The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt — Complete Edition — the most complete edition of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, including all expansions, add-ons The Witcher 3: Blood and Wine and The Witcher 3: Hearts of Stone, as well as numerous graphical improvements. Owners of the original version of the game on consoles and PC received the Complete Edition as a free update. The upgrade is available regardless of the presence of add-ons; the original game must be present on the account.
The events of the final part of Geralt's adventures begin shortly after the finale of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. Nilfgaard has successfully conquered Temeria and plans to subjugate the rest of the northern lands. Meanwhile, the famous witcher Geralt and his wise mentor Vesemir are on the trail of the missing sorceress Yennefer, the longtime love of the White Wolf. You can expect an adventure-filled game world, a brilliant storyline, an excellent combat system, stunning graphics, nonlinearity, multiple endings, and a cozy atmosphere of Slavic medieval fantasy.
New features of the Complete Edition:
- photo mode, available at any moment. When setting up the frame, four menus are available: "camera angle," "depth of field," "effects," and "overlay," each with a range of parameters;
- alternative camera position — slightly further from the character's back and with greater sensitivity when moving the stick/mouse. Now you can see every action of the character and models around him. In the settings, you can set the preferred camera position when walking, in combat, or on horseback;
- the map has become more accurate and detailed, with unnecessary question marks and boat icons removed; the filter can be disabled in the settings. As well as the display of the mini-map itself and/or the list of current objectives;
- quick access to all witcher signs, consolidated into a new menu opened by pressing a separate button;
- Geralt's walking speed now depends on the degree of stick tilt (only on gamepads), and his fall damage is calculated based on height. Running outside of combat does not consume stamina;
- when watching cutscenes and videos, you can pause them at any moment, as all pre-recorded moments have been replaced with in-engine scenes;
- customizable font size for subtitles, interface, dialogue choices, and other text elements;
- errors and inaccuracies in the Russian language translation have been corrected, as well as character chatter with accelerated or delayed playback of lines relative to lip movements;
- cross-platform saves between PC and consoles via CD Projekt "cloud" (account required);
- new quest "In the Shadow of Eternal Fire" with multiple endings, inspired by the Netflix series — as a reward, you will receive blueprints for Geralt's swords and armor from seasons 1 and 2 of the series, Renfri's brooch, and the "series" version of the witcher medallion;
- also from season 1, alternative Nilfgaardian leather armor for Geralt, the outfit of the bard ally Dandelion, and some other characters have been transferred;
- the gameplay rebalance has changed most of the perks, abilities, signs, potions, some types of weapons, and armor for realism. An invincible build is now impossible and you can’t heal with "Gourmet". Skills now have a cooldown after use, so you can’t spam them indefinitely. However, the beginning of the game has become significantly easier;
- the progression system has been fixed — all skills have 3 levels instead of 5, so you can level up Geralt in one playthrough, and the effect of enhancing each specific skill is more powerful;
- additional testing revealed minor but unpleasant bugs from the original, which have been fixed. All previously released technical updates are also included.
Complete Edition graphics innovations:
- ray tracing on PC and PS5/XSX consoles without being tied to the graphics chip vendor. On video adapters without RT cores, software ray tracing, i.e., only the basic capabilities of this technology;
- increased game performance through frame scaling (FSR 2.0 technology on AMD graphics cards and PS5/XSX consoles or DLSS on Nvidia graphics cards);
- increased texture resolution of almost all objects, increased the number of full-fledged 3D objects instead of their previous imitations;
- character and monster models improved with 4K textures, armor display bugs fixed;
- grass improved and almost all in-game vegetation reworked;
- clouds changed and new weather conditions added;
- about a dozen new animations for Geralt and Roach have been added, for example, petting;
- all objects now have reflections on their surfaces when wet (previously the effect was only on water);
- the PC version received a new graphics settings option, "Ultra+", affecting 8 main parameters;
- the listed innovations are not present on PS4, XOneX, and Switch, except for the new quest and items in the style of the Netflix series, bug fixes, and cross-platform saves;
- Complete Edition is the base version for PS5, XSX, and their successors in the ninth generation of consoles, it also replaced the original in sales, both digitally and on physical media.
Witcher 3 is the first game in the series with a fully open world, set in the Northern Kingdoms during the third Nilfgaardian Empire invasion. The Witcher 3 game zone is 30 times larger than that of Witcher 2, and players can use a horse — Roach — for travel.
The world is divided into regions with different landscapes and development, inhabited by various ethnic groups. There are 15 full-fledged states and more than 20 principalities and free cities, which, depending on the player’s actions, will unite to resist or be conquered. The design of the settlements resembles medieval Eastern Europe, but there are Scandinavian-type buildings as well.
The rest of the game world offers mountains and valleys, fields and forests, rivers and lakes, caves and underground vaults to explore. There are swamps and "cursed places" where monsters usually dwell. The bestiary of Witcher 3 is extremely diverse, on the player's path they will encounter not only bandits and wild animals, but also vampires, ghosts, ogres, earth elementals, griffins, succubi, and other monsters.
The game world is filled with numerous events, both random and scripted, programmed to be as close to possible reality as possible, making it interesting to explore.
- Geralt of Rivia — a wandering monster hunter (witcher), wields two swords in combat, fights skillfully, uses magical signs and potions to enhance his abilities. He constantly finds himself at the center of important events.
- Triss — a sorceress, Geralt's lover and Yennefer's friend, well known from previous games in the series. In the third part, her role as support for Geralt during his long journeys has not changed.
- Yennefer — a sorceress whom Geralt is in love with, but mutual feelings cannot balance the different natures of the lovers. Geralt searched for her for a long time, but she first appeared in the third part.
- Ciri — a young witcheress trained by Geralt, but not completely. Pursued by the "Wild Hunt" due to the peculiarities of her true origin. She has a key significance for the plot.
The "Wild Hunt" is not just highlighted in the game's title — it is a squad of elite ghostly riders from another dimension, the dying world of the elves, who are trying to migrate to the human world. It is led by the elven king Eredin, ready to open a portal at any cost, for which he kidnaps people who can lead him to Ciri. The antagonist does not even imagine that Geralt is comparable to him in strength and cunning.
At the same time, the Nilfgaard Empire is absorbing the Northern Kingdoms one by one. The player can choose one of the sides of the conflict, participating in battles and sieges to contribute to the political structure of the game world. Simultaneously, Emperor Emhyr orders Geralt to find and save Ciri.
Unlike other role-playing games, the mechanics of Witcher 3 allow the player not to accept secondary quests, events will unfold regardless of whether Geralt participates in them or not. Each plot quest offers several development options, affecting the game's finale. The writers have meticulously worked on the story, dialogues, and added numerous cutscenes.
Secondary tasks set the bar high, as most of them are well-developed and strikingly different from standard open-world quests like "kill" or "fetch". The plot can be completed quickly in 40 hours, or as expected in 50. The same amount of time will be spent exploring the game world and secondary tasks.
The combat system has been completely redesigned so that Geralt can fight a large number of opponents simultaneously. The system of combos and strike combinations is absent, the player simply needs to time their strikes, defend, counterattack, dodge, and take cover. The mechanics of the silver and steel swords remain unchanged, but an alternative has been added — bombs and a crossbow.
The system of five magical signs has been improved, now they can be used both in combat and in everyday life. Для выполнения квестов часто приходится использовать «ведьмачье чутье», взаимодействовать с игровым миром. Чудовища и монстры получили сильные и слабые стороны, последние нужно знать, чтобы быстро с ними расправиться.
Алхимию усложнили, но, выпивая зелья, Геральт получает особые способности, повышает свои характеристики или урон против определенных врагов. Максимальный уровень персонажа — 70, но меняется в зависимости от сложности игры. Как и раньше, Геральт может улучшать свои таланты, выбрав специализацию и соответствующие умения.
Спустя годы после выхода, Wild Hunt обзавелась сотнями пользовательских модификаций, большая часть которых переехала и в обновленную версию. Более того, в неё по-умолчанию интегрированы моды The Witcher 3 HD Reworked Project, HD Monsters Reworked, Immersive Real-time Cutscenes, Nitpicker's Patch, World Map Fixes и многие компоненты FCR Mod.
Также CD Projekt выпустила новую версию Modkit — инструментария для моддеров, с улучшениями и дополнениями, чем обеспечила проекту жизнь на десятилетия вперед.
- Многочисленные, хорошо проработанные любовные сцены.
- Действия игрока приводят мир в 1 из 36 возможных финальных состояний.
- Очень высокая реиграбельность, как сюжетная, так и геймплейная. Игру можно пройти трижды совершенно по-разному.
- Witcher 3 получила 16 бесплатных дополнений с игровым контентом и 2 больших сюжетных дополнения — Hearts of Stone и Blood and Wine.
- Можно импортировать сохранения РС-версии Witcher 2, чтобы принятые решения отразились на прохождении третьей части. Это повлияет на состояние мира, наличие второстепенных персонажей и квесты.