Wiedzmin 2: Zabójcy królów (Video Game 2011)

The player is Geralt of Rivia, a professional monster slayer, a witcher. Entangled in the political turmoil that engulfed Temeria, Geralt helped quell the rebellion of the Order of the ... See full summary »

Director:

Adam Badowski

Writers:

Jan Bartkowicz (story), Marcin Blacha (additional dialogue),

Stars:

Doug Cockle, Alexander Morton, Antony Byrne

1 win.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Doug Cockle	...	Geralt of Rivia (voice)
Alexander Morton	...	Zoltan Chivay (voice)
Antony Byrne	...	King Foltest (voice)
David Annen	...	Dethmold (voice)
Eiry Hughes	...	Saskia (voice)
Jaimi Barbakoff	...	Triss Merigold (voice)
James Barriscale	...	Bernard Loredo (voice)
John Schwab	...	Dandelion (voice)
Laura Rogers	...	Ves (voice)
Mark Frost	...	Iorveth (voice)
Mark Healy	...	Vernon Roche (voice)
Mark Lewis Jones	...	Letho of Gulet (voice)
Nico Lennon	...	King Radovid V The Stern (voice)
Nicola Walker	...	Sile de Tansarville (voice)
Pandora Colin	...	Philippa Eilhart (voice)

Storyline

The player is Geralt of Rivia, a professional monster slayer, a witcher. Entangled in the political turmoil that engulfed Temeria, Geralt helped quell the rebellion of the Order of the Flaming Rose. Soon after, he saved King Foltest's life when the monarch was attacked by a witcher-like assassin. He continues to protect the king, serving as his bodyguard as Foltest strives to bring peace to his kingdom. The Order's last bastions have yielded to the royal army, yet one more task remains - the Baroness La Valette announced her secession from the realm, and her fortress must be taken. A month after the attempted assassination, Foltest's armies stand at the gates of La Valette Castle, preparing for a final assault. Still at Foltest's side, Geralt is among them, unable to begin his personal quest to discover the mysterious assassin's origin and identity...

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Plot Keywords:

monster | alchemy | sword and fantasy | spell | sequel | 

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Genres:

Fantasy

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Details

Country:

Poland

Language:

English

Release Date:

17 May 2011 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings

Company Credits

Production Co:

CD Projekt RED

Technical Specs

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Connections

Featured in Sage Reviews: The Witcher 2 (2012)

User Reviews

In the role of gaming

First of all, make no mistake, this is a very good game, just as The Witcher was. It is however NOT a role-playing game in the traditional sense, where you can take on the role of virtually anybody - you are playing as Geralt of Rivia, period meaning you cannot make free decisions - everything boils down to that you are Geralt of Rivia, a witcher. In other games like Mass Effect or Dragon Age, you form your role within slightly wider borders - Mass Effect's Commander Shepard can be a black woman or Asian male if the player would like to, giving slightly better immersion than The Witcher.

Background: Since it is possible to import a save from The Witcher and play on from that, some dialog has been adapted to that, like if Adda lives or died for example. However, a lot of key elements and key characters are simply forgotten and plays no part here, which is a crying shame.

Story: The story in The Witcher 2 is a quite complicated political story, but brilliantly written and executed, and one that does not seem forced. It feels plausible simply put, and the side quests are very good as well even if there are the usual DHL missions (fetch this and deliver it there) but they are quite few. Most side quests are actually deep, meaningful and play a part in the overall scheme. That said, nothing is given freely and sometimes one is forced to simply wait until another mission has played out, which is odd and frustrating.

The mini-games: Part of the game are the mini-games - new is the arm wrestling, but the knuckle fights are still here as well as the dice poker, and these games are simply brilliant. Not only can you make money from them, they are missions in their own right.

The sex: Yes, there is sex in the game, much more explicit than in any other game I've seen, but still keeping a main stream movie style, and I have yet to see two that are alike. I think this is actually quite refreshing, and perhaps it will push gaming into the adult entertainment box instead of being seen, more and more wrong, as something for kids. The sex scenes are very tastefully done, and CD1 should take full credit for that. The potential sex partners are fewer than in The Witcher, but Geralt can still enjoy himself with a wide range of good-looking females.

Graphics: Top-notch. Even if some characters changed their look a lot (including Geralt himself) the entire gaming world paints a very nitty-gritty picture, where there is dirt, mud and every piece of leather shows signs of wear and tear. It is a beautiful world in its own way, and the scope is grand.

Sound and music: Also top-notch. Here I should mention the voice-acting, and this is where the games gets a jackpot. Not a single character is out of place, not a word uttered the wrong way. Someone took great care in directing the actors, who all put in a wonderful effort.

Playing: Here the game let me down. First off, I play with the arrow keys in all games where moving around matters, but it was not possible to keymap the arrows, until a found a solution on a forum and some tweaking of a ini-file. Bad CD1, very bad.

Next came the main feature of games of this type, combat. If you are about to play this game, invest in a good new mouse, because it is a click-click-click-game, and frankly, I hate that. Add to this the fact that sometimes Geralt won't respond to keystrokes, meaning he might be in very deep poo.

Then comes potions, which can NOT be used whenever you feel like it - Geralt has to be in so much safety that he can go into meditation mode for that, and that sucks even worse and can cost a lot in potions if they are used at the wrong time ('ok, this might be a bad place, better buff. Oh, it wasn't...'). It steals away from the gaming experience that Geralt can not walk into an ambush, buff on the fly and fight his way out of it - the usual way I used was simply walking into whatever was ahead, check the resistance and load a saved game for buffing.

But to conclude, despite the small flaws, this is a very good game which will make hours fly away. Highly recommended.