With just over a month left until release, “The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt” is so close RPG fans can taste it. Gamer's who’ve been itching to get their hands on CD Projekt Red’s upcoming magnum opus will have to wait till May 19, but a newly released video showing the first 15 minutes offers the next best thing.

The footage comes via the IGN YouTube channel, and offers up the first 15 minutes of gameplay, with the intro cinematic edited out so gamer's can get right into the meat of the action. The video opens with Geralt waking up at a camp in Temeria on the road to Vizima, with his mentor Vesemir in tow. There’s a brief narrative exchange which offers up some choices regarding response, before the pair encounter a pack of ghouls.

Combat is fast-paced and furious, with Geralt smoothly transitioning between slashing, rolling and casting. The witcher’s make quick work of their foes, and continue on the journey to find Geralt’s missing lover, the sorceress Yennefer of Vengerberg. It’s here that the sheer scale and ambition of “The Witcher 3” comes into focus. As Geralt and Vesemir ride along the road, thick vegetation, lush foliage and rolling hills far in the distance are seen. It isn’t long, however, before the two come across yet another obstacle on their path.

It isn’t long before Geralt arrives in a nearby village to pick up new quests, and a couple of dives into the map screen will give gamers a glimpse at just how large the playable game area is. Unfortunately, we don’t get to see the completion of any specific quests. The video ends with Geralt showing off some of the new navigation and platforming abilities in “The Witcher 3,” vaulting over obstacles and climbing up walls as he infiltrates an enemy camp.

DualShockers recently had a chance to interview senior game designer Damien Monnier and localization manager Alexandre Boiret about the game. When asked whether there was a chance that aside from the previously reported wealth of DLC, “The Witcher 3” might also get some performance enhancing patches on PS4 and Xbox One, Monnier was coy, but did not rule it out.

"The goal is to never rely on that stuff, that’s one of the reasons we wanted the game to be good as-is, out of the box you play it, it’s fine, you don’t need a patch to just have it run. You know we just going to carry on working on it, because our engine team never stops working,” he said.

Monnier went on to give an example, stating that a member of the team had recently implemented a faster, better looking shadow system in the game that allowed them to upgrade its graphics. Monnier added that both the Xbox One and PS4 versions of the game would also share the same level of detail with regard to lighting and reiterated the fact that the primary difference between both console versions would be the game’s resolution.

Monnier stated that shadows would be slightly improved on PC and noted that the platform would sport improved draw distances and additional graphical features like ubersampling and Nvidia’s HairWorks technology. The pair said that all platforms would benefit from the free post-release DLC on offer, stating that they planned to offer costumes, quests and a little bit of everything to players. With just over a month to go till its April 14 release on PC, PS4 and Xbox One, it won’t be long before gamer's get to sample “The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt” for themselves.

(Credit: YouTube/IGN)

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