I can't wait to play The Witcher 3

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It looks so epic

Yeah it looks interesting. However the Witcher games fell out of favor with me since I found Souls 2: Scholar of the First Sin (PC DX11 version).

The combat system in that game is absolutely impressive. It is 100% player skill based and its rather realistic when it comes to weapon reach and the timing of combat. Magic is overpowered but it is balanced with the fact that pure mages have poor survival rates in melee.

The game itself is old school RPG. There is no hand-holding and coddling the player through the game. There is no map (not even a static one), no GPS locator, no glowing arrows or anything to indicate who gives quests...nor is there any type of HUD element indicating what is friendly and what is hostile.

The maps are designed so that you must explore. Things like hidden walls, out-of-sight yet easily visible once nearby items on the ground... and the people that design the maps do an excellent job at 'hiding' them.

Weapons and armor have durability and break if you do not take care of them. For example if you strike an unarmored enemy (flesh) the durability of the weapon goes down just a tiny bit..against an armored opponent it goes down somewhat...but if you swing against a rock, the floor, a wall or a door the durability goes down a lot per swing. Same goes for armor.. if you get hit by an AOE attack then multiple armor pieces get hit..by a piercing attack then only the armor piece that took the hit loses it. The bigger the weapon you're hit with the more damage it does to your armor.

Player's health is not a bar that the enemy nibbles down... heck no, if you get hit once by ANYTHING you watch 25% or more of your health bar vanish. Armor mitigates some health damage but its primary purpose is to prevent you from losing poise and staggering... which basically means if you get hit your character is 'stunlocked' from the pain/impact for a second. The better your armor the less time you spend stunlocked and the more hits you can take before getting stunlocked.

Combat is based on defense and timing of attacks. There is no mindless click-spamming of high damage attacks since your stamina is depleted for every action you take.. you can do two strong attacks before you get depleted. Depleted stamina recovers at a certain rate and if you have low or no stamina you cannot run or parry or block. You literally only have four attacks per weapon..and only 3 are available all the time (normal attack, strong attack and jump attack..each leaves you vulnerable while swinging for X time, the harder it hits the longer you are open). The other type special situation strikes.. backstab/riposte/run-through that have pre-requirements. You have parry/guard break and shoulder charge strikes that are meant to be the pre-requirements for the special situational attacks.

There is a death penalty. Dying makes you lose max HP points. You can die until your available health reaches 50% of max which is a significant setback given that it means you die in one or two hits rather than four or five. To regain your lost max health you need to use a consumable which is hard to come by. If that wasn't bad enough, if you die you lose your 'money' ... there is only one 'coin' in the game: souls (gained by defeating enemies)...your money is left at the spot you died in...and you must go back and pick it up. If you die on the way to pick it up, you lose it for good.

Oh, did I mention enemies will respawn fully every time you die? And that when you die you respawn at the entrance to the zone (bonfire)? So yeah, if you died 'deep' in the zone you will have to fight them all again and not die to get your money back. To prevent an enemy from respawning you have to kill them ten times...and you respawn them by resting in the bonfire (which resets the zone respawning all enemies...but the money you dropped when you died remains no matter how many times you rest at bonfire..only your death or picking it up removes it).

Did I mention there is no 'XP' to level up in the game? Nope, you level up by using money to increase your stats (and there's lots of them, very complex interactions). Each stat point you gain = +1 level. So yes, losing your money is BAD mmkay?

Enemy AI is also quite impressive. The 'dumb' monsters can easily be defeated but you're in trouble when multiple of them come at you. Smart enemies are a challenge to fight because they don't zerg rush and spam attacks at you..they actually fight defensively and focus on blocking/parrying you and strike at you when you are open or after they see you waste stamina. I once spent 4 minutes swordfighting a single NPC since neither of us could land a decisive hit.

Multiplayer is unique... each player has his own single-player world that overlaps with other player worlds.. thus you can leave written messages on the ground and others around your level will see them...and you can summon friends (human players) from their worlds to help you co-op. PVP is enabled by having other players invade your world (to kill you and take your money!). You can play the game offline though if you dont want to have co-op or PVP.

The game is simply amazing.

Witcher 3 I might have a look at, not sure... I've only tried the second game, and that was the PC version, which was... a terribly botched port. I (and many others) found it unplayable due to it's controls, which seem to have been designed by a madman. Not really the best intro to the series... so I'm not too sure on the third game.

As for the Souls games, ehhh... they're okay I guess. They ended up being one of those series that seemed challenging for a bit, but that loses that aspect quickly. They make me think of the old (as in, the earliest) Castlevania games; stilted, sometimes awkward movement for the player characters (well, by my own definition anyway, as I'm very picky about controls) and difficulty that can be mostly cancelled through memorization. Granted I have a warped idea of what "difficult" means, but still, that's been my constant experience with the series.

I dont include multiplayer PVP in that though, as I prefer to just avoid it due to finding it annoying.

Decent games, but a bit slow for my taste. Amazing that the series has come so far now.... I still remember importing the Asian version of the original Demon's Souls (which was, for no apparent reason, in english, even the voices) and showing it to friends, who were quite impressed by it. ....which is quite possibly the ONLY time that's ever happened. Usually I show a game to someone and they're either repelled by thinking it's too hard, or they just dont "get it" as they say. Which is annoying...

I was disappointed in the way Witcher games are so scripted, you have to follow a certain path, and how short they are, as soon as I built up a decent character, the game was finished!
I prefer the Elder Scroll games that are sandbox and last so much longer.
Is Witcher 3 going to be more like this?

Looks interesting and have a vast world that appears to be beautifully designed, populated and explorable. But I'm still not sure how to feel about it... Will wait for the release and try it myself before buying it.
About the Souls games I played Demon Souls and Dark Souls 2 but only beated Dark Souls 2. I don't like games where my character feel as heavy as they do on this serie too much, even though this add a lot to make the game feel more realistic. The games are fun, but this type of slow gameplay is not the one that I enjoy the most. Bloodborne on the other way felt better on this aspect in my opinion.

I loved the trailer of the game and eagerly waiting for the game play. I have already pre ordered the game online .

I am counting down the days until I can play. I can't wait!