New ‘Witcher’ game officially announced

Game developer CD Projekt Red has officially announced a new Witcher game is in the works.

Following the smash hit The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt in 2015, the company said the next installment is “currently in development” and will kick off “a new saga for the franchise,” according to their website.

The announcement went on to say that this new development comes amid a migration from the developer using its REDengine to Unreal Engine 5, marking what they call the beginning of “a multi-year strategic partnership with Epic Games.”

The partnership will cover licensing, technical development of Unreal Engine 5, and possibly future versions of the game engine.

“We’ll closely collaborate with Epic Games’ developers with the primary goal being to help tailor the engine for open-world experiences,” the statement said.

No other details of the coming game — such as development time frame or a possible release date — could be shared, the developer said.

For now, REDengine still powers CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077, and is still being used for the development of upcoming expansions, the company said.

The most recent mainline console release by the company, the aforementioned 2020 release Cyberpunk 2077, was plagued with so many issues upon its launch that CD Projekt Red was forced to dole out nearly $2 million to investors as part of a class-action lawsuit settlement, Game World Observer reported.

Before that, the company’s previous mainline game launch on consoles was the critically acclaimed The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. At 30 million units sold, it is one of the best-selling games of all time.