CD PROJEKT RED has revealed that it is working on not just one, but multiple new Witcher games, as well as another Cyberpunk game that will “fully unleash the potential” of the universe that was introduced by the 2020 original. The company also teased a new original IP, one that is being “incubated” entirely within the company.
Project Sirius
- Set in The Witcher universe
- Targets a much broader audience
- Both single-player and multiplayer gameplay
- Under development at the Boston-based The Molasses Flood studio
Project Polaris
- Marks the launch of a new Witcher saga
- Saga will consist of three games
- CDPR intends to publish saga in a six-year period
- Second and third installment will rely on the technological foundation
Project Canis Majoris
- A full-fledged production, carried out by an external studio
- Supervised by experienced developers who previously worked on Witcher games
- First such product being developed outside of the Group
- It will be based on Unreal Engine 5
Project Orion
- Next Cyberpunk game
- Set to fully unleash the potential of the Cyberpunk universe
- Developed by CD PROJEKT’s new North American studio
Project Hadar
- An entirely new original IP
- CDPR began toying with the idea several years ago
- Early-stage conceptual work commenced in 2021
- IP is being incubated entirely within CD PROJEKT RED
- CDPR is still working on basic concepts, laying the groundwork for the new franchise
From CD PROJEKT Group:
The CD PROJEKT Group has published a strategy update which focuses on a set of key long-term projects. In the coming years the Studio intends to release a number of games set in The Witcher and Cyberpunk universes. It is also carrying out conceptual work on a third, proprietary IP, codenamed Hadar. The Management Board has announced the launch of a new studio in North America, adding multiplayer to the majority of future projects, and further expansion of the Group’s franchises in the direction of film and TV.
More information regarding the CD PROJEKT Group Strategy Update can be found at www.cdprojekt.com/en/capital-group/strategy/. Phantom Liberty, Cyberpunk 2077’s first expansion, will be out in 2023.
Discussion (19 replies)
Join Discussion →Well, I just hope they've got their house in order and are able to produce some quality games from all this. I want them to succeed but I just don't know anymore. So many people left them during/after CB so it's really hard to say where the company truly is at this point with everything. I suppose switching over to Unreal offloads a lot of their internal workload but you'll still need a sizable crew for all these projects.
I have pretty strong confidence that they have learned their lesson in that regard. If not... just... would be shameful actually.
A couple large projects are contracted out.
Unfortunately outsourcing only helps so much if the issue is in upper management.
CD Projekt is literally a company who made themselves famous by learning from their mistakes and doing something about it. They literally created one of the best RPGs ever made because they learned, grew and implemented major changes in released games in order to fix mistakes. There's no reason to assume they'd be any different now.
What issues?
I don't know - just saying outsourcing doesn't magically fix every issue that can occur in development.
Oh okay, I wasn't sure if maybe something happened or if there was some kind of stupid drama going on.
They spent what? a decade orso on Cyberpunk 2077 and shipped a broken game and now they want to ship 3 witcher games in 6 years, that could be real ugly even if they intend to fix them after launch they wont have the manpower.
There was also mention of severe crunch at the company, the management needs to be more realistic in their project timelines and treat staff better, fortunatelly by switching to the unreal engine they weill have an easier time finding staff with experience with that then when they used their own in house engine.
The unreal engine is a good choice and clearly has a lot of flexibility and a much more mature tool suite. I think this will be good for CDPR. And a huge part of their problem was a custom engine running on "all" platforms.
They've made 3 Witcher games, I'm sure they can handle 3 more without much issue. They've made one Cyberpunk game which was nothing like The Witcher, there is going to be a learning curve for them, just like with The Witcher, that's how great games are made. The PC version wasn't broken, just buggy. I don't play PC games on consoles so I don't really care all that much about that and I doubt CDPR did that intentionally but I think they were dumb for trying to release it on previous gen systems.
All large games at that scale have issues, that's just the way it works, it's a lot easier to find and fix issues with 500k copies or more in play instead of 200 copies or less. People sensitive to this shouldn't buy these types of games before the first patch is released, not including week 1 patches. I'm kind of tired of people bitching about something that has been a thing longer than most of these gamers have been alive. It's just a matter of scope vs manpower vs time, until we have more complex and efficient AI testing capabilities this will not change. I've been following CD Projekt Red since the launch of the original Witcher and am still more than willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
I've read nothing from actual unhappy staff members, though I have read a bunch of complaints from screaming unemployed gamers who think they were put on this earth to fight for all the peoples who they think are being treated unfairly despite the fact that most of these overgrown children have no clue how to survive in a world without parental or government assistance. The thing is, most intelligent, hard working adults in industries like this understand there will almost ALWAYS be some sort of crunch time at the end of a large complex project because nothing ever goes exactly to plan, events that are out of anyone's control happens more often than people realize and deadlines exist for multiple reasons and can't just be broken on a whim. That is just life.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/9/29/21494499/cyberpunk-2077-development-crunch-time-cd-projekt-red
https://gamerant.com/cyberpunk-2077-annoymous-development-trouble-report/
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/cyberpunk-2077s-development-still-bad-mainly-due-to-crunch-not-fake-e3-demos
https://screenrant.com/cyberpunk-2077s-internal-problems-explained-why-devs-are-so-mad/
Didn't know that. I imagine they'd have to be. As a fan of the Witcher franchise, I'm very familiar with their past strategy of dedicating almost their entire workforce to one game at a time for something like 4-6 years a shot and then splitting off some staff to begin the next towards the end. Basically, it's meant they can only work on maybe 2-3 games during a cycle between finishing-main-beginning phases. With the exodus of staff after CB I can't imagine they regained that many people to expand so much. However, between contracting out and possible investments into other studios, that could leverage resources enough to take on so much at once. Here's hoping it all works out.
I'm sure hoping they get that remastered/enhanced version of Witcher 3 out soon. So many delays and I'm purposely holding off on another playthrough for it.
Not one, but three new Witcher games? Is Christmas early this year? That's great news.
I'm somewhat concerned by the mention of multiplayer. I'd rather the developers concentrate on the single-player component and not waste valuable resources on a feature the majority of current fans of the franchise are unlikely to have an interest in, but it's probably way too early to worry about that.
I don't know that I'd get too excited. Gwent is technically a Witcher game too.
I don't know about the other projects, but Project Polaris is described as a trilogy:
Six years sounds ambitious for three games, but whatever. I'd be pleased with one.
And Gwent is exciting! :p