Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales is a single player role-playing game from the team behind The Witcher 3, and it's due out on PlayStation 4 later this year, on the 4th December. But "single player role-playing game" doesn't really tell you much does it? Thankfully, GameSpot's just published 12 minutes of gameplay, so you can get an idea of what it's all about.
We suppose it's kind of a Fire Emblem-y Banner Saga-style title. It's got a lot of dialogue and characters as well as some overworld exploration, but the battle system is based on Gwent: The Witcher Card Game. It looks interesting, and if the writing is even half as good as it is in The Witcher 3, then the story and characters should be a treat.
CD Projekt Red has also revealed the game's pricing. Unlike the aforementioned Gwent, this isn't free-to-play. It's currently up for pre-order on PC at £23.39, so that's around $25. We assume the price will be the same on PS4.
What do you make of Thronebreaker? Guide an army in the comments section below.
Comments 30
What do we think of this then? I'm the biggest Witcher fanboy on the site so I'm up for it, but I'm not sold on the Gwent-style battle system. Maybe it's one of those things you've gotta try for yourself.
I’m sold. Love Gwent, love The Witcher, love CDPR.
Feels like we’ve been waiting ages for it.
@NintendoFan4Lyf You can knock the Gwent difficulty down in the options and I fully recommend doing so if you're only just starting. It can be really hard to wrap your head around it at first.
I can't wait. I love Gwent, and I've been patiently waiting for the single-player standalone version ever since it was announced.
@ShogunRok I'm down for this. I really liked TW3, and I played a lot of Gwent when the beta came out in 2016. I'm not sure what to make of the changes to the game itself though. It feels a bit lacking with only two rows on each side. But I do hope they return to the system that was in TW3. Gwent: TWCG got a little too complex with all those boosts, summons, etc. You play one card, and a million things happen very fast; cards appear, disappear, a bunch of visual effects; Very pleasing to the eye, but difficult to follow if you're not 100% familiar with all the cards.
Looks boring, and I hate the look of that combat system. I do intend to play TW3 at some point, though.
@Octane they're not going back to the old system.
This game can't release soon enough. The fact that it's separate from the multiplayer game is a big plus too, gives them much more freedom to get creative with the battle system, cards and other things.
One of my favorite games as a kid was the Pokemon TCG on the GameBoy color. Feels great to finally play another game like it.
Also, remember this is probably the only Witcher story game we're getting until after Cyberpunk!
@ShogunRok I put about 200 hours into Witcher 3 but only played a handful of games of Gwent. I'm not sure how to feel about this...
@Octane I get what you're saying. It took me hours upon hours to grasp every card in the game. The Gwent public beta really wasn't friendly to starters. I remember really struggling with playing within the given time, because I was trying to understand the card my opponent had just played.
I remember that one day they introduced the "Make" mechanic. It took me half an hour and reading both of the Wikis to fully get it. The fact that I needed to consult external sites in order to understand a basic game mechanic was just insulting. (If you're wondering 'what is the "make" mechanic?' Don't worry. They added it into the game's last big overhaul, it got a lot of criticism, and it won't be back again.)
I hope they manage to make the game more accessible, because it is a single player game that should be doable. If the game introduces you to all the different type of cards in a nice pacing, it might pull pull more people in.
@ShogunRok I think the most important question to ask here is 'did you have fun playing Gwent in The Witcher 3' and are you excited to play it again, but with more complex cards.
@Kidfried Considering it's a single player game, you can probably take all the time you want. That should definitely help. I remember staring at my screen for three full minutes in TW3's Gwent trying to figure out what my best move going forward was lol!
Why would we assume it's the same price on PS4 as PC, as far as I can tell here in the US PS4 games tend to be $10 more than PC, the console tax.
May be a hard sell after free Gwent, I'll probably wait for it to hit $5.
The problem with The Witcher 3, and honestly this is a huge issue I have with most games, is that it had nowhere near enough Chocobos in it.
They don't look to have improved on this aspect in this game, so it's a hard pass from me.
Well I am really interested.. Definitely going to pick this up
Loved the Witcher 3 and really enjoyed Gwent, but this is a little too late for me.
@kyleforrester87 so what did you think of AC Origins 😂
@ztpayne7 Probably not enough Spider-Men in it
@ztpayne7 @Octane yeah exactly. Let's get some more spiders in Assassins Creed before we get talking about Chocobos. Then once we've got all that ironed out we can look at trying to integrate some fun gameplay.
It's like I'm the only person talking any sense around here you know?
I never bothered with Gwent at first in The Witcher 3 but when i did try it I fell in love with it. This spin off looks cracking, I can't wait.
@rjejr Nah no tax all games are almost same price on console and on pc when they launch on the same day.
Except switch that's Nintendo Tax not console tax because Nintendo is Nintendo.
@Hapuc Maybe you are right, been awhile since I followed anything releasing on PC. I'm not even sure if Amazon lists the PC prices next to the console prices, that's how little I shop for those types of games, it's mostly just PS4 and Nintendo games. Whenever I see a game on sale in the Target ad or maybe Newegg it does always seem like the PC version is $10 less than the console version, but I guess sales are different.
This is the kind of Stuff we get on Switch when publishers realize it cant handle the real thing.
$5 Steam sale or the Free PS+ game. Whatever comes first.
If I had a GPD WIN2 - would be a bit more excited.
@rjejr Digital-only games at least tend to have the same price.
@Kidfried Digital-only games
Well that makes sense if we are talking indie games, I still feel like I've seen $60 console games for $50 on PC on more than 1 occasion though. Possibly long after release, but that's what I remember.
@rjejr Yeah, I might have seen instances of that too. Still, getting a game for PS4 is almost always cheaper for me than on PC.
There are digital deals, physical sales and second hand games. Always one of them has a good deal on a game. With Steam you don't have that kind of choice.
Gwent got me going through the Witcher 3 at first, so I welcome this! And anyway I am not Gwent is objectively better than the TW3 proper battle system...it's really not the best part of the game. Anyway I thought it was going to be a single player mode for The Gwent Game tbh. Also, the art style is very nice. Very graphic novel.
The art is very pretty, and the overworld map reminds me of Battle Chasers. Lookin' sharp so far, though hopefully the text speed can be increased.
I dunno. Watching that video just makes me miss the three row gameplay from TW3. I was wishing for a separate Gwent game years ago when I first played the game. Now that they delivered this it just doesn't seem like Gwent at all. Think I'll take a pass
Meh don't care for these kinds of games, if I ever pick it up it'll be during a $5 bargain bin sale.
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