Witcher 3's Songs of the Past Expansion Will Bring Back Gwent

A Simple “Confirmed!” Was All It Took

CD Projekt Red did not need a trailer, a press release, or a lengthy blog post to send its community into a celebratory spiral. All it took was one word from Marcin Lukaszewski, the studio’s community and social media manager, replying on X/Twitter to a fan who had asked whether more Gwent would appear in the upcoming Songs of the Past expansion for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. His reply: “Confirmed!”

That single response, as reported by IGN, was enough. Fan accounts lit up on August 23, 2026, with reactions ranging from gleeful all-caps to promises that Geralt’s new adventure would simply have to wait while the Witcher finishes his card game.

More Than a Minigame

To understand why people reacted the way they did, it helps to understand what Gwent actually means to longtime fans of The Witcher 3. The in-universe card game launched alongside the base RPG back in 2015 and quickly became something players lost hours to without any sense of guilt. According to an official description from CD Projekt Red, Gwent has players clashing “in fast-paced duels that combine skill-based play with bluffing, and careful deck construction,” played over a best-of-three series of rounds.

It was popular enough to spawn a standalone spinoff in 2017 and, more recently, a physical tabletop version in 2025. Other games have tried to build similar in-world card games and struggled to hold player attention the same way. Gwent stuck. The fact that CD Projekt Red is bringing it back for Songs of the Past suggests the studio knows exactly what it has.

What We Know About Songs of the Past

Songs of the Past is not just a short content drop. CD Projekt Red has described it as a full-fledged expansion, and earlier this year the studio teased that it will function as a story prologue for The Witcher 3. The expansion is currently targeting a 2027 launch, which means that by the time players get their hands on it, they will have been waiting more than a decade since Blood and Wine, the last major Witcher 3 expansion, which came out in 2016.

That wait has clearly not cooled enthusiasm. The Gwent confirmation alone produced an immediate wave of social media reactions, with fans already joking that whatever urgent plot Songs of the Past throws at Geralt, he is going to need to stop and play some cards first.

Lukaszewski’s confirmation was direct, though it did not come with specifics. The expansion sounds like it will keep its narrative ambitions front and center, so players probably should not expect wall-to-wall Gwent. Still, knowing the card game is in there at all was more than enough for the community to feel good about where this is headed.

Gamescom Timing

As reported by IGN, fans did not have to sit with just one word of confirmation for long. CD Projekt Red had already made plans to share more about Songs of the Past during Gamescom 2026 Opening Night Live, with that news arriving less than 24 hours after the Gwent confirmation dropped on social media.

Meanwhile, the studio also confirmed on August 24 that The Witcher 4 remains on track for a 2028 launch, meaning the next couple of years are shaping up to be unusually busy for fans of the franchise. IGN gave The Witcher 3 a 9.3 out of 10 in its original review, calling it “massive in size, and meticulously detailed.”

For players who have been waiting to pull up a chair and lay down some cards in the Northern Kingdoms again, the wait is at least starting to feel finite.