It’s been a year since the original release of “The Witcher 3”, and CD Projekt RED are still developing updates for it and supporting their fans. Most developers would have given up by now, especially with the huge original success of the title, but this studio is obviously determined to keep their brand name strong, and they understand the value of those updates.
The most recent patch, 1.13, was mostly about minor bug fixes and polishing up minor details in the graphics, but it doesn’t really matter what the contents of the update actually are – for most players, it’s the gesture that matters.
PC gamers were first to get the new fixes, but fans on consoles will get 1.13 soon enough as well. Hopefully the patch will fix the loading issues that some players have been reporting recently, as it seems like the studio just introduced a small regression with one of their recent patches, and had to fix it.
How is the game holding up after all this time anyway? It’s clear that many players probably value their purchase a lot, especially with all the post-release support they’ve been getting, but how many gamers are actually still playing through “The Witcher 3” today, more than a year after its release?
As it turns out, there are quite many of them. The game offers a surprising amount of replay value, even for an RPG of its class, and it’s clear that the studio has planned the entire experience with replayability in mind.
There are many reasons to go back to “The Witcher 3” and revisit it in a different way, and it’s quite the open title as a whole. At the same time, it follows a certain narrative which is subtly blended in with the whole action, leaving the player to feel like they’re controlling the direction of the entire plot.
Graphics-wise, “The Witcher 3” was also a huge improvement in the franchise, and it’s obvious that the artists of the development team have spent a lot of time polishing every minor detail. In the end, the game is simply a breathtaking experience in many of its areas, and players have reported enjoying just walking around aimlessly, taking in the scenery and not following any of the quests.
The last major game that had such an effect on its players in large numbers was probably “Skyrim”, and it’s been a while since that came out, so we can see how some players may have gotten hungry for a similar experience. “The Witcher 3” came at just the right time to reap the benefits of those desires, and the game was quickly eaten up by RPG fans all over the world.
Right now, it doesn’t look like CD Projekt RED are going to give up on their hard work and enjoy their profits. The studio has been pouring hours into their next project, “Cyberpunk 2077”, and it looks like things are coming along quite nicely behind the scenes.
Reports indicate that the studio has allocated even more people on the new project than they had on “The Witcher 3” – a lot more, in fact. Official reports claim that the game is being worked on by more people than “The Witcher 3” was at any point during its development, which is quite the bold claim. As we know very well though, simply adding more hands to a development project is no guarantee for its success.