The quests. All the side quests were relevant to Geralt’s profession, Geralt’s main quest, Geralt’s friends, Geralt himself, or situations that were directly affecting Geralt’s in some way. The quests don’t feel like chores, because they each of them plays into the character’s motivations. I have never seen that in an open world game before. Even Gwent, the most optional of pastimes, heavily features Geralt and friends, so I get why he’d want to collect these.

The quests also overlap each other every now and then and have unforeseen consequences later on, so they feel more organic than the quest list of other games. That they happen to expand on the world building/lore is a welcome bonus. The monster hunting missions also have so much variety that they never really get old and, on higher difficulties, help you learn how to use Signs, potions and oils that you may not have bothered with otherwise.

To me, Witcher 3 surpasses the highest standard for a game’s quest list. Whether anyone enjoys them is a matter of taste, but it is undeniable that the writers and developers put in an unparalleled effort in tailoring these quests to serve the narrative. To do that on the scale of Witcher 3’s size and length makes it seem like it must have been easy for them, when it seems virtually impossible for any other developers/writers.

Witcher 3’s quest system is unrivaled.

U can understand this however this game are an evolution way beyond FC or AC, if they took notes from older games then I'd say they perfected those workings to preferring. Skyrim has slow adventure, TW3 has face paced storytelling adventure and I guess it'll always come back around to not sitting TW3 in games like these cause they aren't the same. 

The Blood and Wine expansion is (IMO) among the very best experiences in gaming, ever. Part of it is the mini-world of Toussaint is simply pleasant to play, easy to lose yourself in.
Although, the Wedding during Hearts of Stone is my all-time favourite story chapter of any game.

For me, Witcher 3 happens to be one of those timeless great works of gaming art. And yes, Death March IMO is the best way to play. it's very well balanced in that it's not particularly difficult, but it does force you to use all your tools rather than just picking whatever you want to win however you want... Ironically, playing on the easier difficulties may actually be more difficult in the end, because you can get quite a distance into the game, and then suddenly you get to a part where you simply don't know what to do, don't have the proper skills, and such... Death March, for the most part, requires you to learn and develop everything... both from a simulated RPG type gameplay, and from a player-based gameplay knowledge and practice perspective.

As a note, the game is quite a bit different than the books. While there are numerous adapted stories, it's in the context of sequels. Books and games are completely different mediums. A lot of people (mainly surrounding the Netflix show hating people) often ignore this so they can fanboy-signal in a circle spank of fanboy pessimism.

Side note, I have a Blood and Wine New Game + save to go whenever I have the Witcher 3 itch.

And yeah. No matter what, this is going to be a great game now, it'll be a great game in 10 years, and it will be a great game in 30 years.

Witcher 3 is walking the very line between Action-RPG and Action-Adventure, and while it excels as latter, it is quite average as former.

So, if your looking for better action RPGs, there are plenty (and that means actual RPGs, not adventure games masquerading as pseudo RPGs), as well as better action adventures...but yeah, as that weird combo of both, so far it's pretty much at the top, with Dawn of the Bloodwalker potentially dethroning it soon (being directed by the same guy who directed Witcher 3).

Combat got repetitive, as in the move sets and animation ,and the camera for combat could have been better. Best parts were the cinematic moments, but there wasn't enough of it. Still great game

:(. What difficulty? 

As I go along on this run I'm analysising this question and I'm getting so hyped again, the down side are soooo few, like getting trapped in imations and what not but everything else is blowing my mind again and I've been through this game 3 and a half times before. I'm at 20 hours and I've barely scratched the surface, I'm still level 6 and I've been playing super precise cause I know the game like the back of my hand. It's super exciting to feel this all over again and still after all this time, like the first time I played it.

I had a few minor niggles with it, like the combat, while very competent, not having as much depth as some other more involved action titles.

Still one of the top 10 greatest games of the 2010s in my book though, and probably my #3 open world game ever made after only BOTW/TOTK.

If they bring it to Switch 2 I'll give the new expansion a go for sure, really loved both prior ones. (To answer the poll, while both were terrific, I thought Blood and Wine was the better one)

Yeah, but upping the game to Deatharch makes it very tactical. It's like WuKong without the flashy moves, you have to master dashing and rolling on time. When there is groups of enemies the combat can get very involved and you need to actually build out Geralt, use Signs and oils and bombs. I find very little difference than Ghost of Yotei and this game, but are extremely simple even if GoY has more weapons swapping but those are needless on low difficulties. It's not the greatest but it's better than competent and way better than something like Skyrim however I agree, if TW4 gets that right and closer to something like Sekiro it'd be great but one of these games will never get masterclass combat. It's like GTA or RDR never having masterclass gunplay, just enough to be fun and that's it. 

Man I wouldn't even buy Witcher 4 if its combat resembled anything from Fromsoft, I hate that shit lmao

I'd more like to see taking the current system and making it more fluid and adding more techniques.