The Witcher 3: Remastered - Review

 Out of nowhere, `the time of axe and sword' has come back for one last dance

Consoles: PlayStation 5 & Nintendo Switch 2

There is no game that I own and have reviewed as much as the Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. I first played and reviewed it on the Nintendo Switch, and then got the Next-Gen Update version for the PS5, which became my second review. I wanted a 1:1 comparison between the console I'm used to and the, at the time, new 'big boy' PS5. And now, quite unexpectedly, there’s a remaster to dig our teeth into. 

Well, I say it was unexpected but it actually makes a lot of sense. When it was revealed that The Witcher 3 would, after more than a decade, get a third expansion with Songs of the Past, uncertainty surrounded it because of the base game. Would this new expansion feel immediately dated and compromised because of the old bones it was forced to be built on?

That's precisely where this remaster comes into play. It isn't just a better-looking, slightly smoother iteration like that Next-Gen Update. No, CDPR made this with the intent of making it feel like a game that came out yesterday, not a decade ago. As such, this new version reworks a lot of mechanics, from the movement to the combat to the skill tree to make them more in line with modern standards and expectations.

This introduction has gone on long enough. Let's talk about the Witcher 3 once more and see how much all the changes this remaster brings affect the experience. If CDPR has succeeded in making this game feel and play like a modern title.

Whereas the Next-Gen Update focused mostly on graphical and performance upgrades with some light touches to the gameplay, Remastered flips that script. There are certainly changes to how the game looks and runs, but that's not what the emphasis is on. As such, I’ll keep the section on the former brief and focus more on how the game now feels and plays rather than how it looks and runs. 

All platforms feature updated textures and lighting to make everything look a smidge better than before. More than just a smidge on PC even, provided that you have the right setup. I, however, am more impressed by the work done on the Switch 2 version. I finished the game on the Nintendo Switch and enjoyed the 161 hours it took to do so thoroughly. There is no denying though that this version is heavily compromised. Significantly downgraded textures, shadows, foliage density and more. The difference between it and the other consoles was night and day. 

That's no longer the case. If you compare the Switch 2 to base PS5, you're going to have to put in a lot more effort to catch the differences. I'd say it’s for 90% up to par with the other versions, with only some differences in lighting, shadows and framerate. Not stuff I think the untrained eye will even notice, aside from the longer load times and some flickering here and there. Plus, the Switch 2 version has a couple of unique things to its name: gyro controls for aiming the crossbow and mouse mode for the menu navigation. I had some difficulties hitting the Royal Griffin in White Orchard with arrows back in 2020 but not here!

A graphical comparison between the 3 versions (click to enlarge). Between the Switch 2 and PS5, only lighting and the hair details are noticeable different. 

All right, on to the gameplay. What I was interested in the most with Remastered was how the game felt while playing it. One thing that always stuck with me about the Witcher 3 is how Geralt didn't move the best. I overshot or undershot things constantly and indoors, Geralt would bump into things often and those sorts of things. That isn't entirely gone but it is much better. Geralt’s movements are a lot more responsive and smooth. The developers also put in a lot more animations and Geralt interacts with the environment more now. A good example is that instead of jumping over a fence with the normal jump, he instead grabs the fence with one hand and jumps over it with his legs going sideways. Neat, but this needs a bit more work. The game seems rather fickle at when this new dynamic system kicks in and when it doesn’t. 

A lot of what I wrote above holds true for the combat as well. I think that pretty much everybody agrees that the fighting is The Witcher 3's weakest link. It has never been bad, but it has never been great either. Clunky, repetitive and unbalanced are three good words to use. While fighting multiple enemies, Geralt now also snaps from one enemy to the next better so he doesn’t just slash the empty air when one enemy goes down.

There are no changes to the core combat which means the sword fighting is still a lot of button mashing. Without completely rethinking and reworking the combat, you can't really do much about that. They did, however, improve enemy behaviour to try and put you more on your toes. Monsters are smarter and have been given more attacks and movement options, like Geralt, to make the fights more dynamic and difficult. No more 'large monster getting stuck on a wall it walked into' or things like that. Fighting humans have been made a bit easier so crowds are a bit easier to handle. I haven't really felt that difference so far, I would need to spend a lot more time with this game to do so I feel, but I don't doubt these things are all for the better.

The same goes for Geralt's skills and abilities. The entire skill tree got reworked but I haven't been able to truly dig into it with the dozen or so hours I put into Remastered. They did two things here: change they way you unlock the skills and their actual effects. Just flicking through the new skill tree, I see that stuff involving toxicity has been nerfed in general while the opposite is true for skills that involve Signs. Many fight related skills have been made more situational. Instead of a clean '10% damage increase to attacks' for example, now it reads something like '18% damage increase on every third attack'.

I can't judge how all of this really impacts the experience but I can say that the new skill tree does make things more approachable. Its presentation is clearly inspired by games such as Horizon Forbidden West, and is more dynamic in its progression.

You don’t unlock new skills in straight lines anymore: there is more than one pathway to a skill, meaning that there's no 'set way’ to get any one skill. Due to this, you can experiment more and earlier with skills and build Geralt out the way you want without wasting time and resources on skills you don’t want. For instance, rebuilding my old Sign-focused Geralt took me 10 skill points less than before. That, and I can even upgrade some skills further now which I very much appreciate!

The old Skill Tree (left) vs the new Skill Tree (right). See what I mean with that unlocking new skills isn't a straight line anymore?

Another thing that I was looking forward to when I saw it mentioned is the transmog system. I love the look of the Undvik armour but its focus on defence didn’t fit with my playstyle. The Sign-focused Griffin armour had the exact opposite problem so I transmogged it to look like the Undvik armour while keeping all of its stat bonuses intact. Going to enjoy that transmogged armour once the new expansion drops!

What I didn't know about going in, but what I ended up liking the most, are the accessibility options. They help streamline the experience a lot, if that's what you want. I already played through the whole game once with item durability and weight limits and all that. Systems that are realistic and do help push you to think before you act, but are also time-consuming and tedious. I don't feel like going through the hassle that is managing them if I don't have to. Also very handy: you can now loot multiple enemies at once. If, say, you take down five Drowners, you only have to loot one of them to get all their teeth and hearts and whatnot. Neat.

Conclusion

CD Projekt Red set themselves a high bar with their mission statement of making The Witcher 3: Remastered feel like a brand-new, modern game. After playing it for a good number of hours, I can say that they don't succeed here but that this doesn't matter. The game might still be clunky in areas such as precise positioning and the combat; this is a much better-looking and running version of one of the best video games of all time. One that comes with gameplay changes that make it more modern and convenient to play and setting a much better groundwork for Songs of the Past.

Even if this wasn't a free upgrade, I would've wholeheartedly recommended this remaster. Because of that new expansion coming out and the accessibility features here, this is pretty much the best time to jump into The Witcher 3 for either the first time or once more. I think you'll have a great time!