Further to this, Witcher also avoids the good/bad dichotomy that slightly ruins the choices in games like Mass Effect and Fallout. Fallout 4 still has the awkward design of having "nice" and "mean" responses to almost every dialogue (even though it doesn't keep score), which means that my "good guy" character can turn into a jerk/murderer at any moment. In practice this means that as soon as I've decided that my character should be a "good guy", the "mean" options are completely wasted unless I somehow imagine my character has multiple personality disorder.
Mass Effect turned "good/evil" into "paragon/renegade", when they started to recognise this problem. I'm hoping that with the next Mass Effect, they'll take this a step further, drop the dichotomy and take the 100% grey morality approach from Witcher.
Traits in Divinity are a similar modification to the "paragon/renegade" in Mass Effect. They are specific little decisions that define your character early on, and they are essentially locked in. My experience with them is a little similar to how it works in Fallout and Mass Effect (not good).
I like the fact that Geralt has a personality and my choices in Witcher 3 are generally more about his mood at that particular moment, but occasionally about making difficult moral judgement calls. Either way, I don't feel like I'm ever given options that are not consistent with his personality, and I don't feel like my earlier decisions are forcing me to continue playing in a certain way. I generally play as a "good guy", but there were at least a couple of occasions where I made choices that would have been classed as "renegade" in Mass Effect, because it felt appropriate to me. I definitely don't need the distraction of thinking about whether the decision will affect my ability to backstab. But once again, "RP consequences for RP decisions" (eg not being allowed back into the tavern after picking a fight, or maybe after stealing enough things, people stop letting you walk around their houses unsupervised) feels a lot more acceptable.
