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General discussionAnnouncing The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Expansion Pass(1100 posts)(1100 posts)
(1100 posts)
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Posted April 07, 2015
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
Posted April 09, 2015
high rated
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
Posted April 08, 2015
I own 2 physical copies and 3 electronic copies of Witcher 1, all purchased separately.

I pre-ordered Witcher 2 on GOG, plus I have the collector's edition box (130 USD or something) because my wife insisted.

I just cancelled my pre-orders for Witcher 3. The reasons should be obvious. Hours later I am STILL furious and absolutely dumbstruck that "Witcher 3 Season Pass Pre-Order" is a real thing.

Just say it out loud:

"Witcher 3 Season Pass Pre-Order"

No amount of preemptive PR can spin that.
Post edited April 08, 2015 by bigsilverhotdog
Posted April 08, 2015
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BKGaming: It's not really mandatory, I can do that really with a good download manager honestly. So if I was that opposed I would just do that. I can't reasonably expect a company to support old software when something else has replaced it that does the the same thing. As far as Galaxy being bloat, this isn't Steam... surprisingly it's fast/lightweight even though it still an alpha.
Technically its not mandatory I agree and was merely presenting the point of view that I have seen others express on the forum. Personally I have the GOG Galaxy installed and its quite alright so far. But the website is definitely not, it is in dire straits as a consequence of the unbundling of games for the client and there are no signs of any work being done to fix all the issues. I just hope that this continued focus on the optional client doesn't severely hinder the user experience on the website, thats all. :)
Post edited April 08, 2015 by stg83
Posted April 08, 2015
unhappy

btw how do I go about canceling a preorder? Does it just get credited back to my credit card?
Posted April 08, 2015
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obsidianscythe: unhappy

btw how do I go about canceling a preorder? Does it just get credited back to my credit card?
Go here: http://www.gog.com/support/contact/my_orders_and_payments

Select which order it was and select preorder cancelation under problem type

Since its a preorder you should get money back to your card.
Post edited April 08, 2015 by Matruchus
Posted April 08, 2015
Well I guess the last line there was nice. I think I will wait for a few months and see what the general take is on Wither 3 first.

As for the idea, I wondered for a while if number three would be the "last" Witcher, I just knew inside that you guys would love going back too much.

Best of luck. I hope the game really does turn out as good as it looks.
Posted April 08, 2015
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BKGaming: But again as I said before if you look at the past behavior of GOG in regards to MP/ online MP there focus has always been keeping the single player DRM free, that is what they see as DRM free. Otherwise there would have been no cd keys for MP ect on GOG.
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Davane: If we look at past behaviour on such issues, someone is going to post a Downfall parody, and then GOG.com will respond with a Downfall parody of their own...
Meh doesn't make it any less true... we have always known were GOG's priority was when it comes to games being DRM free. It's now though people really take issue because of people biased views again client software.
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bigsilverhotdog: I own 2 physical copies and 3 electronic copies of Witcher 1, all purchased separately.

I pre-ordered Witcher 2 on GOG, plus I have the collector's edition box (130 USD or something) because my wife insisted.

I just cancelled my pre-orders for Witcher 3. The reasons should be obvious. Hours later I am STILL furious and absolutely dumbstruck that "Witcher 3 Season Pass Pre-Order" is a real thing.

Just say it out loud:

"Witcher 3 Season Pass Pre-Order"

No amount of preemptive PR can spin that.
First off it's "Expansion Pass Pre-Oder", not a season pass or whatever. Second why shouldn't a company make additional content when they have the main game largely done and expect to make money if is a large expansion that they are devoting months of time too. Have I fallen into some twilight zone were gamers have forgotten how extra content was done before consoles and the DLC craze?
Post edited April 08, 2015 by BKGaming
Posted April 08, 2015
...
Post edited April 08, 2015 by Grargar
Posted April 08, 2015
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obsidianscythe: unhappy

btw how do I go about canceling a preorder? Does it just get credited back to my credit card?
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Matruchus: Go here: http://www.gog.com/support/contact/my_orders_and_payments

Select which order it was and select preorder cancelation under problem type

Since its a preorder you should get money back to your card.
ty ill look at that
Posted April 08, 2015
Remember when expansion packs were brought up around Witcher 2's release and then never happened, presumably because of the patching nightmare where each successive patch broke something else? Like when patch 1.3 (I believe) caused putting items in storage to be sold when you went into storage through dialogue? Yeah, well, this is an upgraded version of the same engine and history seems to indicate that the move to open-world isn't going to help with the need for patching.

This is a bad idea, and The Witcher 2 still has bugs, such as the still-mandatory-for-some-bizarre-reason Kayran QTE sequence that a bunch of computers render impossible by not properly registering clicks. If a small portion of a much smaller and more manageable game is left in such a sorry state, how can anyone have faith that the same won't happen to elements of the base game here as the focus shifts to working on these expansions?

The slew of "good news" in the past few months hasn't exactly helped put me at ease, either. You've changed, iWi, and I think it might be time for us to start seeing other people until your priorities are a bit more in order.
Posted April 08, 2015
high rated
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LynetteC: Yes, that was intentional - l prefer to think of it as a "pack" and if GOG had announced it as such there might not have been as much of a shit storm as we're experiencing now. :-)
I know it was, I was just messing with you; I find CDPR's/ GOG's choice quite ridiculous, sort of a desperate attempt to appeal and connect to both the dinosaurs and the newer generations.
Posted April 08, 2015
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mistermumbles: While I feel pretty neutral about this announcement, it does make me curious: With them stating that before coupled with today's announcement it makes it seem like this was already more or less planned at that stage. How long ago was it that they said what I quoted from your post?
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BKGaming: June of last year... I honestly expected this. They seem to want to go more of the Skyrim road with Witcher 3, and after the success of that game who can blame them? Most people want more content after they beat the game.

I think just announced it way to early...

http://tmi.kotaku.com/the-witcher-3-guys-promise-theyll-do-dlc-right-1595359101
If they want to do DLC right this is just the next fuck up from GOG/CD Project.

I'm ok with DLC, I'm even ok with Season Passes, but I'm not ok with this PR-stunt.

When I buy a game, I want to buy it with all content. Bioshock Infinite was offered with the Season Pass from the beginning. Ubisoft offered the last Editions of Assassins Creed with a bundled Season Pass as "Gold" or "Special Edition". I could decide to buy it or wait for a complete or Gold Edition. I buy everything or wait for a complete Edition.
Right now Bioware/EA have a better DLC politics for DA:I than CD Project. They announced the first big Singleplayer DLC nearly 4(!) month after the release, which is ok, too.

But releasing a Season Pass before the Release date and month after the Preorder start ist like sticking a middle finger to the first guys who preordered the game. And they don't even have the balls to call it a Season Pass. Thank you CD Project...
Posted April 08, 2015
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d2t: In the same way you could label GOG Downloader as being mandatory software to download GOG games, because there are people who don't want to use GOG website? What kind of failed, broken logic is this?
In the same vain, you could label installers as being mandatory software to playing GOG games, as well as the every popular DOSBox for many older titles. These are all, technically, DRM.

If the installer doesn't work, the games can't be installed. That's DRM right there.

For many, the OS itself is the biggest part of DRM on most people's computers.

Ultimately, DRM is about control. As a process, it is about who controls the usage of the software.

The unbundling is an example of this - now Might and Magic I is a separate installer to Might and Magic II. I can no longer install Might and Magic I-IV in a single install. It might seem trivial, but I am already being controlled in how I am using the software - and that's DRM in principle.

There's all this talk of conspiracy theories regarding GOG Galaxy, but the simple fact is that it is DRM. It gives GOG.com greater control over how users install content, and that's the whole point of DRM. Whether you use GOG Galaxy, GOG Downloader, or individual installers, you are using DRM.

In fact, you only have to look at Fallout 1, 2, and Tactics to see that GOG.com does have DRM of sorts. Newer members cannot buy these games - they can't download them, or see them, or anything. GOG.com has removed them from their catelog. For those who already purchased them, these games can still be downloaded and installed - so the content itself still exists on GOG.com - it is just unavailable for some people. That is DRM.

As stated above, DRM is ultimately about control. GOG.com being DRM-Free is a myth - and since this is their only remaining core policy, it doesn't bode well for GOG.com being anything other than another online distribution store.
Posted April 08, 2015
high rated
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obsidianscythe: unhappy

btw how do I go about canceling a preorder? Does it just get credited back to my credit card?
As Matruchus said go here: http://www.gog.com/support/contact/my_orders_and_payments.

There's a good chance that your order number won't be in the drop down menu, as it's not been updated in ages.

If you paid via CC, remember to include the type of card, along with the last four digits of it. If you used PayPal, include the transaction ID.

GOG may ask you if you want a direct refund, or store credit (which they'll tell you is faster to do).


EDIT: added missing verb.
Post edited April 08, 2015 by HypersomniacLive
Posted April 08, 2015
wow, that are great news.

when will the royal edition of witcher 3 for 200 bucks be avaible for preorder here?
Posted April 08, 2015
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bmgermani: Oh I see.

Well I'll just cancel my preorder of the game and maybe buy the eventual "GOTY" edition on discount then.

Jesus GOG...
This. I'll wait now. Poor form GOG, poor form.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionAnnouncing The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Expansion Pass(1100 posts)(1100 posts)
(1100 posts)