We’ve all been hyperfocused on Rockstar and the recent GTA VI gameplay leak lately. However, there’s big news coming at us from all sides this week. CD Projekt Red is the focus of our attention today, and the Warsaw-based studio has made an announcement that might overshadow Rockstar for weeks to come. CD Projekt Red has announced no less than five new projects coming our way within the next few years, one of which includes The Witcher 4 and the news saga.
The announcements came during a presentation delivered by the Warsaw-based studio yesterday. The purpose of the presentation was to highlight future plans, but the studio focused on its recent successes at the onset. CD Projekt Red started by delivering an update on how much the company has grown since the first quarter of 2022, stating that more than 65 million copies of the Witcher trilogy were sold during this time.
It added that Cyberpunk 2077 had simultaneously seen over 20 million copies sold worldwide. The company then introduced its plans to keep the upward momentum going with three new games in The Witcher franchise. The games were unveiled under the working titles Project Polaris, Sirius, and Canis Majoris. The studio also announced a sequel to Cyberpunk 2077 under the working title Project Orion.
Project Polaris will be the jump-off point for the new Witcher trilogy, and the studio has said that it will pick up where we left off with The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. In contrast, Project Sirius has been described as an ‘innovative take on The Witcher universe telling an unforgettable story for existing Witcher fans and new audiences.’ Project Canis Majoris brings even more variation into the new trilogy and is in development by a third-party studio. Worry not, however; the development is being steered by ex-Witcher veterans. CD Projekt Red has stated that all three of these projects are expected to release within the space of six years.
The previously mentioned Project Orion is set to be a sequel for Cyberpunk 2077, capitalizing on the success of the franchise’s current iteration. Cyberpunk 2077 started off strong but experienced a wane in popularity until around two weeks ago. The resurgence of the game’s popularity coincides with the release of Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, a new anime on Netflix. The studio hopes to ‘prove the full power of the Cyberpunk universe’ with the next iteration of the game.
CD Projekt Red could have left it at that, but it didn’t. Instead, it announced a brand-new IP under the working title Project Hader. The studio has confirmed that the new project is completely separate from Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher. However, the new title will introduce multiplayer game modes to CD Projekt Red’s single-player games going forward. This means that Project Hader is likely the most significant announcement as it’s set to change the way that CD Project Red approaches its titles from here on out.
I don’t want to brag, but we knew this was coming, especially concerning The Witcher franchise. Shaun M Jooste posted his thoughts early in September, and now that the announcement is official, it’s fun to go back and see how we did with our predictions of the future of The Witcher 4 saga.
