After a few hours I can already see how this game is all about crowd control and using map on your favor. The game has many systems that interact with your abilities. It reminds me of Zelda BOTW/TOTK where many combat mechanics can be applied on the fly because the game physics allow many sick combos and effects. 

It make the game a bit unfair though. Enemies are always filled with items and the fact you almost always start the fight with your whole part together make it them hit hard and remove as far as half of your party HP just right of the bat. I'm relliying on reload and cheese enemies with party replacement and stealth, attacking them first to get an upper hand. Mechanically it works, but I find cheesing like this a little immersion breaking 

Otherwise great game. It doesn't have the insane amount of crazy abilities inherited to D&D BG3 has, but the fact it's a system thought specifically for gaming make the combat system to have a more of depth thanks to physics/weather interactions and far many useless crap that only works in tabletop 

Oh, it opens up significantly after the Island with loads more spells and certain abilities I won't spoil and yes, exactly don't forget about inventory tools like oil and grenades to interact with the elemental mechanics of the game. I get ya though, I think they went a bit too far with having a physical and magical shield for you and enemies, it's a great mechanic when you get used to it but the stuff like that and so much environmental chaos makes it feel the odds are against you but I assure you, they are not. I'll spoil one thing for you, if you combine nails with shoes in the crafting you can walk on ice without slipping. This is important to know cause it makes you realise the amount of choices you have in interacting with the game. For example you can dump a load of stats for weight management on your tank, stock up on whatever oil or poison barrels you can find and sneakily place them around a fighting arena with a rouge with telekinesis or stock up on oil flasks with the red Prince and use his fire breath which costs very little AP to keep a group of enemies burning or get Ifan the poison arrows and since Fane heals off of poison you can heal him while doing damage to whatever mob is close to him. Stuff like that. If you find death fog barrels you can wipe out a whole crowd and have Fane survive as your suicide bomber or teleport someone into a trap you've set up prior to battle to keep them out of the fight. It's stuff like that that adds the like DnD emergent gameplay without the chance rolls. You should make a thread, I'd love to hear how your progress with the games goes and how you find things after the world and more mechanics open up, find some way to keep us updated. I've played it three times now and all three were very different experiences with almost all key points in the game being altered. 

Almost the Witcher 3 actually, it's my number 3 or 4. But number 1 is Tales of Symphonia hands down.

Just got in on the Tales games with Arise (loved it) and have a choice of going with Berseria, Vesperia Remastered, Zeteria or Symphonia Remastered all for "free" on PS+ Catalogue, after I have some breathing room. What makes Symphonia your top choice? Everyone says Vesperia. 

FF X for me!

Genuinely clicked on this to say “The Witcher 3” and felt pleased and also chuckled to see the options.

But, yes, The Witcher 3 is my favourite single game ever. Just an fyi, my favourite game series ever is The Legend of Zelda.

I don't get The Witcher 3, it felt like any other fantasy RPG, just boring. I only completed it because it wasn't free. I was curious to try it because everyone was raging how great the side quests were, turned out they were just as boring as the rest of the game.

I consider my fav game to be Deus Ex (2000), but I have lost feelings towards it, but technically and objectively it is still the best RPG ever.

Mainly the story and characters that are unparalelled, along with the best designed dungeons I would say though that's a minor thing. It also has a unique feeling to it, I think the best way to describe it to someone who hasn't played it is that it's basicly the JRPG version of Avatar: The Last Airbender (in terms of feeling, not story specifics)

Edit: Btw if anybody knows other games that feel like that I'm all ears (JRPG or otherwise).

World of Warcraft at launch.

You want your solo rpg? That's fine you can basically mess around by yourself if you want.

You want multiplayer? Also fine, plenty of content for multiplayer.

Lots of secrets, a massive world, tons of content, the perfect fantasy RPG. You can become guild leader or raid leader as well and learn some people/ life skills. The game was challenging when everything wasn't so freely available to everyone. All the classes are fun. PVE and PVP are vastly different skills.

I quit during Warlords of Draenor, and came back to WoW classic and quit again. Came back for Wotlk classic and Season of Discovery last year and quit again. The game is still fun and still completely worth playing. But my decision to save time and experience more of life is also valid. Basically searching for that game that can surpass it.

Have you tried FF14, I know it's more JRPG but it does everything WOW did but more refined and in a MUCH tighter experience plus the community is actually there unlike the toxic mess WOW is now, it retained that sense of community and people will actually help you, plus it's so much easier to meet people on it and you can main all classes on one account. It evolved the MMO RPG genres and is basically the only MMO that is left that is any good. I haven't been on for the last Expansion "Endwalker" or the one releasing now "Dawntrial" so I can't vouch for it past Shadow bringers but man, if you take the time with that game and don't rush it, play it like a single player RPG it's wildly impressive in that right alone and if you wanna skip all the story and B line straight to end game (although it'll take a while without a paid skip) it allows for that and you can get that sweaty WOW min/max, be elite with no room for error but in this case, it's fun to PUG cause the community is so nice. I never really played WoW to that degree but I know enough to know FF14 is better in almost every way.