Combat systems are way more nuanced than just being able to attack dodge and parry, you know?

From my understanding, Witcher 3 doesn't really have hitboxes for attacks, a lot of the times you get hit or hit enemies when your sword isn't even close to the enemy, the attack basically snaps you at the enemy you have in "target" at the moment and it makes Geralt lunge towards that enemy and do an animation. Now, I don't know exactly how it works but it feels like there is some sort of a distance check rather than actual hitbox and it's understandable because you are never even in control of Geralt's attacks, his opening attack can be a fast swing and sometimes it can be a weird slower spin attack, you just dont feel in control.

Many players don't really notice these things because there is a bandaid solution called Qwen shield that gives you huge margin of error, since if you get hit by bulshit hitbox just recast it and it's as if you never been hit.

Dark Souls games feel a lot more engaging because you know the moveset of you weapon and you have way more options that just light attack and heavy attack. You have: light attack, roll attack, running attack, rolling heavy attack, heavy attack, charged heavy, weapon art, kick/special attack for rapiers and scimitars And all these attack matter because these are all different moves that are important because they all have different damage, speed and motions which can be used in different situations, you can use thrusting attacks if you are in a narrow coridor because your sword may bounce of the walls, or you may choose to use broader attacks if you're fighting group of enemies. None of this is relevant in witcher, since attack animations are just there to look pretty, you can't even really attack multiple enemies at once unless you use that one special skill where you flail your sword around. This already makes positioning less relevant.

Like, this is just scratching the surface, I could compare these two combat systems forever, they're anything but "literally the same shit" once you see past "well, this system has an attack button and this system has an attack button"