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Two full-blown expansions for the epic RPG.




The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is almost here. That means the game is pretty much finished, and the devs are about to take a deep breath while CD-presses and hype machines slowly wind up to take things through the home stretch. It's not gold yet, but now that development is coming to an end, the CD PROJEKT RED team is ready to start their work on two new, ambitious monster-hunting expansions.

The expansions will be called <span class="bold">Hearts of Stone</span>, and <span class="bold">Blood and Wine</span>. Combined, they'll offer over 30 hours of new adventures for Geralt, and the latter introduces a whole new major area to roam. More items, gear, and characters (including a few familiar faces) will all be crafted with the same attention to detail as the game itself.
<span class="bold">Hearts of Stone</span> is a 10-hour adventure across the wilds of No Man's Land and the nooks of Oxenfurt. The secretive Man of Glass has a contract for you - you'll need all your smarts and cunning to untangle a thick web of deceit, investigate the mystery, and emerge in one piece.
<span class="bold"><span class="bold">Blood and Wine</span></span> is the big one, introducing an all-new, playable in-game region to The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. It will take you about 20 hours to discover all of Toussaint, a land of wine, untainted by war. And to uncover the dark, bloody secret behind an atmosphere of carefree indulgence.







There used to be a time when buying an add-on disk or expansion for your game really meant something. That's what CD PROJEKT RED are going for, it's about bringing that old feeling back. You can take it from our very own iWi, (that's Marcin Iwinski, co-founder of CD PROJEKT RED):

"We’ve said in the past that if we ever decide to release paid content, it will be vast in size and represent real value for the money. Both of our expansions offer more hours of gameplay than quite a few standalone games out there.”

Hearts of Stone is expected to premiere this October, while Blood and Wine is slated for release in the first quarter of 2016, so there's still plenty of time ahead. We're offering you the <span class="bold">Expansion Pass</span> now - it's a chance to pre-order the two expansions and even show your support for the devs. But we can't stress Marcin Iwinski's words enough:

“Don’t buy it if you have any doubts. Wait for reviews or play The Witcher and see if you like it first. As always, it’s your call."







The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is just over a month away, and you can pre-order the game right now - it's a particularly great deal if you own the previous Witcher games and take advantage of the additional fan discount (both The Witcher and The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings are 80% off right now!). You can also take a rather unique refresher course on the universe with The Witcher Adventure Game at a 40% discount, all until Thursday, 4:59 PM GMT.
Post edited April 07, 2015 by Chamb
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Hello Everyone,

First of all let me thank you for your feedback. Although a bit harsh at times, it is always very passionate, emotional and we really do appreciate it.

I wanted to add a few words to the original press release, which will hopefully shed some more light on the Expansions and the timing of the announcement.

Let me start with the Expansions themselves. The work on The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is almost done and we are waiting for the final certifications. Thanks to it we were able to allocate part of the team onto the expansions. Yes, we have been thinking about it for some time, as with over 250 people on the Witcher team good planning is essential.

Rest assured, there is no hidden agenda or cutting out any content from the game. Both Expansions are being built at this very moment, from the ground up – hence the release dates long after the launch of Wild Hunt. We develop them in-house by the same team, which was working on Wild Hunt. This is the best guarantee we can give you that our goal is to deliver both the story and production values on par with the main game.

Now, on the timing of the announcement - in other words “why now” and not - let’s say – “a few months after the release of Wild Hunt”. The reason is very simple: we want to get the word out about the Expansions to as many gamers as possible out there. There is no better time for it than during the apex of the Marketing & PR campaign of the game. Doing it sometime after the release would mean that our reach would be much smaller.

Yes, we are a business, and yes, we would love to see both the game and the Expansions selling well. Having said that, we always put gamers first and are actually quite paranoid about the fact that whatever we offer is honest, of highest quality, and represents good value for your hard earn buck.

Yes, these are just my words. So let me repeat myself from the original release: if you still have any doubts -- don’t buy the Expansions. Wait for reviews or play The Witcher and see if you like it first. As always, it’s your call.

Cheers,

Marcin
Post edited April 09, 2015 by Destro
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I was going to post my disappointment in this announcement, but everything of distaste already seems to have been said. I'm not going to cancel my pre-order (though I probably should and wait for a GotY edition), and all I can really say is that I'm disappointed in CDPR/GOG for such a practice. Not that paid expansion content was being released, but that it seems that it was pre-planned cut content from the final game and that it was announced before the game was even released to begin with.

I thought Watchdogs getting DLC a week and a half after release was a bit too quick, not sure how I feel about this. Heh, I said i wasn't going to complain and here I am complaining, I do apologize but this is kind of a little disappointing and frankly a bit heart breaking. I'm also surprised there isn't some form of loyalty discount or something for early adopters of the pre-order for TW3. Oh well, this wasn't exactly a good day for me to begin with, I hope everyone has a good day. :)
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Pheace: ...
Witcher 3, First game on GOG to prevent gifting from a lower priced region.
...
Where did you read this? Could you post the source please? Thank you.
Well this has come as a bit of a shock when i first saw it but now thinking about it 30 + hours of additional gameplay is well worth the price especially considering that some expansions for games only give an additional 1-2 hours per expansion.
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bmgermani: Not a conspiracy. Just a company doing things in a way that goes against what they claim to stand for.

Guess I shouldn't even be surprised anymore.
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darthspudius: I'm not following... it's not like they took content OUT of the game to sell.
We also don't know that it's not content that COULD be in the game.
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ThePunishedSnake: Of course, but that insider told Witcher 3 merely exist or something like that. Maybe those expansion exist but they need a lot of months to be playable, I don't know.
Since I don't recall said discussion, could you post a link to the neogaf thread?
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P1na: One of the reasons I preordered the wild hunt was because it was a game where I counted I'd get it all at once, just like with the previous games. Seeing that not only will it not be so, but that you're pushing the expansions before the actual game is even out... Honestly, it makes me want to cancel that preorder.

Not cool. Not cool at all. This is a shot at your trust boat's flotation line, for me at least.
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mkess: I will cancel my preorder on saturday, if I don't get the future DLC for free as promised in the preorder announcement last year.. It was the main reason I preordered a game for the first time in my life.

They have until friday to clarify this matter. If they do not answer positive, they will loose my money and my trust in them.

And after that, I will buy CD Project game only in a sale, with ALL content, for under 10 Euro. I can wait.
When did they say all DLC would be free? I know they said 16 free DLC will be given. They also said if they do large significant content (ie an expansion pack) that they would probably charge for it. They have been saying that for a while.

So just asking... can you provide a link?
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Yeah, I have no problem paying for expansions, I just question the timing of the announcement...
The sword of destiny has two expansions.

I 'll play the main game first feore I may buy and play the expansions HearthStone and BloodWhine if it the Wild Hunt is worthwhile experience.
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Ultra_DTA: We also don't know that it's not content that COULD be in the game.
It's not. For said content to be able to make it in the game on release, it means that the programmers would have already built it, and not fix bugs for the gold master. At this point in time, it's mostly the writers and artists that are sitting on their thumbs, and those are the ones that are working on the modules.
Sure, it is possible that they would say "Wouldn't it be cool to add feature X to the game" 3 years ago, and for whatever reason it was cut, but the OP makes the adventures seem as separated from the main game, not parts of it.
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darthspudius: I'm not following... it's not like they took content OUT of the game to sell.
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Ultra_DTA: We also don't know that it's not content that COULD be in the game.
Well if it's not finished then how could they? Hmm... lets think about that one.
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Pheace: I don't get the impression parent company CDPR has ever really been that in line with GOG, or at least not for a long time.

If you look at the Witcher games,

Witcher 2, First game on GOG to have Regional Pricing, Region lock, DRM on retail editions and Steam versions.
Witcher 3, First game on GOG to prevent gifting from a lower priced region.

I really wonder how GOG keeps a straight face trying to make deals with publishers/developers, yet their own company doesn't even keep to the same standards.

Every time a Witcher game comes out it seems to chip away at what GOG is trying to achieve.
Indeed, unfortunately there seems to a pattern there which you have summarized quite well.
Is it justme, or have the prices for the Expansion Pack (ugghh) and Base game+expansion pack changed in the last 20-30 minutes?
When I started reading this topic it was 17 and 45 EUR respectively, and now I am seeing 25 and 60 EUR
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ThePunishedSnake: Of course, but that insider told Witcher 3 merely exist or something like that. Maybe those expansion exist but they need a lot of months to be playable, I don't know.
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JMich: Since I don't recall said discussion, could you post a link to the neogaf thread?
Yeah, search this thread:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=905447

http://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/2i7gmx/the_witcher_3_development_issues_in_major_crunch

There was even a discussion on Witcher's forum (not GOG one, the official one from CDPR).
GOGBear is not going to like this thread...
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I simply cannot fucking believe that GOG/CDP are taking the DLC/season pass route with The Witcher 3.

I immediately thought this was an April Fools day joke.

UNBELIEVABLE.