Like the first dlc, there is a retail version with the code and gwent cards.
Cool! Didn't see it listed any of the finnish stores so got bit confused.
A few hours with final Witcher 3 expansion Blood and Wine
Own a vineyard! Mutate! Talk to Roach!
This is more like it. The Witcher 3's second expansion, Blood & Wine, is a treat - as welcome a return to the adventures of monster hunter Geralt as you could ask for. It's even bigger than we've been led to believe. More than 30 hours of content - not 20 as we've been previously told - in a new region the size of No Man's Land, but at very different ends of the visual spectrum.
Whereas No Man's Land is ravaged by war, the new region of Toussaint is untouched by it, an idyll reminiscent of Southern France that's bursting with life and colour, a whole new palette of crumbly old buildings drenched in golden sunlight and wrapped in ivy. It is distractingly beautiful - a fairytale land of knights and chivalry, the ornate palace of Beauclair jutting like a Disney centre-point in the middle. But it's also a region stalked by a mysterious and merciless killer, one who turns out to be far more complex than you at first imagine.
But arguably the two standout features in Blood & Wine are its new Mutation character development system, and how it gives you - Geralt - a vineyard. Yes that's right, no more sleeping on the road: a place to finally call your own. And you can upgrade it, eventually unlocking buffs applied when you sleep there. These buffs range from extra health for Geralt to extra stamina for his horse Roach, extra potion uses or extra experience point gain.
The vineyard, Corvo Bianco, is gifted early on and comprises a main house and outbuildings. Some people mill about there, uttering and grunting the kind of wonderful nonsense NPCs do in The Witcher 3. The vineyard is rundown, the sort of project I used to long to one day take on while watching TV show A Place in the Sun, and doing it up requires coin. It's 1000 gold each for a grindstone and armour table, and a further 5000 gold for a general restoration - and that's not the end of it. Once you splash the cash it becomes a place of luxury, where you can display entire armour sets, weapons and even hang paintings. It seems completely at odds with Geralt's nomadic and gruff character, but as a swansong for CD Projekt Red and The Witcher (at least for now) it's entirely appropriate - a putting up of the feet if you like.
Mutations, on the other hand, are a sorely needed new progression mechanic, particularly aimed at New Game Plus players. Mutations layer on top of the advancement system already there, unlocking new slots for skills (at last!) as well as granting powerful abilities of their own. There are 12 Mutations unlocked by spending both ability points and mutagens.
There's one called Adrenaline Rush which is a kind of berserker mode. It boosts attack power and Sign intensity by 30 per cent for every opponent in the battle - but only for the first 30 seconds. Later it decreases attack power and Sign intensity by 15 per cent for every opponent.
There's another called Bloodbath that has your fatal blows either dismember foes or trigger finishers, which sounds wonderfully gory. It also comes with a very powerful buff that boosts attack power for every blow you land up to a maximum of 250 per cent. Good gracious! But this resets when the battle ends or when you take damage. In other words, the buff behaves a lot like the Wyvern decoction already in the game.
Other Mutations, which I didn't catch the names of, do things like enable Signs to land critical hits, then explode those enemies killed with critical hits; prevent players from dying by healing them after would-be killing blows and granting damage immunity instead; and make Aard instantly kill opponents it knocks down and freeze those left standing. Powerful stuff.
1/14 Knights and tents and, of course, a bit of cleavage.
Other notable gameplay additions include armour dyes - one per piece of armour - and equipment set bonuses. There's a bonus at three pieces and a bonus at six, which means you'll need all four pieces of armour as well as the two swords to make a full set. As an example, the 3/6 Grandmaster Feline set bonus makes strong attacks temporarily buff fast attacks, increasing their damage by 10 per cent for five seconds for each piece of the set equipped. That's a potential 60 per cent damage boost with a whole set when you vary your attacks (and would combine marvellously with a Forktail decoction). The 6/6 Feline set bonus increases rear attack damage by 50 per cent, and if you have an adrenaline point, uses it to stun the opponent.
Blood and Wine also introduces dynamic points of interest that adapt and change according to your actions in the region. So, should you kill some bandits over there, for example, there will be fewer bandits over here, in the hideout - and if you clear the hideout the area will be safer as a result. Blood and Wine further tidies the game's inventory, too, and makes books and letters readable at the click of a thumbstick, which is far more convenient than rifling through bags.
It's harder for Blood and Wine to make deeper changes to ingrained systems like combat, because to do so would probably require a new game. Instead, CD Projekt Red has used all it knows about how you play to try and create new challenges you'll need new tactics to overcome. This is most evident in the scripted boss encounters, which come thick and fast - particularly the smaller, faster bosses who don't wait for you to attack but hit you with flurries of strikes and special abilities. I found myself on the back foot, struggling to work out how make a breakthrough, which was a refreshing turn of pace from the The Witcher 3 base game, where many battles I had fought many times before. One boss in Blood and Wine I couldn't work out how to hurt for a good few minutes. Blood and Wine is challenging, then, and it's advised you be closer to level 40 if playing on a harder difficulty setting. Mid-30s should do otherwise.
1/10 The new Character screen - you can't see the Mutation skill tree here but you can see a Mutation in effect, and the extra skill slots unlocked.
Variation isn't only reserved for bosses, though - or for new monsters like a wight that summons ghostly dogs. It's in the very bones of what Blood and Wine is trying to do, hence the vibrant new region, and hence the vineyard. It's CD Projekt Red looking at a familiar box of building bricks and trying to come up with something new, and throwing everything (plus some 100 people) at it.
I only tried one side-quest in the time I had but apparently it was a good example of the kind of thing on offer. The quest entered me into a grand tourney, of riding and shooting and fighting, and chatting to people in tourney tents in between. It reminded me more than a little of a King's Landing and tourneys in A Game of Thrones - not least because the champion you face in the finale is a blatant nod to Gregor "The Mountain" Clegane. It's the kind of unshackled irreverence and playfulness an expansion can delight in - that CD Projekt Red clearly delights in - and I expect it crescendos as you explore. I even heard of one quest that involves taking mushrooms and talking to your horse Roach, no less!
From what I've seen, Blood and Wine is stuffed to the brim with riches, overflowing with the kind of generosity of content, and craft and care, that made The Witcher 3 so delightful. Whether it keeps the momentum up over its many hours I don't know. But on this evidence it is a very fond farewell to a series the studio has worked on for a decade, and you would be the court jester to miss it.
The Witcher 3: Blood & Wine - train up for a tournament in the huge sunny land of Toussaint, but beware the local serial killer
Toussaint is unlike anywhere you’ve been in The Witcher before. Typically we’re used to Geralt trekking through dismal bog lands and villages filled with the kinds of locals whose real-life equivalents may be found in the grimmest pubs you could ever mistakenly enter. Toussaint, on the other hand, is a Mediterranean-like haven of warm, autumnal colours, flourishing farmlands, and knights with strict codes of honour.
Oh, and a monstrous serial killer on the loose. Business as usual for The Witcher, then.
Love The Witcher 3? It's one of the best PC games, for sure.
I recently went to visit CD Projekt at their base in Warsaw to get nice and familiar with Blood & Wine, the second and final expansion for The Witcher 3. Unsurprisingly it’s wonderful; very much more of what you love, with the odd tweak here and there to make sure it’s all smooth and shiny. But it’s the world that CD Projekt have created in Toussaint that makes Blood & Wine special. More so than the likes of Velen and Novigrad, this new country has its own distinct texture and flavour.
I’ve already mentioned the colour palette, which makes the whole thing feel notably more hopeful than the oft-depressing quests of the main game, and that extends into the scenery. The forest floors sprout giant mushrooms, granting the area a slightly more fantastical vibe. Vistas present acres and acres of rolling gold fields, penned in by astonishing mountains that cast shade over towns with a lively Tuscan aesthetic.
The inhabitants of Toussaint are different, too. While there’s no shortage of people with various motives, the population here are more noble than the backstabbers and grudge-holders we’ve become accustomed to. Led by the well-regarded Duchess Anna, it’s a realm of knights who abide by the laws of chivalry; where breaking those rules is akin to blasphemy. Expect to see ever more elaborate armour designs during your trip, with breastplates adorned with sigils and gold leaf, as well as a full-blown medieval-style tournament.
Before all that though, there’s the issue of Golyet the giant. As Geralt gallops into Toussaint on the back of Roach, he’s soon intercepted by a lumbering giant swinging what appears to be a grindstone bolted to a lamppost. Blood & Wine’s first boss battle is a strong indicator of what’s to come over the course of the expansion.
The series of bosses I fought over three hours of play were significantly more challenging than anything from Wild Hunt. Use of the Bestiary is practically mandatory now; while many previous encounters have allowed you to overcome challenges with unrelenting brute force, there are enemies this time that demand use of specific potions and explosives to defeat them, none of which the game will inform you of outside the bestiary. Research is as key to the fight as swinging a sword.
Golyet isn’t that kind of boss, but the encounter with him is exceptionally cinematic. While Blood & Wine doesn’t feel the need to tell another here-comes-the-apocalypse story (it actually feels like Geralt is winding down a little), its biggest battles do feel more event-worthy than many of Wild Hunt’s. Golyet stamps his way through herds of fleeing sheep and causes a windmill to collapse as he bellows and growls, marking his presence as an important and memorable moment in the story.
Not that he’s the main star or antagonist. As mentioned earlier, there’s a serial killer on the prowl, which gives the whole expansion a sort of CSI: Toussaint angle. While Geralt is no stranger to using Witcher sense and plenty of conversation to bring clues and evidence to the surface, this investigation pulls a few more threads from the world of murder mystery fiction. The killer has a distinct MO, butchering very specific people on very specific days. If you wanted a Sherlock Holmes game where you can simultaneously investigate clues and hack the head off a vampire, then Blood & Wine is the game for you.
Should delving into the gruesome details of serial murder be a little too much for your stomach, you can break up your detective work by exploring the new region and its many, many side-quests. Once again this is an area that rivals the scope of anything in the main game, densely populated with villages, outposts, and weird sites of interest that each have something to keep Geralt busy. There’s even a vineyard for the Witcher to tend to during his downtime.
The side-quests are where much of Toussaint’s flavour can be extracted, with one that I was able to play focussing very much on the code of chivalry that everyone seems to abide by. With a knight unable to enter the grand tourney, it’s up to Geralt to brandish his sword in the arena. While the stakes may still be high, there’s an enjoyable sense of joviality to it all. As you practice for the big day - racing horses, making sure your crossbow aim is true on the range - the spirit of the tournament builds. It’s not to say that Blood & Wine is a lighter or simpler story than its siblings, but there’s definitely a feeling that the title of the expansion sums up the two sides you’ll find.
After dozens of hours in the grim, ugly land of Wild Hunt, the trouble-in-paradise world presented in Blood & Wine feels like the perfect epilogue chapter. It’s very much the game we know and love, but presented through a new filter that reminds us that CD Projekt are at their best when they’re offering a fun, alternate turn on the traditional. If this is Geralt’s last hurrah, it seems guaranteed to be one of his finest.
The Witcher 3: Blood & Wine lets you restore an old vineyard for Geralt to live happily ever after in
As mentioned in our Witcher 3: Blood & Wine hands-on impressions, there’s a feeling in this story that Geralt of Rivia is finally winding down. It’s something all the best heroes have to do. And just like Rambo hobbled back to his ranch after a long career of bloody murder, Geralt now has his own little piece of home: the Corvo Bianco Vineyard.
Looking for somewhere else to call home? Why not try one of the best sandbox games on PC?
Among the big bosses and fancy armour sets of this expansion, the vineyard could be easily swept aside as a minor feature. But it’s of both narrative and interactive importance for Blood & Wine. Not just a place for the series to hang its cloak, the vineyard is an area for players to invest time and money in as they renovate it from dilapidated ruin to stately manor.
The deeds to the vineyard are part of Geralt’s payment for accepting the main contract in Blood & Wine, and when you first arrive it’s clear that a substantial amount of work needs doing. Brickwork is cracked, gardens are little more than dirt patches, and the house is an echoey, spider-web ridden wreck. But with some cash injected into the system, this place can be a perfect retirement palace.
The vineyard works as a sort of player housing arrangement, but don’t expect something on quite the same level of Skyrim’s Hearthfire expansion. Instead your estate manager/butler will arrange the restoration of various areas in return for gold.
And we’re talking substantial amounts of gold; to restore the entire plot you’re going to need multiple thousands. It’s a campaign-long investment, with each new quest reward helping you make an improvement here and there. It’s reminiscent of real-life, much like how people scrimp and save over months to decorate a new home to the perfect finish.
Investment in the vineyard doesn’t just offer aesthetically-pleasing additions. The majority of renovations confer bonus stats to Geralt, or some kind of aid. Plant a garden and you’ll be able to harvest herbs for your potion-brewing. Build stables and Roach will have notably improved stamina. Furnish a guest bedroom and Geralt can invite company around for dinner (come on, CD Projekt, we know Geralt’s visitor’s won’t actually be using that room).
There is some Sims-like decoration too, albeit with an RPG, monster-hunting twist. All those fancy swords you’ve amassed over your career? Why not fill your hallway with mahogany stands to display them on? Those elaborate suits of armour that you stopped using weeks ago, but are too beautiful to let go of? Put them on mannequins in your dining room so it looks like you’ve got an army in attendance at mealtimes.
For all the lovely little things you can do in Geralt’s vineyard, it seems like the one thing you can’t actually do is make actual wine. Perhaps that’s something being held back as a surprise for the final release, or maybe that was just too much to hope for (turning the Witcher into a winemaking and distribution management game may be a step too far).
But that’s not what Corvo Bianco is about. It’s a little plot of land in a beautiful country where finally, after so much turmoil and travelling, Geralt can be at peace. After being homeless and memoryless for so long, it’s probably what he deserves.
dude spoiler that shit
