CD Projekt Red has once again doubled down on a huge promise: releasing a full new Witcher trilogy in just six years. During a recent Q&A, the studio once again confirmed its long-term plan to release The Witcher 4 first, followed by two sequels spaced roughly three years apart.
If everything goes according to plan, that would mean new Witcher games around 2027, 2030, and 2033, a pace that stands out in today’s AAA gaming industry.
It is not a new announcement, but in an industry where development timelines keep growing longer, CDPR’s confidence is hard to ignore.
A Faster Witcher Timeline Than Most AAA Studios
AAA games are taking more time than ever to arrive. GTA VI is set to launch eight years after Red Dead Redemption 2. Naughty Dog has not released a new game since 2020, and Intergalactic is far from releasing as well. Almost every other company is taking more and more time, leaving between 3 and 10 years before releasing their next game. This is mostly due to the amount of work it now takes to make games look as realistic as possible, and even then, most games release with a massive number of bugs. Cyberpunk was a good example of a game releasing too early before being finished.
Against that structure, CD Projekt Red’s goal of shipping three massive RPGs within six years feels unusually ambitious, especially considering the scale and expectations attached to The Witcher.
For comparison, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt released four years after The Witcher 2, and that gap did not include two additional sequels already lined up.
Why CDPR Thinks It Can Hit the Schedule
According to CD Projekt Red’s leadership, the key to this accelerated timeline is Unreal Engine 5.
The studio has fully transitioned to UE5 for The Witcher trilogy, and Co-CEO Michał Nowakowski has repeatedly said the team is “very happy” with the engine’s progress. Shared tools, pipelines, and experience across all three games are expected to reduce development time significantly between entries.
The Witcher 4 has already been in development for nearly four years, and it officially entered full production in late 2024. Around 447 developers are currently assigned to the project, making it the studio’s main focus.
CDPR also wants to work on multiple Witcher games at the same time. The Witcher 4 is still in full production, but early work on The Witcher 5 and 6 would already be underway, helping avoid long waits between each release.
Still No Rush to Show the Game
Despite the confidence, you should not expect new gameplay anytime soon. The Witcher 4 is not expected to release before 2027, and no appearance is planned for major events like The Game Awards in the near future.
So far, the only thing CDPR has shown publicly is an Unreal Engine 5 tech demo from earlier this year. It is more about showing off the tech than the game itself. If you missed it, you can watch it here:
Ambitious and Not Without Risks
Even if the plan is promising, it is not without challenges. Console hardware transitions could complicate development, especially if new platforms arrive during the trilogy’s lifecycle. And this is most likely the case since the PlayStation 6 and next Xbox are supposed to release in the next couple of years as well.
The gaming industry is also facing layoffs, changing market conditions, and rising production costs, all factors that can derail even the most carefully planned schedules.
Some people have also noted that the optimistic messaging may serve, at least in part, as reassurance for investors following CDPR’s turbulent past releases.
That said, the studio appears more structured than ever, with multiple teams working in parallel on The Witcher, Cyberpunk, and new IP.
If CD Projekt Red delivers on its promise, The Witcher could become one of the few major AAA RPG franchises to release consistently, roughly one major entry every three years starting in 2027.
It is an ambitious target, and one that goes against current industry trends. But if Unreal Engine 5 and CDPR’s new development approach can make it work, the studio could set a new standard for how massive RPGs are built in the future.
For now, fans will have to wait, but the road ahead for The Witcher has never looked more clearly mapped out.
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