Before The Witcher 3, side quests in RPGs often existed as throwaway busywork to provide levelling experience and a small smattering of flavor lore to the game world. The Witcher 3 turned the concept of a side quest on its head by giving them the same level of importance and quality as the main storyline. Side quests in The Witcher 3 span the gamut of in-depth character arcs, geo-political upheavals, tying up loose ends to Geralt’s past, and the smaller moments that are no less lovingly crafted. And then there’s stuff that is just so quintessentially ‘Witcher’ like the Morkvang werewolf curse quest, which of course gives the player a choice to make affecting the outcome of Morkvang and the inhabitants of the village.

Some of the best-portrayed scenes I’ve seen in a game take place within The Witcher 3‘s side quests. The best part is the player has a legitimate say in which quest they want to see come to fruition. The interactions between these characters feel effortlessly natural – something very rare in an RPG. And the payoff is surprisingly wholesome and satisfying.

Continuity between the novels and lore is also something that is done very well throughout The Witcher 3’s side quests. There’s even a quest, The Last Wish, which echoes the subject matter and title of one of the most beloved Witcher novels. I admit to being a total Witcher newcomer when I first played The Witcher 3 back in 2019 or so, and yet, all of that prior history and lore felt absolutely riveting and atmospheric to me when I stumbled upon it. I felt like a fish out of water to some extent – flooded to the gills with prior happenings and reignited friendships that I knew nothing about. Yet, the world-building and natural exposition of it all made me feel like I was exploring a real fantasy world that had a history and life of its own, regardless of my participation.

Towns and cities have long been a benchmark of worldbuilding in RPGs. I personally hold Final Fantasy IX’s Lindblum as one of the best examples of a lived-in fantasy city that manages to further immerse us into the game’s world. It would take an entire book to chronicle the history of well-realized video game towns, so instead let’s hone in on one of the best – Novigrad.

I’d be remiss not to mention how perfect CD Projekt Red portrayed Novigrad’s density. Sure, the total surface area of Novigrad isn’t as groundbreaking as any town in, say, Daggerfall or well, any of the cities featured in recent Assassin’s Creed games. But size isn’t the be all end all of quality. No, as we’ve seen with plenty of other open-world games, a map can be as big as an ocean yet feel as deep and interesting as a puddle. Density and what is done with said density is what really makes a space come alive.

Novigrad feels like an authentic medieval city due to the level of sheer detail and attention to variety around ever street corner. Like CD Projekt Red’s other impressive cityscape, Night City, Novigrad doesn’t feel like it has copy and pasted elements; there’s an undeniably organic layout to its alleyways and tight corridors. Yes, some buildings are identical to others in their dimensions, but the decorations and embellishments help individualize them, instilling a ‘humanness’ to the place. The set design of Novigrad makes one feel lost in a gritty medieval cityscape. Novigrad, and the other smaller towns in The Witcher 3 to a lesser extent, feels lived-in and alive.

Of course, people contribute to that sensation of liveliness to a significant extent. Novigrad doesn’t disappoint in this respect, with pedestrians going about their business and filling out the busy cobblestone streets in a believable way. Yes, the sheer amount of NPCs populating an area helps sell the sense of liveliness, but it’s really the variety of character models, clothing, animations, and even voices that really make The Witcher 3‘s towns feel believable.

NPC faces and voices within The Witcher 3’s towns don’t repeat often, helping to avoid the uncanny valley sensation that many open-world games suffer from (I’m looking at you, Oblivion). NPCs will often talk about an ailment plaguing them or rant about the state of the world. And nothing feels more like The Witcher than a bitter pedestrian hollering at Geralt to leave them in peace and cause trouble somewhere else. The Witcher 3 set a standard for open-world games with its believable NPC behavior and attention to detail for the voice and outfits of minor incidental characters. And Novigrad is the creme-de-la-creme of The Witcher 3’s lived-in realism that still captures player’s imaginations to this day.

The core combat doesn’t hold up quite as well as The Witcher 3‘s rich story axis, but the emphasis on monster weaknesses and alchemy does have its charms. When played on harder difficulties, it is required to look through the bestiary for specific monster vulnerabilities and ways to approach certain fights. In this way, The Witcher 3 successfully translates the essence of a witcher’s vocation into its beast-hunting gameplay. Applying the right poisons and potion mixes is vital before fights on harder difficulties, contrasting the more arcady combat feel of easier difficulties. I admit I’m not exactly ecstatic about The Witcher 3‘s swordplay; the lack of combo and weapon variety just isn’t comparable to other RPGs. However, the skill tree and strategic weakness-based gameplay is satisfying in its own unique, purely Witcher, way. My preferred playstyle is a sign-focused build. The mind manipulating Axii sign is a treat to experiment and have fun with. Whenever I got sick of swinging my silver sword and dodging attacks, turning an alghoul to fight on my side never got any less entertaining.

Supplementing the combat is all the potions and weaponry Geralt can have crafted. I love when a rich open-world game renders looting worthwhile, and in this The Witcher 3 succeeds. There’s a ton of stuff to loot, between the many monster corpses you find to junk sitting at the bottom of alleyway barrels. The many armors and bombs that can be made from these materials makes exploring that much more fun. The Witcher 3, while not having the most remarkable armor selection, does feature some really cool looking armors for Geralt to don, such as the intricate Kaer Morhen set.

The Witcher 3 is not a perfect game without faults, but it executes what it sets out to do amazingly well and remains unparalleled today. The worldbuilding is top-notch thanks to the bevy of voice talent animating the well-realized characters and the fantastic environmental design. Making each quest meaningful and unique renders every new discovery and character interaction something the player can eagerly look forward to. The Witcher 3 is a masterclass in world design and quest quality, something that requires that unique human touch around every corner to make it feel alive. We won’t get another experience like The Witcher 3 with intriguing NPCs and quests. In today’s AI-accelerated world, The Witcher 3 shines as an example of what detail-oriented craft can produce, and 10 years later, it’s still one of the best of its kind.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

“This is to prevent issues with the game that are caused by mods before they receive their update from the modding community,” said the company. “We want to make sure you have the best experience when playing the game.”

While mods have been turned off by default for Phantom Liberty‘s release, players who are willing to take the risk with breaking the game can easily re-enable their mods of choice and continue playing.

Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty was released earlier this week, and takes place in the previously-inaccessible Dogtown area of Night City. The expansion is a spy thriller that sees protagonist V involved in a new high-stakes mission to save the president of the New United States of America.

For more details, check out our re-review of Cyberpunk 2077, as well as our review of the Phantom Liberty expansion.

Attention all Steam and Epic players!

We wanted to let you know that mods will be automatically disabled for the launch of #PhantomLiberty. This is to prevent issues with the game that are caused by mods before they receive their update from the modding community. We want to…

— CD PROJEKT RED CS (@CDPRED_Support) September 25, 2023

By this point, I imagine just about everyone reading this is familiar with the technical woes of 2020’s Cyberpunk 2077. The game was one of the most anticipated games of the last console generation and launched to some issues that are still being fixed. Despite that, the game did very well for itself, and carried its developer and publisher to a record year.

As reported by GamesIndustry, CD Projekt RED reported bringing in PLN 2.14 billion ($562 million) in consolidated sales revenues. That’s up over four times of 2019 numbers, and over double of the last record from 2015 when the company launched The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. They also reported a net profit of PLN 1.15 billion ($303 million), which is three times their previous record of 2015.

Earlier this month, the company recommitted to doing everything they could to fix the issues with Cyberpunk 2077 by saying they have no intentions of shelving the project. If you didn’t understand why that was, well, here you go. Doesn’t get more straightforward than that.

Cyberpunk 2077 has officially gone gold, and will be on store shelves just in time for the launch of next generation consoles (even though technically there will not be a native next gen version until 2021). Of course, PC players are also rubbing their hands together, since the game will no doubt be a hot item in that scene as well. For those who are into streaming, you’ll also have another option.

Nvidia released a new trailer for their GeForce Now service, in which they confirmed at the end that Cyberpunk 2077 will be there at launch. If you’re unfamiliar with the service, it’s a streaming service that allows you to stream your games from a variety of devices. It’s similar to Google Stadia, where the game will also be releasing at, but does not require to buy the title and instead allows you to stream it directly from Steam or other PC accounts as long as the title is supported for the service, though it does require a monthly fee.

Cyberpunk 2077 will release November 19th for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC and Stadia. If you’re playing the PC version the old fashioned way, you can check out the PC requirements through here, with requirements for 4K and RTX coming later.

It’s been a long, long wait for CD Projekt RED’s next title in Cyberpunk 2077. It’s been through 2 high profile delays at this point, making some wonder if it will actually manage to make this year or not. But either way, it’s going to be a longstanding and major project, and the developer is keeping those ambitions high.

In the latest issue of EDGE magazine (issue 348, September 2020), Level Designer Max Pears talked about the game, and what the developers want to achieve. He says there’s something of a competition within themselves to outdo what they’ve done before, specifically the success of The Witcher series that largely put the company on the map. The Witcher 3, specifically, they see as a benchmark for the industry, and they want the same for 2077.

“I mean, there’s no bad blood or ill will towards any other studios or any other games because everyone in this industry moves the medium forward together. But especially coming from The Witcher 3, which was such a huge success with such a great world that people spent hours exploring, it’s very much a competition and a different understanding within ourselves as a team. We’ve set the benchmark already in one previous game, and we’re trying to always do the same. So it’s about always going through and trying to make things better, but it’s also understanding that there is a difference and asking how we push those differences to being a benefit. But yeah, we’re always trying to make genre-defining and groundbreaking games.”

Cyberpunk 2077 is currently slated to release November 19th for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC with a Stadia version set to come later. You can check out the latest gameplay footage shown from the game through here.

While we’re all waiting patiently for CD Projekt RED’s upcoming sci-fi epic, Cyberpunk 2077, we can’t help but wander back to the company’s fantasy franchise that helped bring them to the mainstream. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt has sold nearly 30 million copies, and helped to spawn a hit television series. The game has been lauded for its rich writing and well-realized world. But some people were left a little unsatisfied with Ciri’s overall role in itts story. While she had a key part, her long absences were felt by fans. But it wasn’t just fans, as those behind the narrative wanted more as well.

In a Q&A attended by VG 24/7, Principle Writer Jakub Szamałek was asked about Ciri’s potential role in a sequel. After coyly asking if the interviewer would play The Witcher 4 with Ciri as a lead character (the answer to which was yes, of course), he also expressed some degree of regret for Ciri’s reduced role in The Witcher 3. While he wouldn’t give a firm answer about what they are thinking for Ciri in the future, he did say he hoped they could explore more of her story later.

“I regret we didn’t get to explore Ciri’s past a bit more,” he said. “She’s such an amazingly rich and complex character. Due to obvious reasons – well, she’s pretty much gone for two thirds of the game – she didn’t get quite as much screen time as we writers would have liked. But hey, maybe it’s something we’ll get to get back to in the future.”

Ciri is one of the many characters from the franchise that fans have come to love, so odds are people will want to see more of her with whatever followup CD Projekt RED crafts. Not sure how well she as a lead will go over with some people in a potential Witcher 4, but I guess we’ll have to cross that bridge when we get there.

When it comes to the celebrity presence in the much anticipated Cyberpunk 2077, most people think all about Keanu Reeves. What am I saying, not most people, everyone thinks about the Reeves and his key role as Johnny Silverhand. But he’s not the only celeb who will have a part, as Canadian singer and songwriter Grimes will also have some role in the title. So far, though, it’s not been revealed what, but she may have spilled the beans herself, and it’s some wild stuff.

During a livestream, she mentioned her role in Cyberpunk, musician Lizzy Wizzy. Apparently, Lizzy kills herself during a performance and then is revived with cybernetic parts to finish the concert as a full cyborg in a type of extreme performance art. The livestream has since been taken down, but it was transcribed by users at Reddit and then later verified by Polygon.

“I play a pop star who committed suicide on stage,” Grimes said, “and they had to quickly come and preform emergency surgery and replace her whole body with cybernetics while she was dead for an hour and then she finished the show as a cyborg. One of the greatest pieces of performance art ever made.”

Talk about an origin story and a half. While it’s not official yet (the character has not even been revealed), it fits in with the world of Cyberpunk 2077, and that’s little reason to expect Grimes would just randomly lie about her role. We won’t know for sure, of course, until the game releases in September.

When it was announced that the The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was coming to the Nintendo Switch, it was pretty surprising. The game was a graphical and technical show house, and the Nintendo Switch’s hardware wasn’t quite up to the standards of other home consoles. But it came all the same and, while no one would call it a pretty game, but it ran all the same. And the financials of the game’s publisher points to it being a success.

CD Projekt RED posted their financial report for Q3 2019 results and in it they revealed that overall revenue was up 38% year over year from 2018. Piotr Nielubowicz, Vice President and CFO of the company, pointed to the initial shipments of the Switch version as being a contributing factor there. While that is only shipment numbers, not actual sales, in a conference call Q&A after the report it was said the port was selling in line with expectations.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt seems to have been a decent hit at the very least for the company, so hopefully this means more of CDPR’s catalog will make its way to the system. 

The announcement of Keanu Reeves being in Cyberpunk 2077, the highly anticipated next RPG title from CD Projekt RED, is something we’re still talking about. Reeves is set to have a key role in the game, and has the most dialogue in-game outside the main playable character. He got quite the reaction on stage, too, when a surprised fan shouted, “You’re Breathtaking!” as Reeves walked out on the Microsoft conference. Apparently, that guy got a free Collector’s Edition of the game for that memeable moment, and others want a memorial in the game itself to honor it.

Fans have started an online petition to add an achievement (or trophy, if you’ll be playing on the PlayStation side of things) titled, “You’re Breathtaking.” The petition aims to get to 35,000 signatures, and as of writing this it’s just broken 27,283. You can check it out here if you, too, are into this sort of thing.

Cyberpunk 2077 will release on April 16th, 2020 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.

Will Cyberpunk 2077 come out this year? It’s a question many are expecting (and hoping) to learn the answer to at this year’s E3. A lot of rumors are floating around that it probably won’t and will most likely slip into 2020. Regardless of when it’ll ship, we might very well have a look at what a physical copy will look like on your shelf when it does (or your digital icon).

Apparently, a listing from Polish retailers (the region that CD Projekt RED is based in and will be self-publishing in) leaked early, which includes both the cover art as well as some physical bonuses you get from buying the game. It’s since been pulled, but the internet never forgets, and you can see it below (via ResetEra).

Based on the image below, it seems this edition also comes with several physical goodies like a map, a guidebook for Cyberpunk 2020 (the tabletop game this is based on), an art book, postcards, and some stickers.

As always with leaks of these nature, we have to file this under rumor, but if it’s fake, a lot of work has gone into it, and it’s very much in line with what the company did with The Witcher 3’s initial physical release. We’ll just have to wait and see.