#Hearts of Stone (Spoilers below)

Hearts of Stone is DLC to The Witcher 3, offering a focused narrative that takes place in Velen, and features 3 new main characters: Olgierd Van Everec, Gaunter O'Dimm, and Shani. The narrative focuses on the immortal Olgierd, and his binding contract with the mysterious and powerfully magical O'Dimm, which Geralt finds himself in the middle of. During the journey we meet an old flame of Geralt's, Shani, who assists Geralt in a variety of ways.

The narrative is, quite frankly, brutal. It involves several "impossible" tasks that lead to heartbreaking moments, and ending with a difficult decision that Geralt must make. Specifically, the sequence of events with Olgierd’s wife Iris hit me hard, and I couldn’t help but think about it for a few hours afterwards. It’s a fantastic story that only felt like a chore during the moments involving Vlodimir. The moments involving Vlodimir and Shani were especially difficult to get through, they made me uncomfortable and I was looking forward to the sequence ending.

On the topic of Shani, her introduction feels unnatural and forced. If I hadn’t learned, after-the-fact, that she was in the books and previous games, then I would have assumed that she was created solely to have an attractive woman in the DLC. Geralt and Shani discuss their past, but it felt as if the game was trying to convince me that they had history rather than them having a natural conversation. I genuinely like her as a character though, her demeanor is pleasant and I feel like she would be a really fun character for future quests involving injuries or solving mysteries based on illness.

Lastly, the DLC introduces new weapon and armor enhancements called runewords, which is basically enchanting, except glyphs need to be removed before the runeword can be applied. Unlocking upgrades is expensive, and so are runewords in general. It feels out of place for a short narrative focused DLC, perhaps it fits better in the context of when it was released as a way for hardcore Witcher 3 players to spend money and use glyphs that may have been stockpiled.

There is minimal fluff to get sidetracked by, and I highly encourage fans of Wild Hunt to play if they want more of The Witcher.

The entire wedding and the climax of this DLC are some of my favorite experiences in gaming. Definitely spent a good period of time sitting and staring at the closing credits/title screen and pondering what had just happened. The DLC also adds a good amount of much-needed color to the world of The Witcher 3. So good. Essential.

That's an understandable reaction to Shani, though as someone who played The Witcher 1 and chose Shani over Triss, I was really happy to see her again. Especially after The Witcher 2 essentially ignored that choice (even though you can import your Witcher 1 save) and put Geralt and Triss together in its very first scene! Still a bit salty about that... lol. But having her show up like that in the Witcher 3 DLC felt like the developers finally trying to make up for that, at least a little bit.

This also feels like an opportune time to mention that in conjunction with the just-announced Witcher 3 remaster, Hearts of Stone and Blood & Wine DLCs are now free for everyone who owns The Witcher 3.

Those sidequests with Shani felt so much more personal than the main game's romances it's wild.

This DLC hit different for me coz I was crazy enough to play the previous games. I was actually surprised that Shani wasn't in the main game, since she plays such a huge part in the previous ones. So on the flipside, their dialogue really worked for me since I experienced their past first hand.

To be honest, Shani makes me want to play Witcher 1 and 2 because she seems like a great character

Yeah I want to play Witcher 1 and 2 because Shani seems cool as hell.

And yes I just saw the remaster video. Insane!!

Both are worth playing but don't get your hopes up about Shani in Witcher 2, lol. She's not in it at all and if you romanced her in The Witcher 1, all you get is a mention of their relationship in a codex entry.

I actually never played all the way through Blood and Wine but I'll probably go back and rectify that once the remaster comes out in about a month. Very cool!

I played Act 1 of the first game back in the day and it was great, but the combat is soooo bad lmao

Damn, bad timing with the remaster coming out in a month.

I got blood and wine still!

Thanks for the heads up!

True! 😅