I think you are wrong and i will explain what i mean. The 3 screenshots posted above to which i was referring were from the debut trailer and that time of development where everything had this grayish filter on it. You can look at it here if you want in the trailer below.
That was clearly not the final state of the game, you can see at how Geralt's face looks and the non existent lighting effects to understand why.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pt91NLt6mEU
The screenshots you posted above are after the VGX and Sword of Destiny trailer era, where we actually saw how the game looks like with everything in a more complete state of the engine. I agree with you that they look great but those are quite a bit after the debut trailers time i believe.
It simply looks like the game back then was not ready and it shows it, it was January 2013 if i am not mistaken. The screenshots you posted are indeed great but they aren't that different at what we see at the current gameplays are they ?