After 11 years, The Witcher 3 has received a feature that CD Projekt Red abandoned before launch. Players will see some things for the first time

Ahead of next year’s release of The Witcher 3: Songs of the Past expansion, many players will probably want to refresh their memories of the Wild Hunt’s story. However, replaying Geralt’s several-dozen-hour adventure may not be an appealing prospect for everyone. Fortunately, a new mod may prove to be the perfect solution for those who want to quickly revisit the most important moments of the story without having to watch recaps on YouTube.

The cut menu returns after 11 years

Modder going by the pseudonym Glassfish777 has released the Storybook mod, which restores an unfinished feature prepared by CD Projekt Red before the release of The Witcher 3 in 2015. After installing the mod, a new menu called “Events” appears in the “Glossary” tab, allowing players to watch all of the story recaps available in the game.

1. Download the Storybook mod from our FTP (the author has given us permission to host a mirror)

These are short animated sequences narrated by Dandelion, which in the base version of the game only played during loading screens. They reminded players of the most important events of the campaign after loading a save or reaching another stage of the story. Thanks to the new mod, they can be played at any time and in any order, without having to wait for the appropriate loading screen.

Importantly, Storybook is not limited to simply unlocking the hidden menu.

The creator points out that the panel has been redesigned to match the style of the 2016 interface update, which remains the standard menu design in The Witcher 3 to this day.

The panel itself is very straightforward to use. On the left is a list of all available videos, while their titles and descriptions prepared by the developers are displayed on the right. Importantly, all of the text was translated by the studio during the game's production, so the mod does not add any new translations—it uses only existing assets.

The videos are unlocked automatically as the player progresses through the story. The good news is that the story-tracking mechanism has been running in the background since The Witcher 3 was first released. This means the mod can also be used with years-old save files—there is no need to start a new game.

Some scenes were practically never seen by players

The author points out another interesting detail. Most of the videos consist of two parts, yet the second part was very rarely shown during normal gameplay.

This happened because the game always prioritized the most recently unlocked recap. As a result, extended versions of earlier clips were skipped, and many players were not even aware that they existed. Storybook automatically combines both parts, meaning some players may be seeing the complete material prepared by CD Projekt Red for the first time.

For those who don't like recaps on loading screens

Storybook also comes with an optional add-on for players who don't particularly enjoy watching the videos every time they load the game. Once installed, the recaps will no longer appear on loading screens, while remaining fully accessible through the new menu.

However, the author points out that this feature works in a rather specific way. The Witcher 3 engine stores information about the currently playing videos directly in save files, which means that after installing or removing the optional module, you need to save the game for the changes to take effect. This allows players to decide at any time whether they prefer to watch the recaps during loading screens or only access them when they feel the need to do so.

The project had been waiting for completion since 2022

Although the mod has only debuted now, its history began much earlier. The first attempt to restore the panel was made in 2022 by modder Fabian (Tinnaib). However, development stalled after a serious bug was encountered that could not be fixed using the interface-modding tools available at the time.

The situation changed only after RedKit was released in 2024. The UI source files made available by CD Projekt Red made it possible to fix the bug and refine the panel to a level of quality that allowed it to be officially released.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

May 19, 2015

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