After more than 12 hours of playing, I'm still in the first chapter. Don't remember when that happened last time :)

Not really a fan of QTE and action over the shoulder camera, but I like the story for now, and side quests are really interesting... I don't want to write any spoilers :)

I did the exact same thing. I mean i stood and watched the night turn into day and it was beautiful. The suns movement is analog,meaning it really moves and the transitions between day/night are smooth and wonderful. Then i just walked through the city admiring it xD

Seriously, hand over the game of the year award, this is one of the best RPG's EVER! And i'm still at Chapter 1.

FANTASTIC game !

more RPGish than BEST EVER!!

Got nervous yesterday reading so many somewhat troubling/negative threads. mostly in working the game.

BUT installed, downloaded, dlc, registered, graphics, visuals, ect all worked flawlessly for me and strangly this game even on ULTRA settings (minus uber) plays more smooth for me than witcher 1 did.

And i'm loving combat so far, feels more real. In witcher 1 you just go group sword and can take out 20 guys like nothing by just standing there and clicking once every so often.

only a couple things i have trouble with or dislike

1. any way to highlight loot?
2. how come a steel sword didn't transfer over in my safe :(
3. can't throw bomb, maybe what i think is a bomb isn't. But they gave you a bomb and a trap to start right? well the trap was in my inventory slot, and if i pushed R it set it correct? then i disarmed and picked up it all fine. But then i switched to bomb and when i saw a group of enemies that hadn't seen me ye ti tried to throw it and it didn't work. I pusehd ctrl and set it to the slot, then pushed R to throw. NOTHING. am i doing it wrong?

4. kind of wish some way to tell who is an important npc or not. though in same sense i like this as well cause makes it feel more real. i mean in real life you don't have ways of knowing. thus i talk to EVERYONE.

5. still not used to controls yet. I keep pushing q or e to equip my swords silver or steel. which is not correct. though getting better at it.

You can highlight loot (and other things like traps) with your Witcher amulet, pressing Z.

Sounds like you used the bomb right, but if the enemies didn't see you, maybe you were too far away to throw?

Lol I'll just say it was really sore lmao

I loved it, even if I had issues with some mechanics. The story and how much closer it tied itself to the world the novels described than the first game really made it easy for me to overlook my few mechanics displeasures.

I, too, had a real hard time with the hotkeys at first, as I had just re-played the first game last week. Kept wanting to use Q for a sword as well. Eventually, I bound most things to my mouse buttons (10-button mouse), and once I grew comfortable with the new keys, combat became a lot more fluid.

I'm still not sold that combat is an improvement over the first game (bombs and traps, yes, everything else...no), and I am absolutely certain the consolization of the UI was a crying shame with many steps backwards, but again, I'm able to overlook it all due to the great story and atmosphere that makes me wish all the books were translated already, rather than just two.

Final verdict: Loved it.

I would also like to make a few comments here.
I have only spent about half an hour with the game proper, having spent a fair few hours optimising performance (thank you Nvidia beta drivers, vsync off, AA off, obviously no UberSamp, LOD off, but otherwise I can have everything else on whatever settings I want running smoothly at 1920x1080).

Anyway, from what I've experienced so far, I am immediately in love with it. Despite the fact that the damn English publishers have only translated The Last Wish and Blood of Elves, I feel that having read both has made me appreciate how much more this game is centred in Sapowski's universe.
And, to those in the know, within 5 minutes I was chuckling over the mention of "hmm, what was her [wizard] name, something like Conifer" ... teehee.

So, my prediction is I am going to love the whole thing and hope that I can get to grips with the combat well. I shall post back after extensive time over the weekend.

PS, RockPaperShotgun has an awesome "What I think" which is pretty much spoiler-free if anyone is interested: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/05/18/pc-review-the-witcher-2-assassins-of-kings/