The Witcher: Enhanced Edition review (PC)

The Witcher is a masterpiece, pure and simple – combining the depth of socio-political intrigue in Deus Ex with the role-playing sensibilities of Knights of the Old Republic, only with swords.

Sure, when it was first released it was definitely what one would call a rough diamond, plagued by annoying bugs and poor loading times, a number of players were either put off for good or began to wait hopefully for the patches.

Thankfully, CD Projekt acknowledged the problems and began to vigorously polish its magnum opus, a process that culminated in the release of the Enhanced Edition (the version we’re looking at here).

All the loading time issues have pretty much disappeared and, while there are a couple of little niggles here and there, the whole package is so much more stable than when it first saw the light of day.

Coupled with the veritable bounty of extra materials and bonus discs that are included in the Enhanced Edition, you’ve got a package that should appeal to all fans of modern RPGs.





The Witcher follows the adventures and escapades of Geralt of Rivia, legendary swordsman, warrior and lothario (more on that later).

Discovered unconscious in the midst of a raging storm by a small group of his fellow witchers, Geralt is taken to the crumbling fortress of Kaer Morhen, their current base.

Geralt has, in one of the oldest of gaming’s clichés, lost virtually all of his memory, so one of the things you’ll end up doing throughout is piecing together Geralt’s life before this amnesia set in.

The witchers are elite warriors, but are few in number, having been persecuted by jealous and racist humans for a number of years.

Brutal training regimes and the ingestion of powerful mutagens transform fledgling witchers into elite warriors, with lightning reflexes, immunity to contagious diseases and various other skills and abilities ‘normal’ humans don’t have.

This is one of those areas of socio-political intrigue mentioned in the introduction and is indicative of why The Witcher offers so much more than virtually all of its contemporaries.

Geralt and his kind are ‘mutants’ and, as such, are treated with racist contempt by the society they inhabit. This issue is also visible in the attitude humans take to dwarves and elves, forcing them to live in ‘non-human’ ghettos and denying them basic civil rights.

To find this kind of thing in an industry where an ‘adult theme’ usually just means scantily clad women and running over pedestrians, The Witcher’s willingness to address this and other issues is refreshing.





The Witcher also expands upon the idea of character morality, allowing the player to choose between ‘good’ and ‘evil’ responses to various situations.

Normally, this sort of thing is pretty basic, as it is in Knights of the Old Republic. In that game, there is little ambiguity in the decisions – outcomes tend to be black and white, with good and evil outcomes.

This isn’t the case in The Witcher, with the choices offered being much murkier, a decision between the lesser of two evils.

For example, at one point you are asked to decide the fate of another character, faced with an angry mob calling for her head.

There is evidence of evildoing on both sides, with neither being a ‘good’ choice. One has been profiting from the misdeeds of the other, making sure to exploit and blackmail those in the community with secrets to conceal.

The other has been guilty of heinous crimes, but claims to have been 'led astray' by the machinations of the other.

Both choices affect the storyline significantly too. Choose to defy the crowd and they return later to exact revenge. Choose not to and you could in fact be making things easier on yourself, but in the process condemning a ‘less guilty’ person to a gruesome death.

These decisions add significant replay value to the game, especially as some decisions only ‘bear fruit’ much further into the game.





As for the game mechanics themselves, The Witcher employs a relatively unique form of pseudo-rhythm-based combat that might seem overly simplistic at first.

Essentially, you click on the enemy to attack and Geralt swings his blade a bit at the enemy. That’s it really.

Well, not quite. Click again when the sword icon is illuminated by flames and you perform a second attack, then a third and so on.

By the end of the game, you’ll have levelled up your combat abilities to such an extent that stringing together a series of five or so attacks will lead to devastating and visually thrilling results.

The reason I say the combat is initially simplistic is because, when you start the effective tutorial section at Kaer Morhen, you will only have access to one attack combos, so it will feel quite tepid and unexciting.

This doesn’t last long though, as you are soon given access to the three different styles of combat – strong, fast and group.

The strong style is designed for large, single enemies, for whom brute force is more important than quick reflexes. Likewise, the fast style is for use against more agile, weaker foes.

The group style is probably the most exciting to utilise later on in the game, when you are surrounded by enemies. When you are dealing death to up to nine foes simultaneously, you can’t help but get swept up in the excitement of the combat.

Players can also pause the action to change styles, switch from steel to silver swords (more damaging to monsters) or select one of five ‘magic’ disciplines, which include the command of fire, a shield against damage and a Force Push-kind of thing (a personal favourite).

This latter ability can stun or knock down an enemy (something that there is also a small chance of doing in normal combat). Once stunned, Geralt can instantly kill most enemies with a ‘finishing’ move, a stylish manoeuvre that can only be implemented at these times.

Another unique element to the combat system is the way in which potions are used. Normally in RPGs, you can unrealistically quaff loads of them right in the middle of combat. Not so in The Witcher.

It might annoy those schooled in the traditional methods of RPG combat tactics, but in this game you’ll have to drink the potions before fighting commences.

There are also no ‘instant healing’ potions either, with health regeneration occurring over time. This will also annoy people, although you do get used to it.

That is perhaps the best thing you can say about The Witcher’s unique combat system – it might seem strange at first, but once you ‘get’ it, everything clicks into place and feels very natural.





Even the alchemy system is a relative breeze, certainly compared to those employed in other games.

To gather ingredients, you need to research and learn about them, either from books, scrolls or from other characters in the game.

Once you’ve levelled up your Intelligence skill to the requisite level, you can then begin to brew up potions, bombs and sword oils to use in combat.

For example, slaughter a ghoul without having knowledge of the ingredients you can extract from its corpse and you’ll only be able to obtain the most rudimentary of materials.

Do so with extensive knowledge and you receive more from the endeavour, meaning you can brew better potions and so on.

This also goes for herbalism and the collection of wild flowers. You won’t be able to harvest white myrtle flowers, for instance, without Geralt knowing how to recognise them.

Once you’ve done this, you can enter the alchemy screen and brew up various concoctions, such as potions to help you see in the dark, to slow down the passage of time or to greatly increase your endurance regeneration.

Most potions are toxic to some degree and imbibing a number of them at once can lead to Geralt being overwhelmed, blurring his vision and affecting his performance in combat.

This adds another level to the tactical use of potions, as you can’t just load Geralt up on drugs before a battle without suffering the consequences.





Graphically, The Witcher is impressive without being stunning. Weather effects are pleasingly robust, with rainstorms reducing visibility to a minimum and adding a great deal of atmosphere when Geralt is stuck out in the swamps at midnight.

What is more impressive, at least to this reviewer, is the way in which characters run to hide from the rain. This adds literally nothing to the game itself, but this attention to detail is something that permeates The Witcher from start to finish.

It is one of those games that gives back as much as one puts in. You can just breeze through the main storyline if you want, but you’ll miss out on so much that is going on elsewhere.

The sheer number of side quests and extraneous content is very impressive, culminating in the essentially pointless ‘sexual’ missions.

This is one of the more infamous elements of The Witcher, one which I touched upon earlier by describing Geralt as a lothario.

As the story goes along, Geralt has the chance to ‘bed’ an impressive number of womenfolk, from witches to wenches, princesses to paupers.

Before the more cynical among you get on your high horses about this ‘childish’ addition to the game, it might be worth knowing that these quests are entirely optional, although sometimes they can actually be used to make sure a female character is on your side as events unfold.

Certainly, it isn’t built into the game as much as Mass Effect’s infamous ‘sex scene’. If you want to pursue the ladies, you can; if you don’t, there is no downside.





The Witcher is a fantastic achievement, especially considering it hasn’t come from a major US studio with a vast budget. It is a game that rewards those interested in complexity of character, as well as fans of visceral, stylish action.

The plot invokes heady memories of Deus Ex’s conspiracy laden tale and, like every good page-turner, you always want to see what happens next.

There are little issues, however. Conversations sometimes end without all the questions have been asked, prompting you to click again (sometimes more than once) to ‘complete’ the dialogue.

Some enemies are a little uninspired and a drag to fight – the echinops and archespore plants, for example - while it is a bit silly that the character models are repeated so often. A bit more effort could have been made there.

The setting is also perhaps a bit too generic for some – regardless of the excellent discussion of mature issues in the game, it is still just elves and dwarves all over the place (although there is an interesting fish-worshipping cult in the swamps, echoing the works of Lovecraft).

Additionally, the character of Geralt is one that might bore the sort of people who didn’t like JC Denton in Deus Ex – he has a very similar timbre to our favourite augmented hero.

However, I’m stretching to find things that are wrong with the game. None of these things really impact on the exciting combat, intelligent characterisation and page-turning plot.

The Witcher is the sort of game people will look back on in ten years with great fondness, the sort of reaction reserved for only the very best titles.

Anybody who claims to love PC games should check it out, there really is little excuse not to.

9.5/10

David Brown