CD Project Red has its hands currently full with Phantom Liberty, the long-awaited expansion to Cyberpunk 2077, but the studio is not short on post-Phantom Liberty projects—like The Witcher.
Several announced projects mean CDPR fans are a little divided on what they want to see next, but the latest news coming from the developer itself gives The Witcher 4 fans a lot to be happy about.
In CDPR’s publicly available earnings conference from Aug. 30 for the first half of 2023, CD Projekt Red President and CEO Adam Kicinski shared what the studio’s plans are after the Sept. 26 launch of Phantom Liberty. What he had to say is music to the ears of Witcher fans.
“After releasing Phantom Liberty, we’ll transfer a big part of the team to Polaris,” Kicinski said, referencing the code name for the new Witcher title. “Some remaining members will then focus on supporting other ongoing projects, like Orion or Hadar, but bear in mind we’ll also be supporting Phantom Liberty after launch for some time.”
Related: 5 reasons The Witcher games are better than the Netflix show
If you’ve been following CDPR’s development roadmap, you’re surely familiar with what all of those terms mean, but here’s a reminder anyway. Orion is the codename for Cyberpunk 2077’s full scale sequel, Hadar is what CDPR calls its attempt at recapturing the success of The Witcher and Cyberpunk by creating yet another new IP, and finally, Polaris is The Witcher 4, which has the tough task of following the jewel in the studio’s backlog and one of the most successful video games ever, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.
CD Project Red has not tied itself to any release dates for any of these projects, understandable after Cyberpunk 2077’s launch woes. Even then, the news that most Phantom Liberty developers will be shifting to Polaris immediately after the Cyberpunk 2077 expansion is out the door clearly shows that getting The Witcher 4 released as soon as possible is a priority for the Polish studio.
Most realistic estimates are still putting any potential release dates for the fourth installment in The Witcher series no earlier than 2025, but with all the melons CDPR has under its armpits, 2025 sounds almost like next week. We just hope Phantom Liberty has a smoother launch than its parent game had back in 2020, so the devs could actually move to Polaris as per Adam Kicinski’s plan and not further delay the development of The Witcher 4.
