Cyberpunk 2 has entered pre-production, as The Witcher 3 leaps above Super Mario Bros to sell 60 million copies

The Cyberpunk 2077 sequel has officially entered its pre-production phase, according to CD Projekt Red.

In a new investor relations presentation, one slide simply reads that "Cyberpunk 2 has entered pre-production phase." More information is likely to be available as part of the overall presentation, but for now these slides do offer some interesting information to pick over.

Chief among that is the fact that, externally at least, CDPR is still referring to the game - previously referred to as Project Orion – as Cyberpunk 2. That's likely to prevent giving away too much information about its setting. While original Cyberpunk author Mike Pondsmith did recently reveal that the new game would be set in a second location after Night City, the developers are yet to attach anything like the original's naming convention to the project.

A sequel to Cyberpunk 2077 conjures images of Cyberpunk 2078, but as soon as we know if that's the case, players can start making guesses about the narrative – if there's no date, there are no theories to be drawn up.

Importantly, pre-production also doesn't give us much information about the timeline for the game. We do know that The Witcher 4 - CDPR's next game - is in full production, and the studio has offered hints about its timeline for the new Witcher saga over the past couple of years.

But pre-production is a very different beast to full production – it's often a period of ideation and trial-and-error, rather than actually building the final project, and it can often last for years. We do know that CD Projekt Red has built a new, US-based studio to make Cyberpunk 2, so it won't interfere with The Witcher 4 too much, but it's still anyone's guess as to how long we could be waiting.

Speaking of The Witcher, the studio has unveiled new sales figures for The Witcher 3, confirming that it's now shifted 60 million copies. That jump puts it further up the list of the best-selling games of all time, clear of Overwatch and even Super Mario Bros. Given the recent celebration of the game's tenth anniversary, it's likely that CD Projekt is very happy with the timing of that particular milestone.

"Even people in the studio had problems" with Cyberpunk 2077's most uncomfortable quest, but CDPR stood by it because "we don't do heavy things for the sake of edginess."