I already really liked Gwent in Witcher 3, so I was really looking forward to this standalone Gwent game. All in all, I really enjoyed it. I was surprised at how much the game focused on the story and characters, both of which are very well written. I didn't expect characters from this card game like Gascon to really grow on me. Sure, the main story is the classic "Nilfgaard is evil and attacks the North" that you know from the games, books and the series, but the dialogue and individual events are really well written.

The card game itself is also a lot of fun. Its complexity has been greatly increased compared to Witcher 3 and it never gets boring. Some of the puzzle battles are also quite innovative or simply very funny (without spoiling anything: "exploding cows"...if you know you know^^).

Unfortunately, I found the pacing very slow. It took me almost 40 hours for my first run and almost half of it could be cut without really losing anything in quality. You can of course ignore all the optional content, but I like to do everything. It would have been nice if the optional stuff had been consistently good or if there had simply been less content overall. That being said, the scenarios were very varied, at least from chapter 3 onwards, and I really liked Mahakam.

So for fans of Gwent and the Witcher world itself I would definitely recommend it but be prepared for a longer gaming experience than I expected. FOR LYRIA!!!!