More than a decade after it originally released, The Witcher 3 is getting new content, Songs of the Past. Developer CD Projekt Red wants fans to know that this is an “expansion” and not “DLC.” The terms may be synonymous to some, but the Polish developer does not see them as being the same.
“For us at CDPR, DLCs are small pieces of content we release for free–like the additional outfits for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Expansions, on the other hand, are major pieces of content providing lots of hours of gameplay, including new story, characters, etc,” CD Projekt Red’s Marcin Łukaszewski said.
Another developer from CD Projekt Red, Paweł Sasko, pointed to comments from Cyberpunk 2077 actor Idris Elba to make his point about DLC vs. expansions.
“Just to be clear, it’s not DLC. It’s an expansion,” Elba said about the Phantom Liberty expansion for Cyberpunk 2077. “You know why? Because we do expansions. Big. Massive. Monster. We don’t do DLCs. And when we do, we give them away [for free].”
The Witcher 3 had more than 15 free pieces of DLC. At the time, CD Projekt Red said it didn’t want to charge for things like costumes and armor “because people just paid full price for our game. We owe them.”
Songs of the Past is The Witcher 3’s third expansion, following Hearts of Stone (2015) and Blood and Wine (2016). The new expansion arrives in 2027 on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, and it’s being made in partnership with Fool’s Theory. That same studio is working on a remake of the original Witcher as well.
Songs of the Past has players returning to the role of Geralt of Rivia in a “brand-new adventure.” That’s all we know about the expansion, but CD Projekt Red said more details about the expansion will be released in “late Summer 2026.”