The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt News

Five games that can teach us something about love

The Christmas holidays are over, we have dragged our way through the January blues, and now we are here in February - the month with the most romantic holiday of the year, Valentine's Day.

It's a time to reflect on our affections: who do you love? Do they love you back? How will you express your feelings? Can you really step away from Apex Legends for a whole evening in order to spend time with another, actual human? Important questions all.

Many people will, indeed, ransack department stores in search of the perfect present to woo their partners, or call a fancy restaurant to secure a table for two with the one they love. But what about spending some time with your other love - you know, videogames? There's no need to start snogging your PC (though we won't judge you if that's your thing) but you should join us as take a look at what games can teach us about love, romance, and relationships. Turns out it's quite a lot.

Read the rest of the story...

This Witcher 3 mod gives Geralt a Star Wars lightsaber

The Witcher 3 and Star Wars. Geralt and Luke Skywalker. The Continent and a galaxy far, far away. They're not combinations you'd think would slot together all that naturally but, boy, can they ever. A modder has proved a Witcher-Star Wars mash-up can be a glorious thing by putting an iconic new weapon in the RPG game's hero's hands - a lightsaber (I can hear your shrieks of 'Yes!' from here).

Milckywayy's 'Star Wars Lightsaber' mod for CD Projekt Red's 2015 open-world game does exactly what that name implies - it puts that most iconic of melee weapons, the laser sword first introduced to world way back in 1977, in Geralt the monster slayer's capable hands. The good news is it comes in a range of colours, which you can choose and download from the mod's associated optional files, such as the classics - blue (the default), green, red, and even Mace Windu-style purple - and some jazzy others, like orange, yellow, and white.

It's also available to grab as both of Geralt's swords - so, in theory, you could run around with two mix-and-match lightsabers as your silver and steel weapons. As you can see in the showcase clip below, you can also opt to grab lightsaber sound effects for the mod. After all, what is a lightsaber without that signature hum, swoosh, and sizzle? Nothing, that's what.

Read the rest of the story...

Humble Winter Sale brings deals from CD Projekt, Sega, Rockstar, Square Enix, and more

If you're eager for some cheap games, but can't bring yourself to wait for the Steam Lunar New Year sale, the folks at Humble have just the thing. The Humble Winter Sale is underway with loads of deals from some of the biggest publishers in the business, including Sega, Square Enix, Rockstar, 2K, CD Projekt, Deep Silver, THQ Nordic, and plenty more.

You can head to the Humble Store to check out the deals for yourself, but here are some highlights. You'll find 35% off of Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. You can grab Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines for 50% if you aim to catch up ahead of the sequel. The Witcher 3 GOTY Edition is 70% off, perfect for reminding you of CD Projekt at its best.

There are plenty of notable indie games on offer, too. You can get Hollow Knight for 50% off, or dig into the sandbox with RimWorld or Stardew Valley, both of which are 10% off. If you need some lockdown funtime, check out Jackbox Party Pack 7 at 20% off - I've been playing it using Discord streaming to keep up with pals over the past few months, and it's been grand.

Read the rest of the story...

This gnarly Witcher 3 mod turns Geralt into a snowboarder (yes, really)

Hailed for its immersive open world, enticing narrative breadth, and refined combat system that placed it among the best RPG games, one criticism of the Witcher 3 has cropped up time and again. Where's the snowboarding at? In a world as diverse as that of The Continent, you can't seriously expect one of the planet's most-loved extreme sport to not get a look in. A new mod finally corrects this grave cultural and artistic oversight.

Geralt VGX Snowboarder, created by modder Feregorn, takes the Witcher's thrill-seeking to new heights, adding a snowboard for Geralt to shred down the mountainside. More magic than physics-abiding apparatus, the snowboard allows players to zoom down any incline while building up some pretty radical speeds. And you can do so in the style of a medieval alpinist wearing pretty nifty snow goggles.

The snowboard isn't just a tool for transport. Equip the board as a weapon and it will replace Geralt's swords, useful for dealing with any pesky bandits that might insult your chic aesthetic. Just ignore the piercing sounds and stabbing animations - it must be a very sharp board.

Read the rest of the story...

ReShade's latest update speeds up load times for graphical mods

There's a new version of ReShade out now, and it has a new feature designed to cut loading times significantly. ReShade 4.9.0 adds a new effects cache, which means effects you've compiled for games will be stored on your PC rather than recompiled every time you load your games.

We've highlighted a bunch of ReShade-based graphics mods here - some of the best Witcher 3 mods use ReShade, and the tool has been used to add ray-tracing style effects to games like Resident Evil 3 and Doom (2016). It's a powerful tool, and you don't need to limit yourself to predefined presets - ReShade gives you a lot of extremely granular control over a whole extra layer of post-processing in countless games.

The trouble is, once you've added a bunch of effects, load times can get pretty long - previous versions of ReShade needed to recompile each set of effects each time you loaded a game - or even when you alt-tabbed away and then back in. Fortunately, version 4.9.0 saves your effects, and after the first time you compile them, you won't see longer load times - they'll be ready to go.

Read the rest of the story...