“We’re working on getting the Nintendo Switch 2 patch to all users as soon as possible,” explained the company in a social media post before following up by revealing that it “should have more information for those playing on Nintendo Switch 2 very soon.” The focus of the Switch 2 version’s update will be on improving the game’s “clarity and sharpness” on the platform.

In the meantime, players have been quite vocal about their various issues with the Nintendo Switch 2 version of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered. One player has noted that the port is suffering from “a real issue because I can’t use cross-progression properly”. The player’s PS5 save file seems to be incompatible with the Switch 2 version of the game. CD Projekt RED’s response to this post indicates that this might be one of the big issues fixed with the upcoming update.

Just last week, CD Projekt RED released an update for the other versions of the game, bringing in some PC-specific fixes. Headlining the update was a fix for an issue where a number of graphical settings wouldn’t properly reflect in the game despite the player changing them. Along with this, the studio has also fixed a bug that allowed users to pick graphics settings that would be incompatible with their GPU.

The title has also seen a variety of visual adjustments across the board, ranging from Bloom to tone mapping and even ray tracing and path tracing. UI bugs have also been sorted out, like the one where the “You’ve gained an ability point!” pop-up would remain stuck on the screen.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered arrived as a free update to those who already own the RPG across PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. Interestingly, owners of the Nintendo Switch version were also treated to a free upgrade to the Nintendo Switch 2 version, with all of the improvements in visual fidelity and performance that would entail.

Despite these technical issues, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered has been quite a hit on PC, with its launch day reaching a new peak concurrent player record of more than 120,000 on Steam. This is a major jump over the last time the RPG set such a record, which was in 2020 with the debut of Netflix’s adaptation of The Witcher, leading to 103,329 concurrent players on Steam. The Next-Gen Update released in 2024 also caused a major spike, bringing in almost 90,000 concurrent players to the title.

For more details on The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered, take a look at our thoughts about how the RPG still holds up today. Also check out our interview with the developers.

The Remastered project reportedly grew considerably in scope once the team began revisiting The Witcher 3 alongside Songs of the Past. Was there a particular moment or feature where you realised this needed to become a full remaster rather than another smaller update?

Oleg Shatulo: It wasn’t so much a particular moment as a set of circumstances that came together at the right time. Developing Songs of the Past led us to revisit The Witcher 3 as a whole and showed us where there were opportunities to modernize and improve the game. We weren’t focusing on any particular feature or aspect of the game, either — rather, we looked at the experience as a whole and concentrated on finding meaningful ways to bring the game up to date without moving away from what made it special. As a result, the improvements in Remastered encompassed everything from visuals to combat, character progression, accessibility, UI, and quality of life — as well as modernizing the underlying technology.

Yigsoft, which is leading development on Remastered, has roots in The Witcher 3 modding community. How has that background influenced which parts of the original game the team chose to improve, preserve, or leave untouched?

Bence Hambalkó: Yigsoft started as a small team with deep roots in The Witcher 3 community. Today, we’re a full-fledged co-development studio, but we maintained our community ties over the years. That background has given us both a deep respect for the original game and a strong understanding of the ideas, feedback, and issues that have come up within the community over time.

That perspective was something we could draw on when defining the scope of Remastered and it continued to inform our work throughout development. It helped us identify areas where we could meaningfully improve the experience while remaining mindful of what players already loved about the original game.

The Witcher 3 still has an enormous modding scene. With Remastered making significant changes to gameplay, visuals, assets, and underlying systems, how much effort has gone into ensuring existing mods and REDkit projects can make the transition without creators having to rebuild everything from scratch?

Hambalkó: Most transitions should be relatively smooth thanks to REDkit’s annotations, but where underlying systems have changed with Remastered, existing The Witcher 3 mods that rely on them will naturally need to be adapted. Our goal is to make that transition as painless as possible for creators — we have a dedicated Discord where members of the development team are active and can assist modders as they bring their projects over to Remastered.

In general, mods that add new content to the game should be less affected. If they were created independently of the existing content, in most cases we don’t expect them to encounter too many compatibility issues.

Some of Remastered‘s gameplay changes, including the revised combat, can be disabled for players who prefer an experience closer to the original. How did you determine where modernisation genuinely improved The Witcher 3 and where changing something risked taking away part of its identity?

Hambalkó: We were constantly playtesting, talking with our colleagues, meticulously testing everything, and paying close attention to what players were saying online. We wanted to understand which changes simply made the game feel better while still giving you the impression that “this is how it always worked” — where you might only realize how much has actually changed when comparing Remastered directly with the original — and which changes ultimately come down to personal taste. Identifying that distinction was key to finding the right balance between improving the game and preserving the experience players already knew.

Songs of the Past isn’t completely isolated from the existing game, mechanics such as Geralt’s new chain weapon can also interact with enemies outside the expansion. How much work on Remastered has involved preparing the existing world and systems for what Songs of the Past will add in 2027?

Hambalkó: The two projects are separate, but when it came to lighting and other technological requirements, the Remastered team took Songs of the Past into account throughout development. When making decisions in those areas, we considered both how they would affect the expansion and what the expansion would need from Remastered. We wanted Remastered to provide a strong foundation not only for Songs of the Past, but also for new content created by the community, so that both can continue to build on the game for years to come.

Yigsoft is leading work on Remastered, Fool’s Theory is heavily involved with Songs of the Past, and CD PROJEKT RED retains creative oversight of both. What have been the biggest challenges in making work from three different teams feel like one cohesive continuation of The Witcher 3?

Hambalkó: The biggest challenge was making sure that our priorities were aligned and that we maintained effective communication across all three teams. Everyone involved has a great deal of respect for the original game and is incredibly excited to be working on it, so we had a strong foundation to build on. From there, we had to focus on what would matter most to players and what would best preserve The Witcher 3 experience. That meant reviewing our work together frequently, communicating openly, and collaborating very closely throughout development.

Returning to an eleven-year-old game also means confronting thousands of small design decisions made by a very different version of CD PROJEKT RED. Was there anything the team rediscovered in The Witcher 3 that made you reconsider assumptions about how you’re designing RPGs today?

Shatulo: One thing that really stood out was how many of the decisions made more than a decade ago still hold up remarkably well today. When you spend this much time going through the game again, system by system and quest by quest, you get a renewed appreciation for how much attention went into building a world that feels cohesive and believable.

At the same time, some things that were perfectly natural in 2015 feel less intuitive to players today. Expectations around controls, accessibility, UI, and general quality of life have evolved considerably. That was an interesting balance for us: understanding which elements are part of the game’s identity and should be preserved, and which are simply products of the time in which it was made.

I wouldn’t say it made us fundamentally reconsider how we design RPGs today, but it was a valuable reminder that good design can age very well — and that sometimes modernization is less about replacing what was there and more about removing friction around it.

With the opportunity to substantially revisit The Witcher 3, what was the most ambitious improvement or feature the team discussed but ultimately decided would change the original game too much, or simply wasn’t feasible for Remastered?

Shatulo: From the very beginning, our goal was not to overhaul The Witcher 3 or turn it into a different game. We weren’t trying to make a remake or fundamentally reinvent its gameplay — for example, by turning the combat into something closer to a Souls-like experience.

Instead, we were very deliberate about where we drew the line. Every change, whether to combat and gameplay systems, visuals, or technology, was considered in terms of whether it improved the experience while still feeling like The Witcher 3.

There were certainly opportunities to push individual elements further, but preserving the spirit and identity of the original game was always more important than changing something simply because we could. The ambition of Remastered was to make The Witcher 3 feel its best today, not to turn it into a different game.

Can you break down the graphical modes, target resolutions, and frame rates for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt — Remastered across PS5, PS5 Pro, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and Nintendo Switch 2?

Shatulo: On PlayStation 5, players can choose between two modes. Ray Tracing mode features ray-traced global illumination and targets 30 FPS, while Performance mode prioritizes responsiveness and targets 60 FPS. Both modes use dynamic resolution scaling to maintain their respective performance targets.

PlayStation 5 Pro offers the same two-mode setup, but takes advantage of the additional hardware capabilities as well as PSSR. Ray Tracing mode targets 60 FPS, while Performance mode targets 60 FPS at a higher resolution. With VRR and HFR enabled on a compatible display, Performance mode can run at an unlocked frame rate reaching up to 100 FPS.

On Xbox Series X, Ray Tracing mode features ray-traced global illumination and targets 30 FPS, while Performance mode targets 60 FPS. As on the base PS5, dynamic resolution scaling is used to balance image quality and performance.

On Xbox Series S, there is no dedicated Ray Tracing mode. Instead, Quality mode prioritizes resolution and image quality at 30 FPS, while Performance mode targets 60 FPS at a lower rendering resolution.

Finally, Nintendo Switch 2 has been specifically optimized around handheld and docked play. In handheld mode, we target 720p and 40 FPS with VRR. When docked, we target 1080p, running at 30 FPS on standard displays or targeting 40 FPS when HFR is available.

In particular, how does PS5 Pro improve upon the base PS5 experience in terms of resolution, ray tracing, image quality, and frame rate?

Shatulo: PS5 Pro allows us to take advantage of its improved hardware capabilities to deliver higher performance, resolution, and overall image quality. The console features the same two graphics modes as the base PS5 — Ray Tracing and Performance — but with significantly higher targets.

Ray Tracing mode targets 60 FPS, while Performance mode targets 60 FPS at a higher resolution. With VRR and HFR enabled on a compatible display, Performance mode can instead reach up to 100 FPS.

We also utilize PSSR, a feature unique to PS5 Pro, to further improve image quality and maximize visual fidelity while maintaining these higher performance targets.

This guide for The Witcher 3 Remastered has information on the best XP farm you can find in order to level up quickly and efficiently, while making minimal effort.

Early Game XP Farm

Even when under-levelled, Geralt can take on this early game XP farm located in the Velen – No Man’s Land map. Head south-west from Hangman’s Alley to the short peninsula directly opposite the smallest coastal island there.

Begin by enabling Infinite Breath in the Accessibility Settings, since you will be spending almost all of your time here engaged in underwater combat. This particular assist will take the pressure off of breath meter management, thus allowing you to focus on fighting.

Submerge into the waters around the shipwrecks and you will be beset by Drowners, of which there appears to be an endless swarm. Deploy the crossbow and one-shot them one after another, until they finally stop spawning.

But wait: because that will not be an end to the XP farm. When you swing the camera around and away from where Drowners can potentially spawn, they will begin reappearing again, albeit in fewer numbers than previously. This spawn will not stop producing Drowners for you to farm as long as you provide them the opportunity to materialize in when and where you are not looking.

Just a few minutes of farming Drowners for XP, at their default level of 10 for this area, will level you up. Even once leveling requirements rise to 2,000 XP per level, this particular location remains an effective XP farm.

Bear in mind that The Witcher 3 Remastered has a Gameplay Setting titled Enemy Upscaling, which you can enable in order to keep content fresh after it becomes very under-levelled for you. While over-levelled content will never scale down to your level, under-levelled enemies will scale up.

Unfortunately, this does not have any bearing on XP gain itself, but only serves to offer you something of a challenge if you get bored.

Also note that looting chests in the area can break the spawn cycle permanently.

That is the absolute best XP farming method to level up quickly in The Witcher 3 Remastered.

This guide for The Witcher 3 Remastered is all about amassing a tidy fortune in gold crowns as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Fast Hide Farming

As with any gold grinding routine, being able to force a respawn of the money source at will, is the key component of the process.

The Upper Mill fast travel point is located in the north-east part of Velen. Head around the barn to find the enclosure with the three pigs. Use Igni to dispatch the trio quickly, then just about-face and run back around the corner. Return to the sty to find that the pigs have respawned, with the previously dispatched corpses still on the ground. Rinse and repeat.

You can experiment with different places to run back and forth from to cut down time between respawns even further. It appears that simply removing them from line of sight can force a respawn.
With Loot Merge enabled in the Gameplay Settings, you can make easy work of gathering the drops as well.

At six hides every few seconds, it is quite possible to accumulate a hundred pig hides every two minutes, or three thousand per hour. Sell value varies greatly between merchants, so first be sure to identify which of the ones you have unlocked are offering you the best bang for your buck.

In the event that a merchant runs out of gold in their coffers, either fast travel to the next best merchant, or stay in place and meditate for as much as a full day in order to replenish their money supply.

That is the absolute fastest method to make money with minimal effort in The Witcher 3 Remastered.

No details about the project have been revealed yet, aside from the report noting that Paramount has expressed an interest in producing more video game adaptations. The company is currently slated to release Street Fighter, which it co-produced with Legendary, on October 16th. A Call of Duty film is also in development with Peter Berg serving as director and co-writer alongside Taylor Sheridan.

Cyberpunk 2077 – based on the classic tabletop RPG series Cyberpunk 2020 – is set in Night City and tells the story of a young merc named V who gets caught in grand conspiracies that involve massive entities like a Japanese megacorporation. The core narrative revolves around V finding themselves on the brink of death, only being kept alive thanks to a “Relic” inserted into their mental implant that also happens to include the consciousness of a long-dead rebel, Johnny Silverhand.

Originally released in 2020, Cyberpunk 2077 saw a few rocky months before opinion on it shifted to being positive thanks to CD Projekt RED’s work with post-launch updates. The title has gone on to be incredibly successful, and back in July, co-CEO of the studio Michał Nowakowski revealed that it had sold 40 million copies so far. The title would see a DLC that further expanded on its story and introduced new locations and characters – Phantom Liberty – in 2023. The DLC sold 15 million copies.

Celebrating the third anniversary of the DLC, designer Paweł Sasko discussed the challenges behind the development of the base game and how the team had to switch things up when it was time to make Phantom Liberty.

“For Phantom Liberty we moved toward multidisciplinary content teams, our pods, where designers, writers, cinematics, art, audio, QA and many other disciplines could work on the same piece of content together. It took a long time to learn how to work this way, but once it started clicking, I could feel the difference.”

Sasko also expressed the belief that the ultimately successful launch of Phantom Liberty doesn’t necessarily erase the negativity surrounding the launch of Cyberpunk 2077.

“I do not think Phantom Liberty erases the launch of Cyberpunk 2077, and I would never want to tell our story that way. When I stood with Gabe Amatangelo at The Game Awards in 2023 to accept Best Ongoing Game, I thought about all the developers who kept putting their hearts into Cyberpunk and about all of you who stayed with us, came back, or decided to give the game another chance.”

In the meantime, CD Projekt RED is working on a number of projects, including a sequel to Cyberpunk 2077. While few details have been revealed, Cyberpunk creator Mike Pondsmith has said that it won’t use Night City as its main setting.

While the patch notes don’t have a headlining feature for the update, it certainly indicates that CD Projekt RED is dedicated to ensuring that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered runs well and looks good for players across all platforms. PC players in particular will be quite happy with the update, since a host of issues have been fixed, such as the game selecting the wrong GPU, being able to pick a graphics setting despite the GPU not supporting it, and even skill tooltips not updating appropriately.

On the gameplay side of things, the update brings in many improvements that will make the RPG feel more responsive. This is due to fixes to delayed responses for dodging, or even ladder climbing animations not quite being up to par.

The update follows up on one released earlier this month that brought in a host of fixes for the Xbox Play Anywhere version of the game. At the time, CD Projekt RED had said that it is “investigating” the issues being reported by players, and that more updates are on the way.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered is available on PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch 2. For more details, check out our thoughts on why it is so difficult to put down.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered update 5.0.1 patch notes:

Gameplay

• Fixed an issue where the “Automatically Apply Blade Oils” feature would work only if enabled during the current game session.
• Fixed an issue where, under specific circumstances, player-controlled boats could start moving uncontrollably and ignore terrain collisions.
• Improved ladder interaction animations.
• Fixed an issue where Geralt would collide with dead enemies after the Aard finisher.
• Fixed an issue where Vesemir would repeatedly say the same line if Quen was cast multiple times.
• Fixed an issue where dodging could have an unintentionally delayed response.
• Fixed an issue where it was possible to throw a bomb even if the option is disabled.
• Fixed an issue where the bonus granted by the Synergy skill displayed incorrect values.
• Added damage reflection to the Exploding Shield skill.
• Fixed an issue where Geralt’s Stamina would be fully drained when sprinting and dodging at the same time.

UI

• Fixed an issue where the “You’ve gained an ability point!” pop-up could stay stuck on the screen.
• Fixed input hints flashing for a brief moment on the meditation screen.
• Fixed an issue where the Potions tutorial didn’t appear after accessing the Consumables tab.
• Fixed some misaligned progress bars in the UI.

PC-specific

• Fixed an issue where the GTAO Quality setting would reset after restarting the game.
• Fixed an issue where Dynamic Resolution Scaling could display the wrong setting after changing the Anti-Aliasing mode.
• Fixed cases in which it was possible to enable a graphics setting when using a GPU that doesn’t support it.
• Fixed an issue where switching graphics presets could apply DLSS or XeSS on GPUs where they’re not supported.
• Changed the default Dynamic Resolution Scaling setting to OFF.
• Fixed an issue where Skill tooltips wouldn’t update until hovered over again.
• Fixed an issue where the game could sometimes select the wrong GPU.

Other

• Made various visual adjustments, including improvements to Bloom, tone mapping, character lighting, Ray Tracing, and Path Tracing.
• Due to backend issues, the policy consent screen will appear again. You’ll need to confirm your preferences once more. Choosing to opt in helps us improve the game.
• Fixed an issue where My Rewards and Twitch/Bilibili Drops wouldn’t appear in the chest in Vizima if it had been opened previously. As a result of this fix, some of the items may be duplicated. Consider them a bonus!
• Fixed an issue where foliage did not react to collisions.
• Fixed an issue that could affect save file data and added measures to address saves that may have already been affected.
• Fixed an issue where Dynamic Resolution Scaling could cause visual artifacts in certain configurations.

We’ve already seen how Geralt’s journey matches up against Crimson Desert, especially with the latter receiving its own massive Enhanced update. But what about CD Projekt RED’s own Cyberpunk 2077? Red Dead Redemption 2? The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom? Ghost of Tsushima? Elden Ring? Or better yet, all of them? Let’s find out, starting with…

Storytelling, Characters and Consequences

Elden Ring’s world-building, especially the environmental storytelling and lore, deserves a nod, and we admit that Tears of the Kingdom is a better tale than Breath of the Wild. But in terms of emotional investment in the plot, how the stories connect to the world, and the meaningful decisions you can make, the biggest competition in this category is obviously Cyberpunk 2077, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Ghost of Tsushima.

As much as I liked Jin Sakai and his conflict between honor and saving his people, he has little choice (except in the ending). Red Dead Redemption 2 and Cyberpunk 2077 both offer incredible characters, and it’s honestly neck and neck with the best The Witcher 3 has to offer. Night City has a slight edge because of the more extensive choices and consequences. But in terms of storytelling, it’s probably on par with Red Dead Redemption 2 in scale, emotional investment, pacing, dialogue, etc.

Exploration and Discovery

If there’s anything all of these games do very well, it’s exploration and discovery. Following the Guiding Wind on Tsushima to turn up an enemy camp, hot spring or mystery; discovering random events in Red Dead Redemption 2 or just plain creepy occurrences alongside the many side missions; and getting to know the messy ins and outs of Night City have proven extremely enjoyable over the years.

That said, Elden Ring and Tears of the Kingdom are probably the standard-bearers. The former’s boss fights, weapons, spells, and that sense of continuously pushing forward, just to see what’s next. The latter with its discoveries, puzzles, sights, and much more across three different planes of existence. I wouldn’t say The Witcher 3 Remastered is on the same level in terms of puzzles or even boss fights, but it’s stories, especially in terms of writing, are certainly a notch above either. Even the most innocuous of contracts and treasure hunts can lead to unexpected twists and turns.

Regardless, in exploration, I’d put it on par again with Red Dead Redemption 2 and above Cyberpunk 2077 and Ghost of Tsushima, as the kings of the genre continue to rule.

World Interaction and Believability

Right off the bat, Ghost of Tsushima falters. As detailed as the NPCs look and as gorgeous as the world can be, there’s very little interaction with the environment. Similarly, NPCs don’t really respond to your reactions outside of quests, so you can’t suddenly slay the residents of Tsushima. It’s a beautiful backdrop for a great story, but that’s it.

Comparatively, Red Dead Redemption 2 lets you run wild and kill regular NPCs, but with little consequence, as the main characters go scot-free (unless the plot dictates otherwise). On the other hand, from your looks to the last time Arthur showered, the world is responsive and treats you accordingly. The same goes depending on whether you’re honorable or not. That’s in sharp contrast to Elden Ring, where you can murder most NPCs, even those with extensive side quests, though the main quest keeps going. Of course, the world of RDR2 excels because of the sheer attention to detail, thanks to Rockstar’s insane dedication and budget.

On the other hand, Tears of the Kingdom boasts a believable world in terms of weather, physics, and so on. Create a large fire and its updraft allows for gliding. Carry any metal in a thunderstorm, and you’ll be struck by lightning. Those are only the basics, though – we’re not even talking about things like constructing massive Zonaite machines to rain death or exploiting shield hopping to solve puzzles. But aside from yeeting Koroks, you can’t really affect NPCs.

Even next to Cyberpunk 2077, The Witcher 3’s environmental interaction and responses from the world are a step lower. NPCs can still act realistically, but you can forget about killing them. The only effect you’ll have on the world is probably setting fires with Igni or breaking walls with Aard. At least it’s visually believable enough, whether it’s water realistically dripping down clothes, how foliage interacts with wind and other weather phenomena, and more.

Combat

With how wildly different each game’s combat can be, it’s hard to really earmark a clear winner. After all, I liked Cyberpunk 2077’s shooting, but even with solid melee combat, The Witcher 3 is handled completely differently. Elden Ring’s combat remains stellar, but that’s a Souls-like with a completely different rule-set. Red Dead Redemption 2 is a third-person shooter where cover is important; Tears of the Kingdom is more action-adventure hack-and-slash – it’s tough. Perhaps the closest comparison is Ghost of Tsushima, even with the latter’s stance-based combat.

However, even with the Remastered’s various improvements, there’s no denying that The Witcher 3’s combat isn’t its strongest quality. More responsive and smoother, sure, but better than Tsushima, Elden Ring or Cyberpunk? No. At the very least, based on mechanical preference, I’d place it slightly above Tears and RDR2.

Progression and Player Freedom

Player freedom can be a lot more important than one realizes in open-world titles nowadays. Red Dead Redemption 2 offers a range of activities to get lost in, and depending on how you get involved, some circumstances may change. However, the main story proceeds exactly how it should, and any attempt to deviate usually results in failure.

Compare it to Tears of the Kingdom, where you’re relatively free to complete everything based on the tools in your arsenal and how creatively they’re used. In that sense, Cyberpunk 2077 and Elden Ring aren’t too different, at least from an action RPG perspective. The former offers enough avenues for wildly different builds – much more than The Witcher 3 – which the immersive sim elements leverage via alternate paths and shortcuts through levels or even unique dialogue options.

FromSoftware is content to provide hundreds of ways to approach encounters and slaughter foes, and that’s perfectly fine, given the heavier focus on combat.

Even with the skill tree changes, comparing The Witcher 3 against any of them directly is tough. It has shades of RDR2’s stringency in main missions; pales in comparison to build variety and progression in either Cyberpunk or Elden Ring; and encourages nowhere near the ingenuity of Tears. However, it’s definitely above Ghost of Tsushima by virtue of the sheer amount of equipment and weapons, and more unique playstyles (even if Sucker Punch wins out in terms of stealth).

Atmosphere and Pacing

Another tricky comparison, because every game is paced differently. It’s hard to really say whether The Witcher 3’s pacing is directly worse than Tears of the Kingdom. And when considering their respective stories and worlds, almost every title offers excellent pacing (though many could argue that Elden Ring’s pacing suffers in its last portion).

Then there’s the atmosphere, and once again, every other title stands out in its own right. The inherent danger and wonder of The Lands Between can’t be compared to Night City’s mix of pizzazz and sleaziness or RDR 2’s depiction of the Wild West, Tsushima’s quiet beauty interspersed with war, or the contrast in Tears of the Kingdom’s different land masses. If anything, The Witcher 3’s atmosphere still holds up against the best. Trotting through environments with Roach, hearing the odd monster or two in places, and of course, hearing “Wind’s howling” never gets old. A draw, overall.

Conclusion

So roughly, each game has its strengths, weaknesses and quirks. Crazy, I know. The Witcher 3 surpasses almost everyone else in terms of story and characters, but falters in combat, though nowhere near as badly as one would think. And where the progression and player freedom aren’t necessarily the best, the world itself is still absolutely incredible to uncover, leveraging the genre’s fundamentals to encourage curiosity, even if it can be dangerous.

To that end, considering everything, I would place The Witcher 3 Remastered below Red Dead Redemption 2 and Elden Ring, on par with Cyberpunk 2077 and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and above Ghost of Tsushima. Your mileage, as always, will vary. Someone may prefer a deeper, more mature story with a greater focus on dialogue and characters. Others may want to be left alone to explore and take in the world, and still others may settle for nothing less than the very best in combat.

Whichever you may prefer, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt remains a must-play experience, especially today. As much as it shows how far the genre has come, it’s also a stark reminder of its importance over a decade later.

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.

After its latest hotfix fixed Xbox Play Anywhere performance issues and improved the lighting for some interiors that seemed too dark, the developer confirmed more fixes are on the way. That includes improvements to the PS5 version’s performance, more visual “adjustments”, and voiceover audio fixes on consoles. You can also expect Ukrainian localization on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S in other regions.

While much of this is planned for the next update, the developer is looking into other issues. If the mod selection felt a bit sparse, it’s currently working on “bringing more mods across all platforms” with Mod.io’s help.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered is a free upgrade for current-gen versions of the game, bringing several changes to lighting, shadows, foliage and more, while adding GTAO, ray-traced local shadows, and more. It also revamped skill progression, added transmog, improved animations for Geralt and Roach, introduced new finishers, and even implemented a timelapse when meditating. Check out our review or CD Projekt RED’s full list of changes for more details.

But even if you’re not one for critical scores and opinions, there’s no denying the enthusiasm around the Remastered edition, which is propelling the original to its highest Steam concurrent user count ever. You could chalk it up to the fact that it’s free, or the sheer number of changes, or CD Projekt RED finally pushing to improve the gameplay – the one real criticism against the classic (besides the frying pan quest, though that was more Witcher 1 reference than anything else).

Now that it’s been out for several days, one thing has become abundantly clear, even with all the bugs: The Witcher 3 is really hard to put down. You would think a few playthroughs would make that abundantly clear already. But no. In 2026, it still hits differently and makes me appreciate its design.

Keep in mind, this is after years of other incredible open-world titles, some using CD Projekt RED’s philosophy to deliver their own detailed settings and stories. It’s arguably the reason why the Horizon series and Assassin’s Creed’s action RPG titles came to be, and yet, even with other titles raising the bar in their own ways – see Red Dead Redemption 2 – life on The Path is still as endearing as it was more than a decade ago.

I think it begins with the world itself. When you’re traveling White Orchard for the first time on horseback, taking in the forestry and streams, listening to that one child mocking Emperor Emhyr with his rhyme, or getting into fights, there’s this ever-present feeling that the world is alive. That it exists irrespective of Geralt, but that doesn’t necessarily reduce him to a bystander. As monstrous as humans can be, some beings are beyond their capabilities. The real “monsters,” such as they are.

Geralt isn’t all-powerful or the kind of force that can eradicate them with a flick of the wrist (or crossbow). But he is one of the few who is specifically trained and chemically altered to hunt them. So while the world carries its own flow, he stands out, whether he moves with or against it.

Which brings us to another brilliant aspect of The Witcher 3’s world design: The organic exploration. Some may scoff because interacting with notice boards and other NPCs could quickly fill up your map with “question marks.” The potential dread of fetch quests set in for some players, guided by these seemingly innumerable signs of punctuation. This is what CD Projekt RED hyped for so long? But that’s where it subverted expectations.

Travelling to these points could reveal the odd treasure hunt, or even a nest of monsters that needed to be emulated, but none of this felt like busywork. The former could lead to other pieces of gear from other Witcher schools. The latter could lend to world-building or tie into another side quest. Littering the map with question marks did nothing to take away from the fully realised, immaculately detailed world.

Even the simplest monster elimination quest could lead to a moral quandary or something completely unexpected. I still remember taking the contract to eliminate an archgriffin in Velen. Knowing little about the different species – and only that it had the material required to progress another quest – I waltzed right in, without a care…to see it rise out of nowhere, extremely high-levelled and aggressive.

And that’s the beauty of it all. Even with the potential threat of high-level enemies and creatures, the overall activities stand out so much for their quality that you’re always willing to go off the beaten path. There’s this anticipation – this sense of discovering something unique and interesting (which happens pretty often, since it’s about more than just combat). One reason the main quest became so difficult for many players. You weren’t stuck juggling innumerable tasks so much as discovering all these incredible stories. It never felt tedious or like you were being dragged into something tedious.

Of course, that applies to the side quests as well – not just because of the twists and turns they can take, but because of the quality of writing. In a period where other games felt like they were getting by well enough with their conversations and quest dialogue, The Witcher 3 made each one feel special.

But if you think back, all those diversions and distractions didn’t necessarily feel like busywork. If anything, it felt very much in line with Geralt’s life in Andrzej Sapkowski’s novels. Geralt’s life with Ciri and his subsequent pursuit of her is well-developed, and forms the narrative through-line for many of the books. However, there are also plenty of “standalone” tales, if you want to call them that, that emphasise his life on The Path, taking on requests to hunt monsters and sometimes resolving situations without wanton slaughter. The Witcher 3 is no different, and the fact that you’re progressing in some fashion makes for a constantly rewarding experience.

Sure, you’re probably no closer to finding Ciri, but at least you’re stronger or better prepared to tackle what’s next, even if you really wished that one Unique sword wasn’t worse than what you’re currently rocking. The fact that so many of these pursuits can overlap, whether it’s leveling up enough to improve your skills or earning enough money and materials to upgrade your armor, means you’ll dive deeper into the world. And hope that curiosity doesn’t kill you in the process.

But hey, many of us already know all this, right? You were probably there for the Wolf School Gear bug. You saw Roach defying the laws of physics like no other. You may have finished the main quest, earning an ending that can be either heartbreaking or downright cathartic depending on the seemingly innocuous decisions made. You also returned in the expansions and saw Geralt to the happy retirement that he so deserved.

The fact that all of this is still present, and resonates as much as ever, is one reason why the remaster keeps me coming back. The sheer scale of the experience means I’ve forgotten so much, but the overall feel and atmosphere – that pull to explore, hearing “Wind’s howling” before the inevitable rains follow, and meeting these beloved characters once again – is undeniable. Of course, the gameplay improvements certainly don’t hurt, whether it’s the combat animations, new finishers, transmog or the dozens of other quality-of-life features.

Which is why I hope CD Projekt RED addresses the many bugs and performance concerns as quickly as possible. I didn’t really need the remaster in my life – even without the deluge of critically-acclaimed titles lately, my backlog is enough to keep me busy for the next year. But if there’s ever a time to return to The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, especially with Songs of the Past coming up, it’s now. And a fairly well-polished welcome mat certainly wouldn’t hurt.

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.

They’re giant open worlds that are designed to have you exploring every available square inch of land you can find, with interesting rewards and intriguing stories just waiting for you to stumble upon them. They feature gruff-voiced protagonists who carry the weight of the world on their shoulders and often add the burdens of others to the load.

Both games feature fighting systems that can have you feeling untouchable once you master their unique rhythms, while allowing for a surprising amount of nuanced customizability to the experience. But if you’re somebody who’s played both, you know that they’re also worlds apart.

With all of the improvements that have now been implemented in both Pywel and The Continent, we thought it would be a more interesting comparison if we looked at how both worlds have evolved since we first embarked on the respective journeys that they take us on. Let’s get right to it!

A Feast For Your Eyes

We felt the visuals in both worlds are a good place to start, as it’s an area where we believe both games are now evenly matched. However, Crimson Desert Enhanced does benefit from being a game that’s been made with modern technology, while Remastered is bringing modern features to a game that might not have been made to accommodate them.

However, it’s important to remember that CDPR’s 2015 title was quite ahead of its time when it was released, and the studio had already given the world a visual bump with that next-gen update from a few years ago. The remaster brings path tracing and improvements to existing ray tracing mechanics, alongside improvements to textures and assets to give us a very immersive and visually splendid world.

And yet, an open window in a room sometimes forgets to let rays of light in, forcing you to pull out a torch whose glow behaves exactly as it should with the new system governing it. Geralt’s hair often gets black when he’s in dark places, which can be quite jarring for those of us who know him as the White Wolf.

You see the game’s visuals working very well for the most part, until something out of place reminds you of The Continent’s age. It’s something that Pywel doesn’t have to struggle with, although that one did have its fair share of problems on the visual front.

However, the developer has worked to polish the visuals on offer over the course of the year, and Crimson Desert Enhanced is now a version of the game where every scene it presents comes with visual splendor and beauty to match The Continent, and perhaps even surpass it thanks to the benefits of being developed with more modern tech from the get-go.

But how does it feel to engage with the worlds themselves? That’s a facet of the experience that an open world lives or dies by, and it’s also interesting to see how both games have evolved their worlds over the years. It might look like Pywel and The Continent are similar in the ways in which you get to engage with them, but we’d say it’s more about what those activities encourage instead of what you do with each one.

The Continent’s a place that’s reeling from events in the past and present; its war-torn desolation forms a perfect backdrop for Geralt’s cynical examinations of the world around him. The things you do as a Witcher, when viewed through that lens, aren’t necessarily nudging you toward a more altruistic point of view, but challenge you to see the world as it is.

When you translate that into gameplay, you get choices that come with consequences you have to live with, and the potential for stories that feel personal when you play through them. Yes, the game has its minor share of generic open-world stuff, but given that Monster Nests, Hidden Treasures, and so many other activities directly feed into your role as a Witcher, the risk of monotony is somewhat offset by what you get to do with the rewards that come.

Kliff’s role as a Greymane is a little different, coming with more altruistic connotations and political intrigue that make Pywel a melting pot of different factions, cultures, and perspectives. That automatically lends a certain unique flavor to nearly every enemy you come across in a land where distinct biomes help maintain that variety.

Moreover, the spread of activities on offer is similarly aligned with making Kliff rise to his destiny while solving the mysteries of The Abyss. That means exploring the world makes you a better Greymane, while also showing off so many mysteries, quests both interesting and mundane, and a lot of things to distract you from the main story, no matter how determined you are to begin its next chapter.

Which one you’d prefer is sure to come down to personal tastes, but Remastered is the finest version of a world where the very writing forms an undercurrent of quality to it. In terms of nuance, The Continent edges ahead of Pywel despite being equally matched on visual quality in terms of how its world can not only pull you in, but also have you thinking about it even when you’re not actively exploring it, even if Pywel manages to have more scope in this regard.

But the world’s visuals and exploration are only parts of what make great RPGs.

A Challenge For Your Hands and Minds

The combat systems on offer, as well as the ways in which Geralt and Kliff are able to get around quickly in maps that span vast distances, are equally important in crafting a cohesive experience.

Let’s begin with the combat, and how Geralt’s abilities as a Witcher lend themselves to the illusion of a fighter with whom most opponents would rather avoid a direct confrontation. He’s got magic, his swords, his superhuman speed, and of course, potions, oils, and bombs, all of which are options in a fight.

He’s got the knowledge of Kaer Morhen guiding his preparations for fights against deadly monsters, while human enemies are going to be hard-pressed to even hold a candle to his prowess with a steel blade. He’s formidable, but not entirely infallible, and Remastered has done well to improve on his movements and animations, making them more fluid and quicker to give combat a much-needed boost.

But the enemy AI on offer is also important, given how Remastered has made enemies more coordinated, forcing you to switch out the original game’s pattern of “attack, attack, dodge/parry, cast sign, attack again”, instead making you pay attention to where attacks are coming from and respond accordingly. The dynamic camera is another nice touch and makes each fight all the more immersive.

However, from a progression standpoint, we’d argue that the new skill tree makes getting to your comfort zone so much easier if you’re coming back to the game after a previous playthrough. It’s so easy that you risk staying there and not taking advantage of how it now facilitates builds in a way that makes sense, something that a more casual player is going to miss out on, given how many other systems are competing for their attention.

Crimson Desert’s combat and progression mechanics are more woven into the gameplay, as are traversal mechanics. Geralt’s ability to swim, sail, and ride across The Continent matches in comparison to Kliff’s ability to fly, summon wyverns or Dragons, or use his own Abyss-powered abilities to cross even the most imposing natural obstacles with relative ease.

It helps that Pywel is designed to make you use those abilities intelligently, and to demonstrate that same cunning in a fight. Where Remastered brings Geralt into fights where he’s outnumbered by a group, Pywel pits Kliff against literal armies. It’s also relevant to remember that most of his main abilities have been refined, enhanced, and even added to over the course of this year to make Crimson Desert feel like a whole new game while retaining what was already working in these areas.

They’re vastly different experiences, to be sure, but we’d have to say that as far as combat, traversal, and progression go, it’s a tie.

Stories For Your Hearts and Souls

Ah, the main narrative. The reason why many of us end up spending several hours engaging with worlds like Pywel and The Continent. Be it the ever-present threat to reality that stems from misuse of the Abyss in Crimson Desert, or the devastating effects of the Conjunction of the Spheres and the desolation of a war-torn land in The Continent, it’s clear that both games have very interesting stories to tell.

It’s also clear that while those narratives are very effective at lending context and structure to worlds that would otherwise languish in irrelevance without them, Kliff’s time in Pywel can feel too disjointed, and perhaps even too slanted towards being a good guy to give you the same sense of agency you can get from Remastered.

The search for Ciri, and the people it puts you in contact with, present opportunities for you to put your stamp on the world, leaving it better or worse than you found it when you first arrived. The Bloody Baron and the manner in which your choices can influence his family long after his role in the main narrative is over is a great example.

That he isn’t the only character in The Continent whose life you can impact in such a fashion, and that every single such questline comes with so much nuance and depth that you might need a break just to process it all, is something that didn’t need any improving in Remastered, as it continues to be a very potent storytelling formula that has since lent itself to Night City with excellent results.

Crimson Desert Enhanced has done well to try and make its story more cohesive, but Kliff’s fight against the forces looking to destabilize his world isn’t going to measure up against a story that has so much to offer. Yes, there are highs such as the moment you bring Myurdin down, and lows like Damiane’s discovery of her mentor’s fate, all of which can give you memories to cherish.

But The Continent makes you think like a Witcher and allows you to inject a bit of your personality into its eventual fate. That your decisions carry as much weight as they do is something that allows Remastered to steal the win away from Crimson Desert despite the latest update’s effort to bridge the narrative gaps the original game came with.

We’d say it’s more interesting to be a Witcher than a Greymane as far as the story each role presents you with is concerned.

A Common Thread

There you have it. Crimson Desert Enhanced comes with better controls, combat, and traversal mechanics, but The Witcher 3 Remastered is the definitive version of an open world that continues to remain amongst the most legendary ones there are.

The Continent’s overarching story, and the world it thrusts you into, are simply too nuanced and well-written for Pywel’s relatively tamer take on destiny to compare to. However, if you look at how both games have evolved from their original releases, things get a little more interesting.

You see, The Witcher 3 has been beloved not only by its players, but also by its makers, and has thus seen two incredible expansions and two substantial updates over the years, with another one and a whole sequel on the way. Geralt and Ciri have also managed tos tay in the spotlight due to the franchise’s presence in other media, giving Remastered the benefit of a constant spotlight. It’s an improvement that brings new tech to an already great game, with noticeable improvements to the underlying systems that made it special in the first place.

Crimson Desert, on the other hand, has had to claw its way up from a rather lackluster release response, using every improvement it has made to earn back goodwill from its audiences, and as such, makes for a more impressive upgrade. Enhanced is the culmination of a journey that might have taken another studio a very long time to complete, and it now exists mere months after the original release and has already laid the groundwork for an expansion; it is something we can’t scoff at.

As a complete game, we’d have to hand the win to The Witcher 3 Remastered, but as an evolution of the game that came before it, Crimson Desert Enhanced is the more impressive upgrade.

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.