After tons of speculation and leaks, we finally have some hard facts: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt‘s Blood and Wine expansion releases May 31.
Listening to game director Konrad Tomaszkiewicz talk about the game, it sounds more like a new game than any kind of add-on:
“Blood and Wine makes The Witcher 3 complete — it’s Geralt’s final mission. Containing more than 90 new quests, and over thirty hours of brand new adventures, it’s something that I think gamers will remember for a long time,” he said in the official announcement. “There’s also a massive amount of features we’re giving gamers with this expansion like a dynamic Point of Interest system, a new GWENT deck, new endgame mutation mechanics, and even a place Geralt can call home…. And it’s all happening in a new region as big as No Man’s Land in the base game.”
That’s a huge amount of stuff to do, as if The Witcher 3 wasn’t a massive game on its own. And not only does it affect the new game, some of that stuff, like the Gwent deck and the Point of Interest system, will affect the main game as well. Between this and the new Rune mechanics added in with the Hearts of Stone expansion – not to mention all the other choices you didn’t make on your first play through – there’s plenty of good reason to just play through The Witcher 3 again.
Blood and Wine releases for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on May 31.