Videogames and Books: Love books? Then check out this series!

A review ode to one of my favorite authors and his Witcher series:
 
Andrzej Sapkowski https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrzej_Sapkowski
 
Sapkowski's Witcher series has everything a lover of the supernatural could want with the cool twist of a "genetically engineered" hero designed to hunt monsters of lore. I became intrigued with this series long before the Netflix series became all the rage. I do enjoy it, though the first season was presented in a slightly confusing manner.
 
Geralt is a truly a dying breed. I discovered these stories when my son started playing the Witcher 3: Wild Hunt videogame. I was intrigued and quickly bought myself a copy and played it obsessively. I still play it many times a year. At the time of this writing, I'm currently playing it yet again. The DLC Blood and Wine is probably the best bonus game material I've ever played.
 
Though the gameplay of Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings is a bit trickier and it has the unfortunate annoyance of forcing the player to somehow know the exact order each quest must be played in order to avoid missing out on some other quests and also requires the player to be prepared and anticipate monster attacks in advance with oils for the sword and potions designed to aid defense and attack (death otherwise), I also enjoy this game immensely and have played it several times.
 
I do own Witcher 1. Though it was supposed to be released on console back in the day, it ended up available only on PC. Someday I might play it, but I find it much harder to play anything but point and click games like Nancy Drew on PC. A complicated game like Witcher works so better, in my opinion, using a game controller instead of a keyboard.
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After I played Witcher 3, I bought all Sapkowski's books and read them obsessively…more than once. They're phenomenal. Some of the best books I've ever read, in fact. Trust me, in this case, the books are a million *billion* times better than the Netflix series. If you love that show, the books will blow you away. They're well worth any pay you spend and the time you take to read them.
 
Additionally, I fell in love with the incredible soundtracks from each of the games, particularly the Witcher 2 soundtrack.
 
Check them out here:

Witcher 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFIbVqHOOIU
 
Witcher 2:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=witcher+2+soundtrack
 
Witcher 3:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=witcher+3+soundtrack
 
As if that isn't enough to love about this series with all it multimedia components, I love the mini-games that are played within each of the videogames (specifically Gwent in Witcher 3, which I own two physical decks of along with the game board and want to collect all the decks), and Kings Dice from Witcher 2. I've read that in Witcher 1, the player has the option of collecting "naughty" playing cards that are somehow related to Geralt's many sexual conquests. He must have a huge deck, if it's based on that, lol.
 
Even if you don't play videogames or listen to game soundtracks, give this series of books a try. You won't regret it. 

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