Witcher 3 New Game Plus Mode Has Arrived

CD Projekt Red has been giving gamers all sorts of goodies with The Witcher 3. They've treated their audience to 16 free pieces of downloadable content and they're wrapping up the extravaganza with the final bit. What is it? Well, the final piece of content is a doozy, it's New Game+.

Over on the GOG.com website they describe what this means for gamers by stating...

If you feel like you strolled through the game for the story before, this is your chance to turn up the difficulty, stock up on potions, memorise your signs, plan your attacks, and really feel the constant pressure of a monster hunter's daily "routine". If you can call it that.

Some of you might be wondering “Why can't gamers just up the difficulty setting, why do they need a New Game+?” well maybe because not everyone wants to start over with a fresh character and no items.

The whole point of New Game+ is to give gamers an opportunity to take on The Witcher 3's world with a character they've already built up and potions and weapons they've already acquired. This is different from starting a brand new game with a fresh character on a harder difficulty setting because in the latter case you have nothing and you still have to build up all your gear, goods and gold all over again.

The whole point of New Game+ is to see how good you are after you've already beaten the base game. This gives you an incentive to see if you're still just as good when the entire game has harder enemies right from start, along with elevated boss battles and more dangers lurking around each corner. Additionally, not everyone may want to start a new game on the very hardest difficulty setting where once you die that's the end and you have to start over from the beginning. Some gamers may want a more challenging adventure out of The Witcher 3 but with the safety net of saved games and checkpoints.

This final bit of the 16 free pieces of DLC for The Witcher 3 also comes close on the heels of CD Projekt Red releasing the modding tools to the gaming community, allowing them to build and shape all new mods, quests, skins and models for the game.

There was a bit of controversy over the modding tools for CD Projekt Red's latest action-RPG, since they weren't quite as in-depth as the RedKit tool suite for The Witcher 2, which was extremely in-depth and very expansive.

According to CD Projekt Red, they won't be releasing any further updates or upgrades to the modding tools. So the community – if they so desire – will be left to their own devices to utilize or upgrade the modding tools as they see fit.

Given the popularity of The Witcher 3 I'm hoping that modders really take to this game as opposed to what little the community received with the previous outing. There's a ton of potential for this game and it's ripe for all sorts of cool total conversions. With the New Game+ now being available I imagine this may just kickstart some modders into churning out some great content for The Witcher 3.

Will Usher

Staff Writer at CinemaBlend.