The Witcher 3 Remastered Devs Were “Anxious” About The Return

The Witcher 3 Devs Were “Anxious” About Returning For The Remaster Published Nov 12, 2026, 4:35 AM EST Sam Woods is TheGamer’s Senior Reporter. He’s been in games journalism since 2020 and has undertaken a variety of roles in that time. These have included roles such as SEO Editor, Managing Editor at DualShockers, and Global Head of Gaming, and he's also been seen on the BBC. He was promoted to the Senior Reporter position in 2025 following a series of high-quality reports and exclusives for TheGamer. Since 2020, Sam has written over 3,000 articles and specializes in telling the stories of the people behind the games. He’s interviewed the biggest game directors, some of the industry’s top talents, told the stories of how indie games came to be, and spoken to players about what really makes them tick. He’s also interviewed some of the world’s biggest musical artists to find out how the medium has inspired their work, and TV and Film actors about their roles in video game adaptations. He even hosted a PAX panel in 2021 and made a documentary in 2024 surrounding the creation of a Disney game. Alongside this, Sam focuses on breaking news. He got the scoop on Perfect Dark’s cancellation, provided context on some AI drama, and revealed that Lady Dimitrescu’s actress would love to step back into the character’s giant shoes. These articles have been picked up by the biggest gaming sites, including IGN, GameSpot, and PC Gamer. He also loves to dive into the numbers behind the games. Sam’s journey in games journalism has taken him all over the world. He’s covered Gamescom in Germany, Summer Game Fest in Los Angeles, and Tokyo Game Show in Japan, each on three occasions. He’s been learning Japanese since 2024 with the intention of identifying and translating Japanese-language news and bringing it to English-language audiences first, something he’s done countless times. Sam’s first review was 2020’s Battletoads reboot, and he’s since reviewed games in The Legend of Zelda, Super Mario, and Pokemon franchises. Sign in to your TheGamer account The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is one of the most revered games of all time. It sits at a 93 on OpenCritic, has sold over 65 million copies, and is considered by many as the greatest RPG ever created (although I dispute that). It's received multiple re-releases over the years, most recently receiving a full remaster that, last night, scooped up the Golden Joystick Award for the Best Remake/Remaster. CD Projekt Red clearly knew it had a good thing going with The Witcher 3, but that put a lot of extra pressure on the team. At last night's Golden Joystick Awards, the studio's VP and executive producer of external projects, Jakub Kutrzuba, revealed that returning to the game for the remaster gave them anxiety. Returning To The Witcher 3 For The Remaster Was Anxiety-inducing For The Developers The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was one of two games to break big records at yesterday's Golden Joystick Awards. Its win for Best Remake/Remaster made it the game with the most outright wins of all time, at 10. Kutrzuba accepted the record-breaking award on behalf of CD Projekt Red and shared how the team felt while remastering the game. "11 years ago, when we launched it, I was there. For all the good things which happened after that with the expansions and all the stuff we added to the game," he told the audience. "It made us a little bit nervous to get back to it after all these years, to the game. You always want to make it better, but you're always a little bit anxious if it's really that good. But I guess the team did a good job." You're always a little bit anxious if it's really that good. Earlier this year, CDPR also revealed the long-rumored Witcher 3 DLC, Songs of the Past. This got a small nod in Kutrzuba's acceptance speech. "This is the fuel we need to keep working and keep adding to the game. And we hope that you will like the Songs of the Past, the new expansion we are building, as much as the remaster." The Witcher scooped two awards at The Golden Joysticks last night: alongside Best Remake/Remaster for The Witcher 3, The Witcher 4 won Most Anticipated Game. You can check out a breakdown of every winner from last night's ceremony right here. Released September 29, 2026 ESRB Mature 17+ / Blood and Gore, Crude Humor, Intense Violence, Nudity, Sexual Content, Strong Language, Use of Drugs and Alcohol Developer(s) CD Projekt Red Publisher(s) CD Projekt Red Franchise The Witcher Genre(s) Action, Adventure, RPG, Open-World, Exploration