The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Leaks

In June 2014, the Google Drive account of a CD Projekt RED employee was hacked, resulting in a massive leak of internal development documents, which included concept and production art and information on missions, endings and various plot points, as well as platform information. CD Projekt RED advised fans not to access these files, as they could ruin the experience of the game.

In a separate incident, stores in the United Arab Emirates started selling the game two weeks early, naturally causing the spread of spoilers. Twitch.tv prohibited livestreaming of the game until the release date.

Finally, the GOG version of the game was leaked on torrent sites one day before the release date, albeit unable to run until the release day came. Rather than filing DMCA claims against the torrents, a supposed CD Projekt RED employee was seen posting in a torrent site's comment section, advising people to consider purchasing the game for the effort it took to develop, the features it had and its low price compared to much of the AAA games at the time which were shorter and more linear.

He (or she) also announced a day-one patch that would be available for separate download, virtually enabling pirates to use it as well. He (she) concluded with the sentence: "I really do hope you enjoy the game, no matter if you buy it or not. I will however really, personally appreciate if you purchase it."

Famous NPC Reference

While in Novigrad, Geralt can meet Hattori - an elf that is a master weapons smith. This is probably a nod towards the real life 15th century Japanese ninja Hattori Hanzo.

Sales

A financial report from CD Projekt released in April/2020 showed total sales of 28.3 million spread as follows: PC - 12.4m, PS4 - 10.8m, XboxOne - 4.3m, NintendoSwitch - 0.7m.

Following the release of The Witcher live-action series on Netflix which garnered 76 million viewers alone in its first month of release, physical sales of The Witcher 3 increased 554% in December/2019 compared to a year before due to renewed interest.

Awards

• EGM
  • 2013 - Best RPG Game of E3
  • 2015 - ranked 1 (Top 25 of 2015)
• The Game Awards
  • 2014 — Most Anticipated Game — Won
• Steam Awards
  • 2016 — The 'Whoooaaaaaaa, dude!' Award — Nominated
  • 2016 — The 'Game Within A Game' Award — Nominated
  • 2017 — The 'Choices Matter' Award — Won