The Witcher 4 devs are preparing for "a generational shift" after The Witcher 3, and they're studying the RPG's biggest city to help

The "generational shift" between The Witcher 4 and The Witcher 3 means that CD Projekt Red is "stepping up" to deliver on its ambitions - but also looking to the past for inspiration.

In an interview with GamesRadar+, Jan Hermanowicz, engineering production manager on the recent The Witcher 4 tech demo explained that the studio is adapting to the "generational shift when it comes to hardware, engines, and technology between The Witcher 3 and The Witcher 4." Since the third part of Geralt's saga released in 2015, we've had a whole new console generation, and seen CDPR shift to a new engine for its RPG.

"That generational shift, we want to do it right," Hermanowicz says. "Our ambition is to take full advantage of it and really deliver the next-gen experience." For Hermanowicz in particular, that ambition had to show in the tech demo, which put Valdrest - a small village in The Witcher 4 region of Kovir - in center stage. But by the standards of The Witcher 3, that village was not all that small - in fact, it was a busy port town with 300 NPCs and a bustling market.

That density is evidence of how CD Projekt is "stepping up," but Hermanowicz is keen to point out that the studio is "not stepping into this blindly." To help build believable crowds for Valdrest, he says that the team "spent a lot of time watching recordings of Novigrad from Witcher 3."

That generational leap means that the last game's biggest settlement is a reasonable comparison for the Witcher 4 tech demo, and the team studied things like NPC density and activity to help shape their showcase. "We actually looked at what we did in the past, what was cool about that, and what we couldn't do at the time," Hermanowicz explains.

That also helped the team consider what they hadn't even thought of last time around - watching Novigrad meant they could determine whether their "ambition was even there, and what new ambitions appeared throughout the last years."

Clearly, the detail and density of Valdrest will not necessarily be found in every nook and cranny of The Witcher 4. Both CDPR and Hermanowicz have been keen to remind players that this was a proof-of-concept tech demo for The Witcher 4, which means it's probably not representative of the finished game. Either way, it's interesting to note that the biggest cities in The Witcher 3 are helping shape fairly nondescript villages in The Witcher 4.

The Witcher 4 has a "console-first" philosophy and a 60fps target to avoid another Cyberpunk 2077 situation, though the Xbox Series S is "extremely challenging."