Mar 232015
To some of you, that headline might look familiar. Didn’t I recommend The Witcher Adventure Game as a good holiday gift? Haven’t I had it listed among my reviews for months?
I reviewed The Witcher Adventure Game as a freelance writer for JBG News… which has since disappeared. As a result, trying to follow the old links currently results in an error. (I’m going to edit them all, but if you find any broken links lying around that I missed, let me know!)
So, let’s talk again about The Witcher Adventure Game.
When I played and reviews this game, I was a complete newcomer to the Witcher series. I hadn’t even read The Last Wish yet. I’m not a big player of board games, either. Therefore, I asked questions like:
- Can you play The Witcher Adventure Game if you’re unfamiliar with the Witcher series?
- Can you play The Witcher Adventure Game if you’re unfamiliar with board games?
As a result, I cautioned readers not to come to my review looking for comparisons to other board games or details on how it fits into the Witcher lore.
If you’re new, however, I can say the Witcher Adventure Game is accessible.
From a lore perspective, this is easy to see. It has no story of its own and only references to places and characters from the Witcher universe. From a gameplay perspective, you might not see it as accessible at first. The tutorial is confusing–although there’s a more in-depth tutorial I only found later, which cleared up my lingering confusion about a few points–and when you start playing it seems like a thousand things are happening at once.
The best way to learn The Witcher Adventure Game is to play it. You might be overwhelmed at first, but the mechanics slowly become clear. You can take a look at my first playthrough to watch my clueless muddling become more and more confident the longer the game goes on.
As you can see, game sessions tend to be rather lengthy, so make sure you have a solid block of time if you plan to play online with other people. A patch added an auto-save feature for single-player games, so if you’re playing against the AI, you no longer have to do it in a single sitting.
Some players find it to be a mean game, as it sometimes seems impossible to do anything without something horrible happening to you. It can be challenging, but once you learn the strengths of each character, you can use strategy to avoid the worst fates and come out victorious.
Now, all of my comments have been based on the digital video game version, sold by GOG.com and Steam. The Witcher Adventure Game also comes as a physical board game, if you prefer to have a real copy on the table in front of you.
Let me know your thoughts on the Witcher Adventure Game, and if you caught my review in its original form, don’t worry–I’ve got fresh reviews lined up for the rest of the week.