Ciri wearing a hood in the snow in The Witcher 4's tech demo
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Lee D'Amato
Published 54 minutes ago
Lee D’Amato is a writer born, raised, and based in Queens, New York. With collective thousands of hours in games like Final Fantasy, Metal Gear, Elden Ring, and The Legend of Zelda, he's now writes game features, guides, and reviews for Screen Rant, but has covered a wide range of topics, including ancient history, affordable travel, and overall health.
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Developer CD Projekt Red has unveiled an ambitious release timeline for The Witcher 4 and two planned sequels that have some fans questioning its feasibility. Currently one of the most anticipated RPGs, The Witcher 4 is rumored to be targeting a 2027 release, and will tell a new story focused on Geralt of Rivia's adoptive daughter, Ciri.
Although CDPR has yet to reveal a definitive release window for The Witcher 4, a transcript of its Q3 financial results reveals that The Witcher 4 and its two planned sequels will be released within a six-year time period. It certainly sounds like welcome news for Witcher fans, but some took to social media to question the validity of such a tight timeline.
The Witcher 4 Trilogy Planned To Launch In Span Of Six Years
An Ambitious, If Not Impossible, Goal
The Witcher 4's Ciri smiles gently with her hood on.Custom Image by Bruno Yonezawa
According to CDPR co-CEO Michal Nowakowski, "Our plan still is to launch the whole trilogy within a six-year period, so yes, that would mean we would plan to have a shorter development time between TW4 and TW5, between TW5 and TW6 and so on."
It's not totally unprecedented, but, again, it is ambitious. In the same transcript, Nowakowski admits that development of The Witcher 4 has already taken about four years to date. If the 2027 release window is correct, it'll have been in development for at least five years by the time it hits shelves.
If The Witcher 4 really is set to be released in 2027, that means the whole trilogy should have come to an end by 2032, averaging one game release every two years. That'd mean that CDPR expects to churn out The Witcher 5 and 6 more than twice as fast as they did The Witcher 4.
They'll achieve this, Nowakowski said, by using Unreal Engine 5 for the next Witcher trilogy, replacing the proprietary REDEngine it used for The Witcher 2 and 3. Its UE5 graphics did make for a pretty impressive tech demo at this summer's State of Unreal, but even so, some still worry it could suffer the same fate as Cyberpunk 2077.
It Seems Extremely Ambitious, Fans Agree
Some Remain Cautiously Optimistic
Custom image by Katarina Cimbaljevic
In a Reddit thread discussing the next Witcher trilogy's release timeline, fans of the series were split: some found the prospect of three games in six years entirely unrealistic, while others found it difficult to believe, yet possible.
One commenter, Skylam, called CDPR's track record to attention, saying, "I'll believe it when I see it, this is the same company that scuffed the Cyberpunk launch and is gonna crunch the hell out of their devs trying to release Cyberpunk 2 and Witcher 4-6 at the same time."
GodOfBoy8, meanwhile, while not discounting the possibility, expressed a belief that CDPR was taking a major shortcut by using UE5. While they might hit their deadline, this fan argued, it could result in a buggy, poorly performing final product. "That sounds like they are plugging in UE5 and hoping it works. No optimization."
Some commenters pointed out that many triple-A releases nowadays take far too long to come out, and that, while the six-year timeline seemed unrealistic, it'd still be a great thing for the franchise if CDPR could pull it off. Godlike013 said: "While I doubt it, I do think it's a worthy endeavor... The industry needs to go back to this. Dev times are far too long nowadays."
A handful of fans were more optimistic, pointing out that other series have pulled off similar feats. Although we don't have a release date for Final Fantasy 7 Remake Part 3 yet, the series is on track to release three major games within seven years, points out Proud_Inside819.
So, while it's unclear whether CDPR will meet this lofty goal, it's not totally out of the realm of possibility. First things first, it'll have to deliver on The Witcher 4 before making any concrete plans for a trilogy.
The Witcher 4
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CD Projekt Red
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CD Projekt Red
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Unreal Engine 5
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The Witcher
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Action RPG, Open-World
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