I knew it was fake when I first saw it. But I tend to pay attention to those kinds of details.
It became even more obvious when those characters were talking, the facial animations didn't seem as "human" as they could be.

Big props to what they achieved though. And I look forward to where CGI goes in another decade.

For some reason I got the notion if I got the expansion pack for N64 (think a friend told me) I would see individual fingers on Mario in Mario 64. I was so hyped and got home and..nothing. So when I saw how well modeled the hands were in Shenmue I thought we reached the peak of graphics.

Haha gotta love those rumors back before the internet was accessible within 3 seconds... All I remember about that expansion pack is buying DK 64 without realizing I needed it, Electronics Boutique had closed for the day, and I had to spend a super sad night staring at a cartridge that I couldn't yet play lol

Can 9th gen end already?

At first i thought what fotogrammetry? but clouse up i can see the skin detail impossible to do by hand. But from far away Your sig picture is much more realistic then Gerald  even with a more simple skin. But sometimes low resolution helps to create the feeling of realism because our brain fills the  blanc rest.

CGI why you stopped making threads like these bruh? :/

I can't remember the technique (sub-surface something or another) since my book is at home, but the nose has way too much light going through it. The skin is too sparkly, glittery and uniform. The eyes are too big and wet. The beard hairs are too thin. It's like an Oblivion character 2017 edition. Too many effects thrown in grasping at next gen, while missing attention to detail of human anatomy. Still, a thousand times better than I could do. Especially faces. I suck at those. Have you rigged it for animation? What's the polycount, not counting the hair? 

I'm gonna be honest, I think what you did there looks pretty awful

This:

Looks good. What you did looks.....creepy

He looks...fake. And I think a large part of why he looks fake, rather than any of the techniques you used is that he looks incredibly groomed. For all his stubble, there's not a hair out of place on him.

Like others have mentioned, his skin looks rubbery and much too rosy and healthy for a seasoned fighter, out in the elements. Yes, he does have Geralts skars, and suggestions of his facial lines, but other than that he looks like a pampered king that has a facial every other week and it clashes.

His eyelashes look like they are out of a maybeline 'seperating and defining mascara' spot. They are so dark and clearly defined with such regular gaps that they look fake....or as if he enjoys putting on mascara.
Personally I always thought Geralt just has pretty severe eyrings an not johnny depp style eye-make-up, so I'm not sure if this is intentional or not.
(Also having the lashes get lighter around the tips like they often do, even with dark haired white people might be too taxing on the technical budget you allocaed to this render, but it would help with the look, I think)

His eyebrows look brushed in place and are really missing the sparser under-eyebrow hair, these kind of thick, dark, bushy eyebrows usually come with.

His hair look like it was drawn on with a rake brush and looks too stiff, especially towards the roots. It's confusing because the individual hair looks too fine to have this much spring, stiffness and definition. He either needed thicker individual hairs or a more lanky flatter overall hairstyle.

His beard makes his chin look like a hedgehog. Even a three day stubble will lay down on the face a little more. Human hair does not usually grow straight out, but grows in an arch that curves back down to the skin. It will also usually follow a pattern (that pattern varies from human to human), just like some people have one or several cowlicks in their headhair, the same happens with beards.

All in all he appears just a little too perfectly symmetrical, hansome and groomed. This clashes with Gerralt, who would be out in all weathers, probably grimy, greasy haired, a little dirty and....well..weathered.