Some Witcher 3 Fans Aren’t Too Happy With New Remastered Footage

Sep 23, 2026 - 22:06

0 1

Some Witcher 3 Fans Aren’t Too Happy With New Remastered Footage

Published Sep 23, 2026, 1:57 PM EDT

Willa Rowe is a contributing writer at Polygon, covering games and entertainment. She is a New York-based journalist and critic whose work has been featured in Kotaku, Digital Trends, the A.V. Club, GamesRadar+, and more. She also co-hosts the Girl Mode podcast.

Players seem to think the original 2015 release looks better

Next week, CD Projekt Red will release The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt — Remastered, a massive overhaul of the 2015 role-playing game. Considering the game is over a decade old, it isn't wild to think the game may need an update to make it feel brand-new to audiences in 2026. Based on fan reaction to a new clip from the remaster, that may not actually be the case.

The official Witcher X account recently posted a comparison between the upcoming game and the 2015 original. The short 11-second clip shows Geralt casting the Igni sign to blast fire at a Drowner. Geralt and the enemy are standing in a marshy area with lots of water to reflect the light of the fire flowing from the Witcher's hand. This comparison was clearly meant to show off the updated graphics and improved effects of the remaster, but fans do not seem pleased. One response simply asked, "Why does the remastered [version] look worse?"

That is an opinion shared by the surprising majority of responses to the original post. "Old one looks so much better!" wrote one user. Another chimed in with a hefty dose of sarcasm: "Did you put the before and after text on the wrong square because the left looks way better?" As for why fans seem to prefer the original release over the remaster, most responses point specifically to the way it handles reflections and color. "The color and fire stands out more and looks more alive" in the 2015 release explained one user. There definitely appears to be a more intense orange hue to the 2015 footage when compared to the remaster, with the flames reflecting in the water in a seemingly more dynamic way. If anything, this is just a testament to how good the original game looks even after all this time. But better looks aren't the only thing coming to the remaster.

Everything new in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Remastered

While the upgraded visuals are nice, the remaster will also have improved animations, overhauled combat, better movement and mount handling, and tweaked enemy behavior. The skill tree has been given a big revamp as well. The remaster adds cross-platform mod support and introduces a handful of accessibility features. Perhaps most exciting is that the major overhaul will be free for everyone who owns the original base game, with all currently released expansions being made available for free.

The release of the remaster comes in the lead-up to Songs of the Past, an entirely new expansion to the game that is set to be released next year. The paid expansion was developed by CD Projekt Red and Fool's Theory, the developer behind The Witcher remake, which is currently in development. Songs of the Past will be about the size of Blood and Wine, which means there will be a lot to dig into.