▷The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Complete Edition recensione, troppa magia per Nintendo Switch 🥇

Can the magic of a witcher and the vast universe created by the boys of CD Project, as well as from the mind of Andrzej Sapkowski, find enough breath and expression in the small Nintendo home console? We have been wondering since the moment The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Complete Edition, with related expansions Hearts of Stone e Blood and Wine had been announced for Nintendo Switch long ago. Now that we have this version available for a few days, we have also found the answers we were looking for.

We are on our hands yet another version of a game that had already trod the stage of practically every platform, where all the main quest revolves around searching for Characteristic and the threat dictated by Wild Hunt, granting us 30 good hours of gameplay before throwing ourselves into the huge world that awaits us, also thanks to the two contained expansions alias i DLC among the most full-bodied and interesting that the videogame knows. This brings us to the bar of fifty additional hours for an already very large game, allowing us the luxury of experiencing all this beauty wherever we are. If the first expansion is a little less complex in the structure, also recycling a good part of the environments and standing out more for the main narrative than for the ancillary activities, the second, Blood and Wine, is almost one standalone by duration and type of content.

The Witcher 3 on Switch: like Icarus with wings melted in the sun

As anyone who has already experienced this adventure on consoles and PC will know, the game also includes a flood of side quests, contracts to be completed and treasure hunts that will open the doors to truly evocative and literally magical worlds and atmospheres. The storytelling behind this careful construction of the personality of each character remains at the basis of the work done for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, yearning for excellence that however melts like Icarus's wings towards the sun, if we pass instead to the graphic and technical sector of this version on Nintendo Switch. Let's see why, without going too far on the story that you will almost certainly know and summarizing our experience on the Nintendo laptop.

In light of the considerations that we are going to rattle off, we do not really understand the reasons why this title is still available at full price, considering the complications effective that we have found compared to previous releases on consoles and PCs. Let's first observe how this version shows one resolution at about 540p in portable mode, which reaches 720p in the dock, but wasn't the version in question created to be played in the comfort of your bed, on a train or on a deckchair for the luckiest vacationers in the heat? This is the point. [

The Witcher 3 on Switch: one mistake leads to another

However, it is not this aspect that really affects the full enjoyment of The Witcher 3 on Switch; what is really boring is that these technical compromises have reduced the artistic rendering and the beauty of the views, due to a motion blur effect and technical flaws, as well as poor detail rendering. In fact, we observe some glitches where the movement of elements such as leaves in the wind is not very natural. We want to talk about the bugs, whereby the characters literally go through each other? We would have expected better. They could not miss some annoying ones aliasing effects in hair design, one of the body parts of our heroes that was really penalized in the Switch version. A pity to observe the thick hair of Yennefer so drawn or the white hair of the Witcher that flutters in the wind "fracturing" here and there.

When compared in graphic terms with the PC version, details like lights, shadows and some textures are visibly richer on the latter, despite the fact that it was the version on PS4 that guaranteed a more stable FPS (a really hot topic if we compare the different versions). Net of this, however, there are other technical difficulties that we will encounter, starting with translation of subtitles: there are some errors in the localizations that were already present in previous versions and have not been corrected, in addition to some annoying ones camera problems, too sensitive to our commands and without any possibility of correcting the shot.

The effect is really annoying on such a small screen, where there is no shortage of obvious and frequent difficulties about the fluidity in movies: during the latter, the game turns to a fairly low number of frames per second, until it freezes for a few milliseconds, even in some moments of dialogue with the NPCs. A mistake that we cannot forgive in a game of this caliber.

A fatigued game engine

Still comparing the technical capabilities on the Switch, i controls with the joystick they are definitely a little simpler and more immediate to learn, compared to those on PC, which require time to practice and be memorized, especially in the early stages of the game. It is also convenient to automatically lock enemies in battle, as well as having noticed a good visibility of the road to go horseback riding in console mode. The fact remains that there is some delay in replying with some of the keys, especially in console mode; in general, the response is slow and the movements are woody and jerky, a clear sign that the engine is running with difficulty and fails to properly support this title, which deserves a much more careful and precise work.

Il compromise that we need to achieve is really exhausting, to be able to digest this limp version of a witcher who dreamed of galloping without restraint between flowery prairies and under the snow-white mountain peaks. Probably the result achieved is the maximum that could be desired, considering the software of the console in question; however, the bittersweet aftertaste remains due to the incomplete satisfaction in having in your hands one of the greatest masterpieces of recent videogame production with a graphic and technical sector not really at the best of its prowess. The Witcher is still the Witcher, but we would have preferred him even more beautiful, even more snappy.