Now that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt's Blood and Wine add-on has finally released, fans of CD Projekt Red's open world title have discovered the DLC's expansion to be quite challenging. Taking this into consideration, it makes sense for developers to have put in a reference to Dark Souls, which is a similarly difficult action-RPG.

Those fans of The Witcher 3 who are on the lookout for the Dark Souls nod can find it in one of the last missions from a branch in the main story line of Blood and Wine's Beyond Hill and Dale quest. Not only does its discovery give players the satisfaction in being privy to a nice little in-joke to another fantastic video game, but finding the Easter egg also rewards Geralt with a level 46 sword known as Gesheft, which is a Relic class weapon offering 20% extra intensity across all signs, has three rune slots, and does up to 627 damage in its base form.

In order to find this Witcher 3 secret, players will first need to defeat the Cloud Giant boss, and then approach the castle without proceeding through the arch. After that, fans should vault over the railing on the left side, and with Geralt facing into the castle with his back to the boss arena, players need to drop down to the next ledge, follow the path to a cave, and then once in the dark, as seen in the image below, there's a Dark Souls-esque bonfire that can be ignited.

Of course, since great developers like CD Projekt Red know that secrets like this are all in good fun and add to the richness of a game's overall quality, it's safe to presume the studio has plenty more hidden goodies stashed throughout the last expansion for The Witcher 3. After all, the company has paid homage to other intellectual properties within the game before, with one enjoyable example being the Game of Thrones Easter egg that references the character Tyrion Lannister.

Interestingly enough, The Witcher 3 is not the only current generation video game to pay respects to From Software's notoriously difficult titles, as Just Cause 3 has its own bonfire Easter egg. Bearing this in mind, it's obvious that plenty of game developers hold Dark Souls in high regard.

What do you think about The Witcher 3 giving props to Dark Souls' bonfire? Have you come across any other interesting secrets in Blood and Wine? If so, share your thoughts in the comments below.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is out now and is available for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.

Source: VG 24/7