loaded with micro transactions and DLC. You know exactly what
we're talking about here. A Ubisoft style cash shop
filled with cosmetics and other pointless crap
that adds nothing to game. In terms of DLC, the "Witcher 3" is actually
one of the all time best. They gave out tons of stuff for free that most developers would charge for. And the add-ons that
you paid for were huge. On top of that they were fairly priced and contained some of the best
stories in the entire game. So we have hopes that
that's what CD Projekt Red goes for with "Witcher 4." They didn't go out of
control with "Cyberpunk" or anything either though. The DLC situation in that
game is kind of anemic. There is not much DLC at all. For a developer that puts
out such large games, they're still a relatively small studio, so I'm not sure they're
really capable of cranking out nonstop DLC like Ubisoft would, especially if they're
occupied with fixing bugs like they have been for
the last couple years of "Cyberpunk's existence. But who knows at this point. The game is years away and
who knows what they will do in the intervening years. Nothing from the NFT world
in "Witcher 4," please. No one wants that. At number four, locked
first person perspective. Okay, this one's kind
of petty, but come on, it seems like everybody wanted some kind of third person perspective
for "Cyberpunk," but the best we ever got was
being able to see our character and third person while
riding a motorcycle. I think that with
"Witcher 4" it's unlikely that we won't have a third person camera given the type of combat
that's in the game. But since we're talking
about things we don't want, a locked first-person
perspective like "Cyberpunk" is among those things. It works for "Cyberpunk" 'cause
so much more ranged combat is in there. But when we start talking
about magic and casting spells and all the melee combat, I
just don't think it would work, at least not in the way that
makes the "Witcher" series the "Witcher" series. So, yeah. Only being able to see, and it's not even out of the
character creation thing. In "Cyberpunk" you could do
a whole lot of customization to your character but
you'd only see 'em in menus and in mirrors once in a while,
which is a strange choice. Whether we're playing a Ciri or Geralt, there's a lot of reasons why
that wouldn't be a good idea. Now the best of both worlds
would be Rockstar style, being able to switch
between them on the fly. But if we had to choose we'd
much rather see third person. There's basically no way
the next "Witcher" game isn't third person, but we've also been wrong
on stuff like this before. So we just kind of reinforce this. Please do not pull a "Cyberpunk" and lock us into first-person view. Even if you thought it
worked fine for "Cyberpunk," and I do think it worked
fine for "Cyberpunk" in terms of combat, but we weren't always in combat, were we? We don't want that for "Witcher" at all. At number three, boring side
content like in "Cyberpunk." Okay, I know we're harping
on "Cyberpunk" a lot here, but there is a lot of
negativity surrounding that game and I hope it's something that
they address for "Witcher 4." One of the biggest
complaint about that game was how shallow most of
the open world content was. The missions were kind of
cookie cutter and basic, and really didn't add a lot. Compare that to "Witcher 3," which yeah, had a few forgettable side activity but was rich as hell in content. All of the side quests were stuff that I wouldn't
even classify as side content. It just technically was that. It was at the same quality
as any main story anything. "Witcher 3" gave you side content that made you want to experience
everything in the game. And we wanna see more of that instead of the "Cyberpunk"
more stuff is good philosophy. Now I think the switch to Unreal Engine bodes well for this particularly, because as I said in a previous point, switching to Unreal Engine
means all they have to develop is the game. They don't also have to develop the engine to keep up with everything that progresses in the gaming world as they're
in the cycle of development which again is probably
gonna be at least five years. But in all seriousness,
"Cyberpunk" had a ton of dots on the map to explore, but most of it was gang
hideouts, collectibles and stuff, that, I mean, either didn't
need to exist in the volume it appears in or possibly it all. I mean, did anyone
actually do all of this? I didn't. Not even a fraction of it. Hopefully the developers will remember why "Witcher 3" works so well and adjust their approach accordingly. Some side jobs in
"Cyberpunk" were amazing, but there were so many that
ended up just being filler it was easy for players to get burnt out and miss the good stuff. Everything's gotta be
interesting and exciting. So less of that. At number two is unaltered gameplay. Now this might come off
a little controversial but we hope that with "The Witcher 4," they actually take the
time to update the game in a few ways. Like we don't want an overhaul, and to be truthful, it wouldn't be terrible if it
was just "Witcher 3" but more. But there are some areas
where the game can feel a little old fashioned these days. Part of the problem is that
so many open world games have taken influence from "Witcher 3," like "Assassins Creed Origins,"
"Odyssey," "Valhalla," even games like the "Horizon" series. And obviously they're not
bad games, far from it. It's just that that formula
has been seen so much at this point. And especially when we're talking about the investigation stuff,
that aspect of the gameplay. When "The Witcher" first
had you investigate things by looking around the area
you're in, following trails, reading documents, that
stuff felt really fresh, but it's in so many games now that it's become a bit obvious. One big step there is just
make it more in depth, less hand holding, that type of thing. It would be nice if
investigation was actually kind of a puzzle with
you figuring things out rather than completing a checklist. "Witcher 3" is still better
than many of its copycats, but there's always room to try new things. And combat in "Witcher 3" is good. It's just a little old, it's dated. And even back then it got some complaints about being unresponsive
and awkward at times, Complaints I ultimately agree with, especially in the console versions where feels like the controller, particularly in the magic stuff, could have been mapped
just a little bit better. And that doesn't mean
"Witcher 3" isn't a classic, it's genuinely one of
the best RPGs period. But there's no such
thing as any work of art that couldn't be improved upon. And all people creating
things get better at it. This is an opportunity
to make what was great about "Witcher 3" even greater. We don't want to see them pass on that. At number one, if they promise
too much and under deliver. The absolute last thing we want. The hype train before the
release of "Cyberpunk" was completely out of control. And while a lot of that came from people imagining a game in their heads that was never going to exist, the developers do
deserve some of the blame for hyping that game to the moon and setting impossible expectations. I don't know if it was quite
as bad as "No Man's Sky." I mean, "Cyberpunk" was a
tremendous disappointment, but the difference between the
"No Man's Sky" that launched and the "No Man's Sky" that
they had promised would launch, was a bit bigger than
the difference between what "Cyberpunk" was claiming to be and what it actually was. And a lot of the
"Cyberpunk" disappointment came from the game being buggy as hell. But the fact that it's not obvious which one of these situations
is bigger, should say a lot. It was a bad idea for the studio heads to not deny things weren't
going to be in the game. They never outright lied
about what was coming, I guess except for when they did. Well, regardless, I mean, every developer does a lot of hype stuff but people try to keep
expectations within the realm of what they're going to deliver usually. And at a certain point, there was no way that this game
could be what people wanted. A lot of people expected "GTA5" and that level of experience
set in a "Cyberpunk" world. And in reality, what we got was kind of
a stripped down version of "Witcher 3" as a first person shooter. And all that hype basically
just set the game up to fail. And that is not what we
want for "Witcher 4." So don't go around promising stuff, like wall running and multiplayer, along with other random
stuff they said in the game when it actually wasn't. Of course, after all the public schlocking they got over "Cyberpunk," I think it's safe to say
they're gonna be a little more careful this time around. We'll see. But I think nobody will us
to go through that twice in one lifetime. That's all for today. Leave us a comment. Let us know what you think. If you liked this video click Like. If you're not subscribed
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for watching this video. I'm Falcon, you can follow
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