The Witcher: Enhanced Edition

Genuinely exceptional games have been few and far between in recent years on the PC, the Witcher is one of those standout titles that deserves every accolade it gets.

I grew up on and indeed own the vast majority of Black Isle RPGs (Baldurs Gate/Icewind Dale series, Placescape etc) and this is a game which I would list alongside the aforementioned titles in terms of quality.

The game itself stands on its own two feet in that unlike BG/ID its not based around the AD & D universe and perhaps as a result is slightly limited in that you don't have different classes/alignments or vast amount of spells, armour and weapons. Instead the game is more story driven with you (obviously) playing the Witcher, there are limited weapons/spells but the game is of such high quality that you quickly forget about some of the perks of the AD & D universe and comfortably slip into the role of the mysterious (womanizing!!!!) Geralt.

In regards to the enhanced edition I guess you could just upgrade your original Witcher using the enhanced patches and grab the bonus content from the official site as to the developers credit its all free, but I would add that it takes a painful 1-2 hours to patch the game upto the enhanced edition and the last time I looked the mirrors for all of the additional content included in this package were being hit hard to the point where downloading them was impossible so I ended up buying it instead.

To be honest its such a great bundle that its worth rebuying the game and is one of the very few PC titles that I'd happily heap praise upon from a great height.

Well worth the money.

I owned the original version of The Witcher and loved it so much that I just had to get the retail version of this with all the extras rather than simply download the new content. Needless to say I'm not disappointed, CD Projekt have done a fine job of re-mastering this already great game.

Gameplay is smoother, dialogue is measured and vastly improved, and the subtle yet significant changes to the game mechanics can be felt every step of the way. I personally like the added challenge of trying to amass vast amounts of money; in the original, it was child's play, playing Dice Poker was like daylight robbery, but now the AI is greatly improved and won't throw away a strong hand anymore. Its these little touches that will put a smile on the face of any Witcher fan.

If there is one slight gripe, its that function to enable EAX effects (with possession of a capable sound card such as a Creative X-Fi series card of course) is still somewhat unpredictable, I had to fiddle around with some settings before I could get it to work. This is more a Vista related issue given the change in sound processing from DirectSound to OpenAL and there seems to be enough internet forum chatter going on about it, so I wouldn't imagine that it'll be long before its ironed out.

As I said however, this is the only inconvenience, and an insignificant one at that, that I can mention about this game. If you love RPGs but don't like the pay-as-you-play online RPG genre, (and you're over 18!!!) then this game is a shining beacon in mature single-player RPG gaming. Buy it!

The Enhanced Edition is basically what the developers originally wanted The Witcher to be. It isn't massively different but it does have a much polished and professional finish to the game. This includes voice acting, graphics and tweaks on the inventory + much more.

Most developers release a couple of patches that don't even fix all the bugs then statrt on an expansion or sequel. Not here, although patches were released as the original was quite buggy, they announced months ago that they intended to release this Enhanced Version.

And here it is, so credit to you CD Projekt because you have a loyal fanbase and one which will be avidly waiting for The Witcher 2. I think EA should take note!

An Awesome game and the content of this edition is well worth the extra pounds.

If you have already purchased the Witcher game you can down load the enhancements free of charge though they are a few gigs worth if you want it all.
This game deals with adult themes, not just sex, that's more a bit of fun for the player, adult in that there is no good, no evil - just shades of grey and which path you choose is up to you. The fight animation is top notch, the English voice acting has been improved - I didn't think it was so bad the first time around! Playing time is long enough to feel value for money and they've added a couple of short games to the enhanced version two that are more stand-alone.
The game plays well with everything on full on my pc - core2 duo 3.0mhz, 3gb ram, nvidia 8800 gtx, win XP. Initially loading seems slow but quick saves and quick loads are much faster, changes in scene switch quick enough not to spoil the story or make you reluctant to go everywhere you can. You can choose three different viewpoints depending on you play style - high up over the shoulder to right in there!
The developers seem keen to improve things as needed and pass the improvements back free of charge - see above, which is a nice change these days. As for re-playability - I'm on my second journey as Geralt of Rivia and enjoying it as much as the first. I've played Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter Nights, ice wind dale, Morrowind and Oblivion, The Witcher beats them all for story, gameplay and immersion.

The game is brilliant, but I'm dropping a star due to misrepresentation of the product on this page.

The product specs include 'Game manual and game guide' - well the only evidence of these in the package I received were a PDF of the game manual. In short, if you want the maps and manuals you'll need the Enhanced Edition Limited Edition!

Personally I hate on-disc manuals. Cheap and lazy, and you can't consult them in game either. Rah.