And it isn’t made less boring by the quest’s knowing references to its own tedium.ĭon’t get me wrong: it’s easy to pick apart these details only because The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt is such a stunning game that anything less than phenomenal is bound to stand out for being “merely” great. It’s sensible, then, that the game’s most boring quest envelops you in a morass of financial red tape at the hands of a dwarven-run bank. Dwarfs in this universe have often been bankers-but in Blood and Wine, that’s almost the only role they play. Perhaps if Blood and Wine’s main story and characters were more engaging, the references wouldn’t have been so distracting, but none of Geralt’s new cohorts can match Yennefer’s lusty spark or The Bloody Baron’s brutal sorrow. All too often, the fantasy I wanted to be living reminded me of the world I actually inhabit. I can’t say the references always work in Blood and Wine’s favor, though. Suffice it to say that developer CD Projekt RED has no qualms about making fun of its own foibles. The self-referential humor reaches a head during a side quest involving hallucinogenic mushrooms, though it’s best that I don’t reveal the specifics. You might hear a local singing “El Condor Pasa” under his breath as you pass by on your search for a statue’s missing testicles, or you may do a double-take when you notice not-so-subtle references to GOG.com, publisher CD Projekt’s digital storefront. The humor has never been this ubiquitous or straightforward, however.

That isn’t to say that this series has never been funny in fact, it’s always possessed a wicked sense of wit.

Yet compared to the rest of The Witcher 3, Blood and Wine is brighter and more ebullient, downplaying the melancholy and bringing humor to the forefront. The vampire-focused main story explores the creatures’ innate lust for blood, among other quirks and passions, and the related scenes are dramatic and distressing in fine Witcher tradition.

At times, the vast new region of Toussaint seems to have been poured onto the screen from the pages of a fairy tale-and depending on your choices, you may literally find yourself drawn into one such tale.īlood and Wine is sometimes as thematically dark as its predecessors. That The Witcher 3 continues to look and sound so lavish is unsurprising, yet Blood and Wine’s visuals are even bolder and more vivid than the main game’s. Like the full game, The Witcher 3’s final expansion, Blood and Wine, has a way of expressing its sensory delights so fully and richly that you could be convinced you really do feel the rain pouring on your face or the pesky tickle of a mosquito buzzing near your ear. “You can smell the delicate flowers,” says the duchess to Geralt of Rivia, and in that moment, you might believe that you can smell them, too.

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