In addition to marking the start of a new saga in the famous dark fantasy franchise, The Witcher 4 promises to be a very ambitious game for CD Projekt RED.
In any case, this is what Michał Nowakowski, CEO of the Polish studio, announced during a recent Q&A session with its investors. Enough to further crystallize fans’ expectations around the future game currently known under the code name Polaris.
Exploration of new poles (aris) with The Witcher 4
Some two years after its first teaser, The Witcher 4 is currently the game that mobilizes the most people at CD Projekt RED. With most of the work finally done on Cyberpunk 2077, it’s time for the studio to move forward. Thus, it is the commotion over the next opus of the franchise that has elevated it to the top. 403 developers are working on the game called Polaris internally, or 64% of its workforce. The new saga in The Witcher universe is currently in pre-production. However, it could go into production later this year, according to the CEO of CD Projekt RED.
He also had exciting news to announce regarding The Witcher 4 to investors, and by extension players. “ Making a new game is always a creative risk, especially if we’re trying to push new boundaries and explore new possibilities, doing something we’ve never done before. What I mean is that you shouldn’t expect The Witcher 3 with just nicer clothes. We’re obviously building on what came before, but we’re going to add new gameplay elements and mechanics that you haven’t seen in our previous games “.
A potential new masterpiece?
This should make the mouths of fans (or the lips of the witchers of the Wolf School?) water. It is of course still too early to know to what extent CD Projekt RED’s ambitions will be realized on The Witcher 4. Let’s remember that Cyberpunk 2077 was the studio’s first first-person game. Despite its numerous bugs at launch (especially on PS4/Xbox One), the title was particularly convincing in its gameplay, but above all in its narration and its immersion.
The studio is certainly well aware of the colossal expectations of fans after the masterpiece that was The Witcher 3. We can therefore bet that it will take the time necessary to offer its core franchise the sequel it deserves. Especially since the transition to Unreal Engine 5 should allow it to better focus on its promises when it comes to new mechanics to explore. As a reminder, the in-house RED Engine was particularly capricious, requiring considerable rehabilitation work for each game since The Witcher 2. With this weight less on our shoulders, we wish CD Projekt RED to thrill us again in this new saga in the deliciously dark fantasy universe of Andrzej Sapkowski’s novels.