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General discussionAnnouncing The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Expansion Pass(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 am incredibly disappointed in a pay for expansion. I am sure that GOG have gone on record before saying that they did not believe in this, and any games they create will have free content added.
That said, I am more than happy paying for said content, I just don't like to see a company with such firmly set moral values going against them.
Posted April 08, 2015
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marcusslade: I am incredibly disappointed in a pay for expansion. I am sure that GOG have gone on record before saying that they did not believe in this, and any games they create will have free content added.
That said, I am more than happy paying for said content, I just don't like to see a company with such firmly set moral values going against them.
They have actually gone on record saying the opposite. They said small non significant DLC would be free. However they have stated IF they make a large significant expansion they would probably charge for it.

Just saying...
Posted April 08, 2015
It seems a little odd to be offering a pre-order on expansions for a game that isn't even out yet. I'm not that bothered though. It just means the eventual complete edition will be 30 hours longer than before. I'm looking forward to hearing how The Witcher 3 and both expansions are.
Posted April 08, 2015
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DarrkPhoenix: CDPR, what happened to you guys? You used to be cool.
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ThulsaDooom: The same could be said of gamers. Or what happened to "don't like it, don't buy it?" Remember when gamers didn't complain about everything under the sun and let their decisions speak for themselves? The victim mentality gamers have nowadays is so gross and kills any sort of interest I have in discussing games online. Petulant spoiled children who bitch and moan over trivial amounts of money. I hope their moms' raise their allowances in time for the expansion releases.
I don't think it's a "victim mentality" to raise issues that you have or to even complain or argue. Although, sure, people can take it to extremes.

I don't think there was a time when gamers didn't complain or get passionate about games. It's just now we have an instant forum where we can punch away at our keyboards rather than having to wait every month to vent down at the Atari Users Club.
Posted April 08, 2015
Getting an irritated chuckle out of the "back in the day" comments.

The only difference between this announcement and add-ons "back in the day", say, late-80s to early-90s, is the timing of the announcements. Oh, and they used to be called Expansion Packs. But they still made the stuff, and the games were developed to be able to accept additional content that they KNEW they would be creating - you just didn't know for certain that it was coming because game news was a different animal back then. So if you think this same stuff wasn't in the cards from the get-go in, say, the Wing Commander games or Age of Empires, then I got a troll-free bridge to sell you.

Did anyone seriously think that there wasn't a plan for an Expansion Pack or two? And if you were to find the main game really enjoyable, would you not be hoping that there was more content to be had once you finished the main game?



I swear, developers / publishers can't win with some of the gaming community. We don't want to wait overly long for the games to be released, we don't want to pay extra for content, we DO want there to be more content for the titles that are really fantastic, but we can't accept that they make plans to actually create and release that content at a later date and then have the audacity to put a price on the extra work that it takes to create it.

You were excited about the game before this announcement and were willing to pay the asking price, maybe even pre-ordered the game, and until now have been looking forward to its upcoming release. But now that they tell us that there will be significantly more content available at a later date that you can choose to purchase - or not - well, shit, that changes everything, doesn't it?

"They said they'd never do that!" Okay, so they did do that. Big whoop. Doesn't change the base game that you were excited about up until the moment this announcement appeared.
Posted April 08, 2015
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HereForTheBeer: Getting an irritated chuckle out of the "back in the day" comments.

The only difference between this announcement and add-ons "back in the day", say, late-80s to early-90s, is the timing of the announcements. Oh, and they used to be called Expansion Packs. But they still made the stuff, and the games were developed to be able to accept additional content that they KNEW they would be creating - you just didn't know for certain that it was coming because game news was a different animal back then. So if you think this same stuff wasn't in the cards from the get-go in, say, the Wing Commander games or Age of Empires, then I got a troll-free bridge to sell you.

Did anyone seriously think that there wasn't a plan for an Expansion Pack or two? And if you were to find the main game really enjoyable, would you not be hoping that there was more content to be had once you finished the main game?

I swear, developers / publishers can't win with some of the gaming community. We don't want to wait overly long for the games to be released, we don't want to pay extra for content, we DO want there to be more content for the titles that are really fantastic, but we can't accept that they make plans to actually create and release that content at a later date and then have the audacity to put a price on the extra work that it takes to create it.

You were excited about the game before this announcement and were willing to pay the asking price, maybe even pre-ordered the game, and until now have been looking forward to its upcoming release. But now that they tell us that there will be significantly more content available at a later date that you can choose to purchase - or not - well, shit, that changes everything, doesn't it?

"They said they'd never do that!" Okay, so they did do that. Big whoop. Doesn't change the base game that you were excited about up until the moment this announcement appeared.
Actually, they never said that they wouldn't do it, quite the opposite. They always said that they would charge for large expansions, in every interview about DLC starting from as early as 2011.

Otherwise I totally agree with you.
Posted April 08, 2015
Yes, as expected.

First they will test on you live, then add excluded content for extra price (and test it on you live), then they will polish it enough and make it stable, and sold it to you again as "Enhanced edition".

We're seen it in 1, we're seen it in 2, so I don't think they will do any better with 3.

Players, don't pay for testing. No preorders, no first day DLCs, ever.

No way, "Reds", finish it and polish it first. I can wait.
Posted April 08, 2015
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Rincewind81: Only if the Expansion Pass was a short-term decision and I doubt it. I don't say, that they cut content, but you "logic" has some flaws. ;)
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mchartman: Let's suppose, hypothetically, that in mid development, members of the team (writers, directors, etc), ask themselves this; "post release, do we want to release any more content for the game?" and "if so, how big are we talking?". From a business perspective, this is perfectly sound and not to mention smart, but even from a purely creative perspective, one might entertain the notion of a 'sequel' or an 'expansion' during development simply out of personal interest. How is this in any way shape or form malicious or disingenuous to potential customers?
Here's how: you pay the full price but don't get the full game. For the full game you need to pay full price plus $21.

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mchartman: Especially when said content hasn't even started production?
You don't know that. Let's face it, it's probably not the case. The only way we could pretend they haven't started production would be if they weren't selling it now, even unveiling details of both stories. This is not Kickstarter.
Posted April 08, 2015
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tfrog: Yes, as expected.

First they will test on you live, then add excluded content for extra price (and test it on you live), then they will polish it enough and make it stable, and sold it to you again as "Enhanced edition".

We're seen it in 1, we're seen it in 2, so I don't think they will do any better with 3.

Players, don't pay for testing. No preorders, no first day DLCs, ever.

No way, "Reds", finish it and polish it first. I can wait.
Sorry, I don't quite get what you're talking about. Enhanced editions were free.
And what does it have to do with these 10- and 20-hour expansions coming way after the game gets released?
Posted April 08, 2015
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tfrog: Yes, as expected.

First they will test on you live, then add excluded content for extra price (and test it on you live), then they will polish it enough and make it stable, and sold it to you again as "Enhanced edition".

We're seen it in 1, we're seen it in 2, so I don't think they will do any better with 3.

Players, don't pay for testing. No preorders, no first day DLCs, ever.

No way, "Reds", finish it and polish it first. I can wait.
exluded content?
The game was locked down in december.
CDproject has worked on ironing out the bugs since then and giving it the final polish.

This is simply an expansion pack.
What you use your money for or when you use it is up to you though.
Post edited April 08, 2015 by Lodium
Posted April 08, 2015
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mchartman: Let's suppose, hypothetically, that in mid development, members of the team (writers, directors, etc), ask themselves this; "post release, do we want to release any more content for the game?" and "if so, how big are we talking?". From a business perspective, this is perfectly sound and not to mention smart, but even from a purely creative perspective, one might entertain the notion of a 'sequel' or an 'expansion' during development simply out of personal interest. How is this in any way shape or form malicious or disingenuous to potential customers?
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RafaelLVX: Here's how: you pay the full price but don't get the full game. For the full game you need to pay full price plus $21.

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mchartman: Especially when said content hasn't even started production?
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RafaelLVX: You don't know that. Let's face it, it's probably not the case. The only way we could pretend they haven't started production would be if they weren't selling it now, even unveiling details of both stories. This is not Kickstarter.
So you will be happy if they stop all works on the expension now and save 1.5 year time and use it to develop a new game?
Posted April 08, 2015
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apehater: REMEMBER:

The Witcher 3 Dev on Making a Stand Against Paid DLC
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BKGaming: I'm guessing you didn't read that article:

"DLC, it’s small content," said head of marketing and PR Michal Platkow-Gilewski last September. "Like one-thousandth of the whole game. Why should you charge for that? If it’s small, give it for free. I know it’s not always possible or easy but this is what we want to give gamers; a little bit of love, which we’d like to get from other developers as gamers ourselves."
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BKGaming: What they see as DLC and what you see as DLC is two different things. To them this is not your standard DLC... this is an expansion. A term that was around long before the rise of DLC.
And I'm guessing they've been feeding you this BS so you or they could say exactly that. Look at how far they go to make you believe the expansion is "different": on release day there will be two "DLC" packages: a set of armor and, get this, a "beard and hairstyle set". They wouldn't push this kind of ridiculously useless content if they didn't need to. If it's free on release day, then it should come with the game, but it doesn't, so there's the free DLC and the bullshit paid expansions.

The truth of the matter is that they are shipping the game with the DLC or expansions ready for prime time, which makes the original game an incomplete game.
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Windebieste: A less scrupulous business model would charge $60 - or more - for the same content as a stand alone 'expansion' that had no relationship to the original title.
HOW? Which company ever charged $60 for expansions? GOG fans are starting to hallucinate to rationalize GOG's choices, that's new!
Post edited April 08, 2015 by RafaelLVX
Posted April 08, 2015
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mchartman: Let's suppose, hypothetically, that in mid development, members of the team (writers, directors, etc), ask themselves this; "post release, do we want to release any more content for the game?" and "if so, how big are we talking?". From a business perspective, this is perfectly sound and not to mention smart, but even from a purely creative perspective, one might entertain the notion of a 'sequel' or an 'expansion' during development simply out of personal interest. How is this in any way shape or form malicious or disingenuous to potential customers?
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RafaelLVX: Here's how: you pay the full price but don't get the full game. For the full game you need to pay full price plus $21.

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mchartman: Especially when said content hasn't even started production?
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RafaelLVX: You don't know that. Let's face it, it's probably not the case. The only way we could pretend they haven't started production would be if they weren't selling it now, even unveiling details of both stories. This is not Kickstarter.
Of course they planned the production of these expansions, and they probably have the story ready, since it's the first thing that gets done. They started producing them after the main game was content-freezed in December for polishing, optimization and bug fixing. At that point all the artists and the like didn't have anything to do in the main game (since optimization and bugfixing is performed by programmers and qa testers), so they started working on the expansions. Till October and Q1 2016 they will have almost a year and a year and a half respectively to work on the expansions. I don't see how it's an unreasoanble time to create this amount of content.
What solution do you propose, anyway? To fire all the artists who wouldn't have anything to do after the content-freeze of the main game? Or to delay the whole game to 2016? Or to give away 30-hours expansions to a 100-hour game for free?
Posted April 08, 2015
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BKGaming: I'm guessing you didn't read that article:

What they see as DLC and what you see as DLC is two different things. To them this is not your standard DLC... this is an expansion. A term that was around long before the rise of DLC.
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RafaelLVX: And I'm guessing they've been feeding you this BS so you or they could say exactly that. Look at how far they go to make you believe the expansion is "different": on release day there will be two "DLC" packages: a set of armor and, get this, a "beard and hairstyle set". They wouldn't push this kind of ridiculously useless content if they didn't need to. If it's free on release day, then it should come with the game, but it doesn't, so there's the free DLC and the bullshit paid expansions.

The truth of the matter is that they are shipping the game with the DLC or expansions ready for prime time, which makes the original game an incomplete game.
Huh?

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 Expansion Pass now - it's a chance to pre-order the two expansions and even show your support for the devs.

The base game is out in about a month or so.
So how can you say that its bullshit when this extra content isnt ready before several months later?
Post edited April 08, 2015 by Lodium
Posted April 08, 2015
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jerff: They always said that they would charge for large expansions, in every interview about DLC starting from as early as 2011.
Please quote, specially if you have a statement from 2011 up your sleeve.
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Community
General discussionAnnouncing The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Expansion Pass(1100 posts)(1100 posts)
(1100 posts)