Although it's been 10 years since The Witcher 3 came out, CD Projekt Red says The Witcher 4 is coming together using some of the same "scrappy" energy as its predecessor.
We sat down with CDPR veteran and The Witcher 4 narrative director Philipp Weber to mark The Witcher 3's 10-year anniversary, and he gave us something of a peek behind the curtain at what the vibe's like at the studio. The Witcher 4 has been in full-scale production since November 2024, and although it won't be out until 2027 at the soonest, it sounds like CDPR is firing on all cylinders at this point.
Weber told us there's the same "scrappy energy" at the studio that there was when he first joined as quest designer on The Witcher 3 in 2013, a time of "good creative chaos" where a lot of tasks were "a little bit vibe-based" in the sense that developers were just doing what needed to be done regardless of their specific job titles.
"Sometimes I like to just say, 'Get it done. Do it dirty. Do it the way we used to do it!" Weber said.
This may sound potentially disorderly, but there's an intention behind this philosophy that's defined by CDPR's appreciation and respect for The Witcher 3's legacy as one of the best RPGs of all time.
"The way we want to do justice to [The Witcher 3's] legacy is to take the philosophy we had during The Witcher 3 – how to make a game, how to really care about these things, how to tell stories – and keep that," said Weber.
At the same time, "there are [also] new questions we want to answer, because this is supposed to feel like a true sequel, not just redoing what we did before. And I think it's really [about] trying to have that healthy mix of moving forward and also trying out some new things."
CDPR unleashed a stunning tech demo for The Witcher 4 earlier this month filled with dramatic valleys, enchanting forests, and plenty of grit and gristle that characterizes the medieval age for many of us. Whatever chaotic energy is driving the sequel's development behind-the-scenes seems A-okay to me if that's the result.
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