Well into The Evil Within now and I've got to say that it's a very good game and for me is exactly what a survival horror should be, which is great ambience, conserving your ammunition, safe spots and exploring everything you can to get all the supplies that you need. The game's like Resident Evil meets Silent Hill and its weapon and skills development style is almost a copy of The Last of Us.

Another thing is how long the levels actually take as they're not very long, because you spend a whole load of time sneaking about and then going back to collect what you couldn't before and choosing whether you should disarm bombs or not (if you screw up its like back to the last checkpoint) so it's sometimes better to leave them. The story is the only thing that is suspect at the moment but a great game for any survival horror nut.

http://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/st...g?t=1425936249
Chivalry: Medieval Warfare

Picked this up for super cheat today, and have played about a half hour of it so far. I'm late to the party on this game, but man, this one is definitely a lot of fun. The controls will take some time to get used to, mostly because you really have to time your attacks just right in order to inflict damage on an enemy. Other than that though, i'm having a pretty good time.

I haven't noticed that, but then again I always manually select the swords...something I got used to playing Witcher 1 and it stuck.
My minor annoyance is ... how treacherous the swamps can be. Not because of the monsters, toxic gas, curses etc - because it's full of small sinkholes that turn Geralt into a complete moron that forgets how to climb out. I had to load the game from an earlier save 3 times because the White Wolf doesn't know how to get out of a hole ...
My other pet peeve is that the Hattori Hanzo spoof, a retired elven swordmaster turned pierogi maker, has a quest with a recommended level of 24 and I'm only lvl 16 :D
The more I play the more small bugs I notice, I firmly believe just as with previous games, CDProjekt will everntually release an "enhanced edition" with a massive overhaul of some minor mechanics and ton of bug fixes. So while at the moment these really are minor things that don't make this game significantly less awesome, if someone can't play it now and picks it up in 6+ months, they will probably have a better experience.
Having said all that, the game is awesome.
Also, what I find especially amazing is that so far the majority of big quests are based on old European (I recognize most of them as Polish, but maybe some have a .. broader origin, so to say) legends and myths.
For example, and this might seem like a spoiler but it's a minor quest and I won't mention any specifics, at one point this witchdoctor or whatnot asks you to help perform a ritual that will help guide lost souls home, especially since there's a war and quite a bit of them are roaming around. What happens, how it happens, the words they use - to anyone that has anything to do with polish literature or history, it's a recreation of "Dziady", a pre christian pagan ritual practiced by many slavs.

Yeah, very fond of their influences and I am impressed with the lifelike NPCs, environment (like wind in the trees) and so on.

To me, having recently played through Shadow of Mordor which is also an open world 3rd person game, the combat actually seems a little sloppy. Geralt and the monsters are often all over the place. I'm only level 5, but so far, combat felt much tighter and was a lot more fun in SoM.

They are different kind of games, but both use the kind of Assassin's Creed / Arkham Asylum style gameplay.

edit :

Could mention that SoM has the most satisfying combat of this sort that I've ever experienced, so it's a tough contender.

True, Geralt is not as swift as one would like .. but that might be a design choice. Ciri who you get to play from time to time is a lot more agile, the difference is huge.
Having said that, Geralt is usually swift enough. I've learned that if you time it right and use witcher signs properly, combat can be extremely fun, rewarding and spectacular too. Dispatching a horde of wolves/nekkers/drowners without getting hit once is perfectly possible, you just have to time the attacks.
The only aspect of combat that imo sucks are the fist fights - most are easy but some .... There's a fighter called Gorgeous George ( Snatch reference, in case there is someone alive who doesn't get it) that keeps handing me my a** as I can't seem to be able ti time the parry well enough and his ham like fists find their target all the time ...
I played SoM for a bit and while the pace of combat was better, it got .. boring after an hour. Don't really know why to be honest...I might give it a try after I'm done with the Witcher ... which won't happen anytime soon ;)
Finally, as a long time card gamer, I'm simply in love with Gwent. last time I enjoyed a mini game so much it was Might and Magic 7 and their Arcomage. And Gwent .. it's one of those "easy to learn, hard to master" games and it's surprisingly robust - 4 factions each with 5 leaders to choose from and build a deck around, tons of cards and several interesting tactics. I wouldn't mind playing this as a regular card game, not only a virtual one (I believe it's going to come out, or already has).

I am also an old card gamer (at least I buy a new Magic: The Gathering deck now and then) and Gwent seems rather clever and fun :)

The only thing I don't like about it is I didn't bother with it in the first pub. I regretted this and so at first opportunity, I went back there to play the guy and he was gone. Then I read that you won't get the chance to win whatever cards you could've got from him later in the game (grr).

I think they're gonna patch the game so the quest to get all cards will be completable to schmucks like me, so I guess I'll just wait for that to happen.

I hear that's a hoax. I mean, E3's coming up, so why would they make any big announcement now?

We get it. Stop spamming it everywhere.

Bethesda tweeted this themselves. It's fo'real.
Please Stand By
Please Stand By
Please Stand By
Please Stand By
What was that?