Before going into the actual book review, I first have to mention that one of the reasons why I think The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is the best game I’ve ever played is because of it’s beautify story. The main story in the game was written in such a way that anyone how had either read the novels, only played the first two Witcher games, or who is playing the game for the first time. Will all have an amazing story driven gaming experience.
Though, I firmly believe in order to fully enjoy The Witcher games, you have to read the novels and know the universe. Their is simply just to much lore, it’s practically impossible to know everything in the games without first having read the novels. So, if for whatever reason you don’t want to take the time to read the novels, then this book a great introduction to the Witcher universe. Visually, this hardcover book is gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful illustrations from all three Witcher games and its settings. The book is divided into five chapters:
1. The World and Its Inhabitants
2. The Witchers
3. The Magic and Religions of the Continent
4. The Beasts of the Northern Kingdoms
5. Geralt of Rivia
The book narrates events from the very begging of world, up the most major events The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. This means that there are some spoilers from both The Witcher saga and the games. At 179 pages, obviously this book doesn’t go into deep detail about events in the Witcher universe, but it does do a good job giving you a comprehensive high overview of the world. The chapters are described from Villentretenmerth, Yennefer, Geralt, and Dandallion’s point of view and perspective.
As of the time of this writing this book is priced at $27.19 on Amazon. Although the quality of this book is very well made and worth the steep price. I feel this book is more aimed for Witcher fanatics like myself, that love to collect items from this awesome fantasy series. For the casual person wanting to learn about the Witcher universe, instead I highly recommend checking out “The Witcher Lore Series” on YouTube. The video series cover almost all topics in this book and they’re extremely well narrated. I literally felt like I was watching a NatGeo or History Channel documentary.
Thus said, if you live near a Barnes & Noble store, then I highly suggest going there, buy yourself a large latte and read this book. It took me about 2-3 hours to read this book in its entirety.