The next mainline entry in the Witcher series has been highly anticipated once The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt quickly became recognized as one of the greatest games of all time back in 2015. Although developers CD Projekt Red have mostly been silent on Witcher 4, currently known by its codename, Polaris, their latest earning report shows that many of its employees are working hard on the game.
As seen in the report, as of October 31, 2023, about 330 CD Projekt Red employees are working on Polaris, just a little under half of the full staff. By July 31, 2023, about 260 employees had been working on it, so it’s possible that once production on Phantom Liberty wrapped up, some members moved onto the Polaris team. Still, the report states about 25% of developers are “in-transfer” following the release of the Cyberpunk expansion. CD Projekt stated that these employees would move on to either Polaris or the Cyberpunk sequel, currently codenamed Orion. CEO Adam Kicinski stated that Polaris is expected to have over 400 employees by mid-2024, so some more former Phantom Liberty workers might be on their way.
Despite what seems like good progress, the public is unsure of what development stage Polaris is in, as CD Projekt hasn’t said any more since May 2022, when it was stated to be in pre-production.
It’s also unknown when this project will release to the public. In October 2022, Kicinski said that Witcher 4 would be released in 2025 at the earliest. The game is made in Epic’s Unreal Engine 5, a departure from previous games made using CD Projekt’s own RedEngine, so all staff has certainly been adjusting to it. This fact combined with the lack of development updates means fans will probably have to wait a little longer than 2025. Still, if it’s anything like its predecessor, it’s sure to be worth the wait