It’s not surprising that The Witcher is getting yet another entry, but CD Projekt Red has finally made it official. The studio announced that it is developing another installment in the acclaimed Witcher franchise and gave a few details about the upcoming game and its vague tagline: “A New Saga Begins.”
The simple blog post started off by saying that CD Projekt Red is moving on from its internal REDengine (which it has used since 2011’s The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings) and will be working on Unreal Engine 5, the newest version of Epic Games’ popular engine. This is part of a multi-year strategic partnership between the two entities and will help both teams. Epic will cover the licensing and technical development of the engine (and potential future versions of it) and CD Projekt Red insinuated that it will help the engine be better suited to open-world games.
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Epic Games Founder Tim Sweeney also spoke about how the two were working together to create “dynamic open worlds at an unprecedented scale and level of fidelity.” CTO of CD Projekt Red Paweł Zawodny also gave a statement about the partnership.
“One of the core aspects of our internal RED 2.0 Transformation is a much stronger focus on technology, and our cooperation with Epic Games is based on this principle,” he said. “From the outset, we did not consider a typical licensing arrangement; both we and Epic see this as a long-term, fulfilling tech partnership. It is vital for CD PROJEKT RED to have the technical direction of our next game decided from the earliest possible phase as; in the past, we spent a lot of resources and energy to evolve and adapt REDengine with every subsequent game release. This cooperation is so exciting, because it will elevate development predictability and efficiency, while simultaneously granting us access to cutting-edge game development tools. I can’t wait for the great games we’re going to create using Unreal Engine 5!”
CD Projekt Red did not include platforms or a release window for the game, as it is still likely very far off; the developer is still working on Cyberpunk 2077, after all. And speaking of Cyberpunk, the developer stated that the futuristic RPG and its upcoming expansion are staying in the REDengine.
This deal also doesn’t mean that the game will be exclusive. The official Witcher Twitter account said the title won’t be exclusive to one storefront, meaning the partnership with Epic Games won’t lock it to the Epic Games Store.
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Unreal Engine 5 hasn’t had much time to shine yet as many of the games using it, like Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II and Black Myth: Wukong, are still in development. However, players did get a taste of the engine with The Matrix Awakens: An Unreal Engine 5 Experience, which came out for free on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S in December 2021.
