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[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

As revealed during an earnings conference for the publisher’s FY 2023 earnings, the development team now sits at 403 staff.

Joint CEO Michał Nowakowski explained that following the release of Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, the number of staff working on that game has now dropped to just 17, with others being distributed to other projects.

“The Polaris team, on the other hand, has grown to over 400 developers,” Nowakowski said, “reaching its target size for entering the production phase. This is scheduled for the second half of the year.”

The team working on Witcher spin-off Project Sirius, led by The Molasses Flood, hasn’t changed in size since CD Projekt’s last update, and remains at just under 40 staff.

Back in January, CD Projekt joint CEO Adam Badowski said he hoped the production phase of the fourth main Witcher game, Polaris, would start this year.

CD Projekt confirmed last May that it had wrapped up its research phase on the game, which will be the first part of a new trilogy, and progressed to the pre-production phase.

It said last November that almost 330 developers were working on the project, making it CD Projekt’s biggest development team.

“We’d like to have around 400 people working on the project by the middle of the year”, Badowski said at the time, a target which has now been met.

Two thirds of CD Projekt developers are now working on The Witcher 4, reaching its target staff size | VGC

Production is set to start in the second half of the year…

www.videogameschronicle.com

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

Also related

CDPR Groups Earnings presentation for FY 2023: https://www.cdprojekt.com/en/wp-content/uploads-en/2024/03/cd-projekt-group-presentation-fy-2023.pdf

 

[SlimySnake]

if 400 devs are working on the game, why is the game not in production yet? Are they sitting around jerking each other off?

 

[Tsaki]

400 devs doing pre-prod? That seems super messy. Hoping I'm wrong and it comes out great

 

[cormack12]

if 400 devs are working on the game, why is the game not in production yet? Are they sitting around jerking each other off?

Depends if they class community managers, admin etc as 'devs'

 

[cormack12]

Do we think a ciri Trilogy? A cirilogy?

 

[EverythingsOverrated]

if 400 devs are working on the game, why is the game not in production yet? Are they sitting around jerking each other off?

In addition to the typical concept art and storyboarding stuff, there's probably a lot of engineering going on with UE5, I think this new Witcher game is their first game on the new engine.

 

[Xtib81]

Damn, we're not getting anything from them until the end of the gen and cp2078 is for next decade ^^

 

[Luipadre]

Damn, we're not getting anything from them until the end of the gen and cp2078 is for next decade ^^

Im guessing 2028 and PS6 only. They wont do crossgen again after cyberpunk, atleast i hope so

 

[Dazraell]

Do we think a ciri Trilogy? A cirilogy?

Rumors says it'll be a brand new witcher from the Lynx school, most likely CD Projekt's original character as this school wasn't previously mentioned in the books

 

[Cyberpunkd]

if 400 devs are working on the game, why is the game not in production yet? Are they sitting around jerking each other off?

Not being Ubisoft and outsourcing art assets to ChatGPT.

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

I'm a bit concerned about the "modern audiences" thing that has been mentioned by devs since we all know what that entails.

 

[Dazraell]

if 400 devs are working on the game, why is the game not in production yet? Are they sitting around jerking each other off?

They mentioned having a playable prototypes of the game running on all target platforms last year. I think pre-production means they're on a phase where their baseline is still being established and some things can be changed if their prototypes won't work in a way they're satisfied with them. When they will enter full production, the game will probably be content locked, script will be finalized and they will be working on finishing and implementing everything they planned out during pre-prod like assets, quests, etc

 

[Raven117]

Yeeeeaaaahhhhh Buuuudddddyyyy

 

[TheRedRiders]

Let’s go!!!

 

[Jinzo Prime]

Also related

CDPR Groups Earnings presentation for FY 2023: https://www.cdprojekt.com/en/wp-content/uploads-en/2024/03/cd-projekt-group-presentation-fy-2023.pdf

I'm surprised that The Witcher 1 Remake is still in the concept phase. I know they had to move the project away from Russia, but I thought they could find someone willing to work on an obvious money maker pretty quickly.

 

[Dazraell]

I'm surprised that The Witcher 1 Remake is still in the concept phase. I know they had to move the project away from Russia, but I thought they could find someone willing to work on an obvious money maker pretty quickly.

The project they had going in Russia was actually The Witcher 3 next-gen update, which was later developed in-house by CDPR. This move actually turned out well for them as they even developed some new content for that update like fully-voiced quest and some minor additions that original version wouldn't had

The remake is handled by Fool's Theory, the Polish studio that was formed by some devs who worked on the original The Witcher. To my understanding that project was announced more as a 15th anniversary celebration thingie. Fool's Theory just wrapped up the development of their main project (The Thaumaturge) so they're probably shifting towards working on TW Remake. I imagine they also had to wait for CDPR until they will develop the tools for Polaris as both games are meant to share the same engine and tools. Polaris is also planned to come first and The Witcher Remake is planned to be a game released after

I'm still surprised CDPR even given that Remake to any external partner as they had some plans for porting The Witcher 1 to consoles back in late 2000s and found an external partner in France who was apparently very hard to work with and issues durign development led them to cancelling it and paying some hefty fines to their publisher for not delivering it. If you're curious, this project was called Rise of the White Wolf

 

[SHA]

Time moves fast.

 

[Elbereth]

 

[samoilaaa]

I'm a bit concerned about the "modern audiences" thing that has been mentioned by devs since we all know what that entails.

i hope they didnt mean what i think means but it most likely does

i think they will break the lore and add female witchers , maybe even black female witchers because slavic folklore doesnt mean a thing

 

[Dodo123]

i hope they didnt mean what i think means but it most likely does

i think they will break the lore and add female witchers , maybe even black female witchers because slavic folklore doesnt mean a thing

The representation of slavic people and slavic culture in mass media is close to 0%, so they could actually say that embracing these is diversity (which in such case would actually be true)

 

[gow3isben]

If you want the most sales bring Geralt back. End of Story.

Main decisions in the new game should be Ciri's ending and Romance.

I chose triss and for Ciri to be a Witcher. These 2 decisions should be allowed to carry over.

 

[Dazraell]

If you want the most sales bring Geralt back. End of Story.

Main decisions in the new game should be Ciri's ending and Romance.

I chose triss and for Ciri to be a Witcher. These 2 decisions should be allowed to carry over.

Geralt's story already reached its natural conclusion in Blood and Wine though. CDPR already said a few times this new game will be the first entry in a new trilogy and it won't be about Geralt. I think multiple gaming franchises like Yakuza / Like a Dragon, Final Fantasy or Assassin's Creed proved that you can pull off a change in the protagonist and still elevate the series to new heights. It's definitely challenging as Geralt is the face of The Witcher franchise, but it's not impossible

I think CD Projekt understands that and they will make sure that this new character, whoever it will be won't repeat the same mistakes BioWare did with Ryder in Mass Effect Andromeda or The Coalition did in Gears games with new cast post Gears of War 3. This world is so vast that there is plenty of room for various stories that doesn't need to include further dragging a character whose adventures already spanned 8 books and 3 huge RPGs whose story arc was pretty much concluded

Also, fun fact. Geralt wasn't always meant to be a protagonist of The Witcher 1, so it's not like ideas like these are something they haven't considered in the past

 

[samoilaaa]

If you want the most sales bring Geralt back. End of Story.

Main decisions in the new game should be Ciri's ending and Romance.

I chose triss and for Ciri to be a Witcher. These 2 decisions should be allowed to carry over.

yeah i think that ciri is the only female that could survive to the witcher procedures

 

[RyRy93]

TW3 was in production for 3 and a half years but that’s from an era when games didn’t take as long to make.

They started / restarted production of Cyberpunk 2077 mid 2016 which released messily at the back end of 2020 so we’re probably 4+ years away from their next game… Fall 2028 or 2029 even?

 

[samoilaaa]

TW3 was in production for 3 and a half years but that’s from an era when games didn’t take as long to make.

They started / restarted production of Cyberpunk 2077 mid 2016 which released messily at the back end of 2020 so we’re probably 4+ years away from their next game… Fall 2028 or 2029 even?

i think witcher 4 is 2026 , 2027 at the latest
The game is being made in UE5 so it wont take as much to optimize the engine , add assets , lighting effects etc.

 

[simpatico]

TBH I'd much rather get Cyberpunk 2. But I'll still check out Witcher 4. Just don't know how much more we can romp around in Polish countryside mud puddles before it gets boring.