LogFAQs > #964931356

as far as needing to play them to get 3, no. 3 takes a lot more from the books than the previous games anyway. youll have a better understanding of certain relationships and characters if you played the others, but its not a big aspect to understand the game. that said 2 specifically has a lot of cool elements going for it which even 3 didnt pull off as well. 1 is still really good as an rpg, but has a lot of older aquired taste stuff going on and its disturbingly slow for its story to get going. if you wanted to skip you wouldnt be missing a lot and the unique aspects to the series was pulled off better in 2 anyway.

length wise 1 is 40-50hours. 2 is 40hours + another ~25hours depending on choices for another run(which id say is mandatory). 3 is closer to 80-100hours +40-50hours for dlc.