The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered Impressions

When CD Projekt Red announced yet another next-gen re-release of The Witcher 3 at Gamescom this year, I was initially immensely skeptical. I cynically assumed they were going the Skyrim route of re-releasing the game for the sake of a cashgrab, especially since they already re-released Wild Hunt in 2022. And yet, credit where it’s due, given the sheer number of quality-of-life improvements and graphical updates within The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered, in this instance, CD Projekt Red does what Bethesdon’t.

Jovial jabs aside, it is impressive how much love and support CD Projekt Red have afforded to The Witcher 3 over the years. Many game developers and fans would be content to leave the past be and move on to their next project(s). But supporting the game that made CD Projekt Red a household name a decade after its release, with a substantial update in 2026 as well as the promise of new DLC on the horizon to help bridge the gap to The Witcher 4 in 2028 (supposedly), is truly commendable.

The Witcher 3 Remastered is substantial indeed. This isn’t just a graphical upgrade for current-gen hardware. There’s a veritable laundry list of improvements, updates, and quality-of-life changes to this remaster. Changes are substantial enough that the developers very cheekily neglected to list them all in the reveal trailer, cutting the list off before it could finish. It makes sense for them to over-deliver, given that they already did a graphical update in 2022 that introduced ray-traced lighting, along with its own bevy of gameplay improvements.

Having dived into the remaster for several hours since it went live last week. While it’s an impressive effort from Yigsoft (the studio that handled the remaster, under guidance from CDPR), it’s not the literal game-changer you may have come to expect from reading the descriptions and itinerary of improvements added to this release.

Frankly, if I were to sum up this remaster in a sentence, it would be “your mileage may vary.” A lot of the changes The Witcher 3 Remastered makes are not uniform improvements to the degree that Cyberpunk 2.0 was, but it would be ridiculous to expect that level of dedication and effort from this project.

That’s not to say it’s bad. Far from it. It’s just important to set the right expectations. I mention that specifically for the people who may have bounced off of The Witcher 3 for whatever reason over the years, hoping that this remaster does enough to win you over. It probably won’t.

The combat in The Witcher 3 is still the same combat, for better or for worse. True, the remaster adds new combat animations, tweaks the enemy behaviour, fine-tunes some existing animations, and adds a new dynamic camera specifically for combat. That does sound good on paper, but even then, I wouldn’t say it’s enough to sway skeptics and critics of this game’s combat. That said, as someone who already enjoyed the combat in The Witcher 3 well enough, having it play smoother than it ever has is all-too-welcome.

Graphically, yes, The Witcher 3 Remastered is stunning. It boasts a new lighting pass, improved shaders, and updated textures (courtesy of The Witcher 3 HD Reworked Project mod team), among many other visual improvements. The new lighting pass shines the brightest, literally, since every scene and location is much brighter and more saturated across the board. I do appreciate the new look, especially during dusk and dawn, but it depends on your personal taste. Judging by cursory glances at YouTube comments, subreddits. and forums, public opinion seems fairly split on whether the remaster is truly an improvement or an overcorrection that robs the original of its character in favour of more glossy modern visuals. This could well be a loud minority, as is the case with a lot of online consensus, but looking at the side-by-sides, it’s hard not to see where they’re coming from with those critiques.

The skill tree in The Witcher 3 Remastered also underwent a revamp. While it still functions similarly to before, skill progression is streamlined so you no longer need to put points into skills you may not necessarily need to use for the sake of unlocking the next skill tier. Now you have a tree with multiple paths, depending on how you want to distribute your points. Again, reception on this has been mixed online, but most agree it looks more visually appealing now, and many of the more boring skills (x% damage/defense increase) were upgraded or removed.

What’s decidedly less subjective about The Witcher 3: Remastered is how it performs on both consoles and PC at present. While I’m fortunate enough to own a PS5 Pro to play the remaster on, even that is prone to stuttering on occasion, especially in Novigrad: a problem that was also present in the 2022 update. The stutters are not quite as frequent, and to be fair, performance mode is a much smoother experience. Yet, as is customary with CD Projekt Red releases, it’s better to wait a short while for the most egregious issues to be ironed out.

Even with performance woes and arguments over graphical fidelity aside, one objective improvement without any debate is how much better the game looks on Switch 2 versus the Switch version in 2019. Don’t get me wrong, ‘The Switcher 3,’ as fans affectionately name it, was an undeniably impressive “miracle port” of the original game onto the platform, but comparing that version to this current one is a night-and-day difference and speaks to how far the platform has come with its new-gen refresh.

There’s still plenty in The Witcher 3: Remastered to gush about unequivocally, and as was true of the next-gen update in 2022, it’s the smaller touches and quality-of-life improvements that really make it worthwhile. Of those improvements, one of my favourites is the fact that meditating, which is how you manually pass time and restore your health and potions in the open world, is now a timelapse rather than a clock ticking by in the menu. It’s a small touch, but it’s immensely satisfying, and feels like something that should have always been in the game.

Other notable additions that help make the game much smoother to play include: the ability to hide the icons for herbs and corpses on the minimap, the ability to transmog your gear, the ability to loot nearby scenery without dismounting Roach, and a new suite of accessibility options, with a preset called “Bard’s Ballad.” These options are billed as suitable for gamers who may be overwhelmed by The Witcher 3‘s various systems and would rather have a more streamlined experience. Frankly, anyone can and should be using these as needed. Infinite breath underwater, unlimited item durability, and the ability to ignore carry weight are just some of the options you can toggle here, if you dislike those facets of RPGs and would rather minimise the potential tedium that comes with them over a 100+ hour playthrough.

Last, but not least, The Witcher 3 Remastered now features mod support across all platforms thanks to mod.io integration: a welcome trend in recent years, with games being retrofitted or launching with mod.io functionality built in. While I can’t speak to how robust and viable mod.io is as a platform, it’s great to see this particular gap between PC and console players of The Witcher 3 smaller than ever. No doubt many of the top mods for the game will become available for console players over the coming months.

If, like me, you’re someone who adores this game and regards it as one of the all-time great RPGs, then you can be confident the remaster is the most enjoyable and complete version of the game to date: gameplay-wise, if not visually. If you’re due another playthrough, especially in preparation for the upcoming Songs of the Past DLC next year, this update will give you more than enough to chew on without feeling like you’re going through the motions, especially if you haven’t played the 2022 next-gen upgrade.

If you have played that update recently, though, Remastered may feel more like an incremental upgrade, rather than a complete overhaul. I was more than fine with that, especially given that it’s a free update rather than paid DLC. Otherwise, your personal taste will be a large factor in whether you feel this remaster enhances the experience or not.

Me, though? I’m eager to jump back into it and venture back out there. Wind’s howling.