If I had to choose one genre of games to play for the rest of my life, chances are I’d pick RPGs. I can’t get enough of them, especially when they’re done well. The Witcher series had been PC exclusive, until just before E3, when an adaptation of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings for Xbox 360 was announced. I say adaptation instead of port, because CD Projekt RED was very clear that it is less a port and more a newly coded adaptation of the recent The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings PC release. They feel that the effort they’ve put into this adaptation will result in one of the most complex games on the Xbox 360 platform.
Geralt of Rivia is on a quest to clear his name and find the assassin who killed the king, the crime he is considered guilty of. There are different approaches to making your way through the fully explorable world of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. Are you a stealth player? Use stuns and stealth movement to earn greater XP while progressing through the game. This is by far the more difficult approach, as stuns are not permanent. On the easier levels, you have maybe a minute before your target awakens. On harder levels, that goes down to a matter of seconds. Don’t care for the subtlety of stealth? Do you prefer making your presence known in a more obvious way, with steel and magic? Lay waste to your enemies as they assemble before you with a brutal combat system that rewards you for chaining magic and melee attacks.
Except for fistfights. Fistfights are quicktime events. Not a big fan of that implementation in a game where everything else is so interactive.
The RED engine used for The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings is a cross-platform development engine, so it’s possible that we’ll end up seeing the game move onto additional consoles in the future. The greatest thing about the Witcher 2, though, is the DLC. All PC DLC is free, but what does that mean for Xbox 360 players? Well, all PC DLC released up to the release date of the Xbox 360 version will be included in-box with the Xbox 360 version. As for continuing to release DLC free for the Xbox 360 version, the desire is still there to support the fans, but I wasn’t able to get a straight yes or no answer from the developer. Regardless, there would be some effort made on CD Projekt RED’s part to support and thank the fans.
Look for our review of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings on PC coming up soon, and keep your eyes peeled for more related news as the Xbox 360 version comes closer!
