“It’s February 2012. A former factory in Warsaw. Red brick, wooden folding chairs, the smell of an old building that has been a hundred things before. Around 80 of us, the team that just shipped The Witcher 2,” he wrote.

“The lights dim. Game director and executive producer speak briefly about new game we are going to make. Few sentences change the air in the room. The next game will be an open world. At the end, they show one image on the screen – it’s Geralt, but older, with a beard.”

Throughout the post, Sasko wrote about the many challenges he faced when designing some of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt‘s most iconic quests, like Family Matters, which involved the Bloody Baron. It took him quite a few attempts to nail the finer details of the story, including the Slavic folktale-inspired Botchling. However, he faced bigger pushback when he proposed that (spoilers if you haven’t completed the base game, turn back now before it’s too late)…

…That Vesemir, who served as as father figure to Geralt, should die.

“Then comes Battle of Kaer Morhen,” he wrote. “The story outline is just two paragraphs. In a meeting, I propose that Vesemir dies. First reaction is wide eyes and silence. The weight of it is exactly what the act needs. Ciri’s outburst, the moment she throws the Wild Hunt back, requires that the floor fall out from under her first. I prototype meteors, rifts opening in the forest, Wild Hunt pouring out of them, the ride back to the keep on horseback. So much of it does not work. Technical issues. The quest flow is unclear. Review feedback I get is negative, so I rebuild. Pieces start to hold. I begin to see why something works and why the thing next to it does not. Through repetition I truly start understanding the craft.”

Sasko also wrote about how it took the team nine months to write out the main storyline of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, with all the other development teams eagerly waiting for the writing to be finished so that they could start building the rest of the game.

“For the first nine months all of us write the main story quests, because every other department is eagerly waiting,” Sasko wrote. “Level has not even grass yet. RED Engine 3 is still finding its shape. But we keep moving. I write much more than then we need for the game, because we pick only the best. Priscilla’s concert in Novigrad is next. Then the The Last Wish. Some of it is designed last minute.”

He caps off the post by celebrating the fact that it has been 11 years since The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was originally released on PC, PS4, and Xbox One. The fact that he once more brings up the Bloody Baron quest line indicates that he is quite proud of the story.

“Today it has been 11 years. Over 60 million copies. A Polish village monster from a threshold burial lives now in the imagination of players on six continents. A Bloody Baron most of those players chose to forgive. A female bard’s concert in a tavern that players adapt and recreate,” he wrote.

In the meantime, CD Projekt RED is hard at work on a number of projects, including The Witcher 4 and a sequel to Cyberpunk 2077.

It started with the complete lack of documentation for The Witcher 1 and 2, and, surprise, “nothing from that period” exists.

“We were tasked to recreate the classic game for the mainstream audience, only to realize that we had little to no technical knowledge preserved from that time,” said Ruciński, referring to the upcoming remake from Fool’s Theory. With Cyberpunk 2077, the team opted for a “fresh start” and utilised Confluence, a “living documentation tool.”

Unfortunately, what started with the best intentions turned into over 8,000 pages of barely useful material (and maintaining it was, unsurprisingly, a “low priority”). Things became even worse when Phantom Liberty shifted to a “cloud instance of Confluence” for its documentation.

As Fulneczek notes, “It was chaos, right? Two spaces, two instances. It was very difficult to understand for us, for our outsource partners as well… If you can, don’t divide between platforms or different tools. You have to link very clearly between them.”

Thankfully, CD Projekt RED has overhauled its documentation process. Referring to The Witcher 4 and Cyberpunk 2, Fulneczek said, “The future looks really promising for us. We learned our lesson.”

“We’ve got some new requirements, especially a new definition of ‘done’. So as you know, any project, any game goes through development stages, and right now, every stage ends with a gate. Part of the requirements to pass that gate is the documentation, which wasn’t the case before.”

Ruciński added, “Unlike in the past, now, today our knowledge isn’t locked between specific teams’ permissions. It’s a shared asset. If a team working on, let’s say, The Witcher figures out a solution for a specific issue, the Cyberpunk team can see it, benefit from it, take it into their own code, modify it probably a little bit.” This means that “problems aren’t being solved multiple times by different teams, and also that if a breakthrough happens on one of the projects, the whole company benefits.”

While this is all well and good, the fact that CD Projekt RED shipped some of the biggest games out there despite this messy approach says something. It also makes one excited about what a properly organised development team can deliver in the future, that too without severely burning out its workers.

The Witcher 4 doesn’t have a release date, though it entered full production in late November 2024. As for Cyberpunk 2, it was last noted to be in the pre-production phase as of May 2025. Teams for both have been scaling up, however, so it wouldn’t be surprising if there were new announcements this year.

“It will be some time before I can talk about the project,” he said on LinkedIn, “but in the meantime, I’ve been immersing myself in the dark and eclectic universe of The Witcher. It’s humbling to get the opportunity to tell stories in this world and in the company of such talented developers.”

Perng’s hiring could indicate significant steps forward for the project, which has seemingly been in limbo since its announcement. Developed by The Molasses Flood, a reboot in 2023 led to lay-offs for 29 employees – nearly half of the total team.

At the time, CD Projekt RED said the team’s composition changed to match the project, though not so much on the former’s side. Perhaps this is a sign of the Boston studio taking a more active role (while The Molasses Flood is more tertiary). How this will affect other upcoming projects, including Project Orion, aka Cyberpunk 2, remains to be seen.

Either way, we’ve yet to see any gameplay or details on Project Sirius. It was announced as an “innovative take on The Witcher universe” with “unforgettable tale for existing Witcher fans and new audiences.” It will have spent nearly four years in development by November this year, but judging from Perng’s post, we may have to wait longer for a reveal. As always, stay tuned for updates as they arrive.

After having spent 8 years at Warhorse Studios working on both Kingdom Come: Deliverance and its sequel, Glatz has now taken on the role of senior open world designer at CD Projekt RED. During his tenure at Warhorse, he had worked as a senior game designer and writer, and a lead level designer.

Interestingly, Glatz’s new role is similar to one that was mentioned back in December 2025 among a list of roles that CD Projekt RED had been hiring for. Other roles included Game Capture Lead, Lead VFX Artist, and Senior VFX Artist, among many others.

Since then, the studio hasn’t slowed down its efforts to hire new developers. In February, former cinematic animator on Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Lucie Hennet, joined CD Projekt RED’s Warsaw-based studio, which is working on The Witcher 4.

“During my time at Sandfall Interactive, my main responsibilities included cleaning up and refining body and facial motion capture, as well as managing data from Xsense to UE5,” wrote Hennet about her qualifications. “I also provided support on the motion capture sessions and contributed to building the animation pipeline for the cinematics.”

December 2025 also saw Felix Pedulla jump over to CD Projekt RED from Larian after having worked at the Baldur’s Gate 3 developer as its senior cinematic designer. Pedulla is an industry veteran, and in the past has also worked at Crytek, having a hand in the creation of cinematics for titles that include Hunt: Showdown.

“After an incredible and frankly wild six-year ride with the amazing team at Larian Studios, a new chapter begins,” wrote Pedulla. “I’m so grateful for every chaotic, creative, and unforgettable moment we shared. We made some serious magic together, and I’ll forever cherish the lessons and memories. A huge thank you to all my incredible colleagues and friends I made.”

“As one adventure ends, another begins! I am absolutely thrilled to announce that I’m joining the legendary team at CD Projekt Red as a Senior Cinematic Designer! The opportunity to contribute to one of the most ambitious studios in the industry is a dream come true. Time to trade in my Baldur’s Gate dice for some Polish steel and get to work crafting some epic cutscenes.”

In the meantime, CD Projekt RED has continued to quietly work on its variety of projects. While it hasn’t yet confirmed a release date for The Witcher 4, co-CEO Michał Nowakowski has reaffirmed that there are plans to release the game, along with two sequels, within the span of six years.

“I do believe that further games should be delivered in a shorter period of time – as we had stated before, 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 The Witcher 4 and The Witcher 5, between The Witcher 5 and The Witcher 6 and so on,” he said on the subject of development times for CD Projekt’s games getting “shorter and more predictable” in their cadence.

And burn it did, thanks to a controversial launch by CD Projekt RED that also led to one of the most significant redemption stories in gaming. In September 2023, it felt like that story had come full circle. Update 2.0 fully revamped the game, allowing it to achieve its potential in every way, and Phantom Liberty delivered a stellar narrative with an unimaginable yet fitting narrative catharsis. CD Projekt RED got their win, finished their story, so on and so forth. Roll credits.

Except it didn’t stop. Granted, supporting a game for almost three years after launch was already notable, but it’s now April 2026, and Cyberpunk 2077 has finally received PS5 Pro support. You know, the same feature that the developer said there were no plans for back in 2024.

The best part about this update isn’t that it supports the regular PSSR for dynamic 4K. No, this is the Upgraded PSSR, which offers better image quality. It could have stopped there, but it went even further and implemented 8-way Bounding Volume Hierarchy to further improve the ray-traced lighting, reflections and shadows. That’s on top of Variable Rate Shading, and improved ray-tracing cache and object queries.

Which probably would have been enough on its own, but it also went a step further and added three different modes. You can opt for Performance Mode if a higher frame rate is most important, except now it can run at up to 90 frames per second on displays with Variable Refresh Rate support. Ray Tracing Mode delivers “only” 60 FPS but ensures ray tracing for all shadows. Ray-traced reflections are available with transparent objects and vehicle paint.

However, if you want the full Night City experience, then Ray Tracing Pro Mode is it. Alongside everything else, you get ray-traced ambient occlusion, emissive lighting and skylights at 40 frames per second on high refresh rate monitors. Even if you don’t have the latter, hitting 30 FPS with such fidelity and image quality is pretty impressive.

I know, I know – there’s no New Game Plus, no third-person perspective, and nothing for other platform holders to really latch on to. It’s a bummer, but the fact that CD Projekt RED is still supporting Cyberpunk 2077 to this extent is insane.

You could argue that it’s because this is their highest revenue earner, and you would absolutely be right, with over 35 million copies sold as of November 2025 (even reaching that milestone faster than The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt). However, it achieved those sales even without giving anyone any reason to believe that PS5 Pro support is on the way. Even if adding support did nothing to boost sales, it recognized that it’s a feature that a subset of players, however small, wanted for a long time, and set about delivering something it never promised.

Furthermore, despite the game still selling extremely well, it’s removing any barriers to entry. Last year, Cyberpunk 2077 was added to PlayStation Plus Extra/Premium’s Game Catalog. Last month, it debuted for Game Pass Ultimate and Premium, allowing even more players to carve out their legend in Night City.

Even when it released the Nintendo Switch 2 version last year, it didn’t simply port the Ultimate Edition over and call it a day. It delivered solid performance in both handheld and docked modes while adding motion controls, Joy-Con 2 mouse support, gyroscopic aiming, cross-saves, and even touchscreen support for the menus. If that wasn’t enough, the entire base game and Phantom Liberty shipped on a cartridge rather than a Game-Key Card. You bought it, you owned it. No additional shenanigans.

Then again, all of this – the PS5 Pro update, Game Pass and PS Plus releases, and Switch 2 Edition – is just born from a love for the game and the players who brought them to the dance. It’s one of the reasons why CD Projekt RED continued releasing new updates even after dropping the biggest yet.

Features like the Metro System, listening to radio stations on foot, replayable car races, gangs that actively pursue you in the open world if you annoy them enough, vehicle paint jobs, brand new vehicles, an overhauled Photo Mode, Auto Drive – things that you’d otherwise take for granted. Did it have to add all this and more in, even roping in Virtuos? No, but it went ahead anyway and made it all free.

Given everything that happened at launch – the lying, the deception, the disappointment (even when the game had several excellent qualities that held up over the years) – it’s understandable to be cynical about CD Projekt RED. There are still many people who won’t quote-unquote forgive the developer for what happened, and no amount of support will get them to change their minds.

But that doesn’t change the fact that the team put their hearts and souls into this game, and then a little extra on top for more than five years. There was no guarantee that all of this would recoup any goodwill, much less build excitement for the studio’s next projects – The Witcher 4 and Project Orion, aka Cyberpunk 2. Look at the sheer number of titles that are cancelled, month in and month out, despite pouring years and millions into the drain, never mind those that can’t even make it to market.

And yet, here we are, with currently an 88 percent “Very Positive” rating on Steam (94 percent if you consider the recent reviews), a presence that works hand in hand with transmedia like Edgerunners, and near-universal acclaim by those whose story in Night City changed them in ways they could never imagine.

It gives new meaning to the phrase “City of Legends.” Even if the megacorps run rampant, making people’s lives miserable, or crime is at an all-time high, or consumerism has led to all kinds of brand new societal nightmares. Even if it seems Johnny is right about dropping just one more nuke, it all comes together in a way where the player – and their encounters with everyone else – really mattered.

Of course, nothing says that CD Projekt RED has to stop here. With plans to scale its teams to over 450 developers by 2027 for Cyberpunk 2, there’s still plenty of room for additional updates and support. If The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt can supposedly receive that long-rumored free DLC, especially with The Witcher 4 next up on the developer’s release docket, then there’s nothing that says it can’t return to 2077. Maybe it’s a new tactic – using its existing games to hype up their sequels (and making some money in the process). Since the PS5 Pro update is finally here, perhaps that bit about no plans for additional DLCs or expansions won’t hold water for much longer.

We can’t really say for sure until it happens. Until then, we’re returning to Night City – slightly older, perhaps slightly wiser, with fond memories and a drive to make new ones. Because if The City of Dreams has proven anything for fans, it’s that some legends will never fade away.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

Utilizing the upgraded version of PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution, Cyberpunk 2077 on PS5 Pro offers an upscaled 4K resolution. Performance and fidelity ultimately depend on three modes, starting with Ray Tracing Pro. It offers ray-tracing for everything while also implementing ray-traced skylights and ambient occlusion, running at 40 FPS for those with VRR displays (30 FPS otherwise).

Ray Tracing Mode runs at 60 FPS, and while there are some compromises, it still supports ray-traced shadows and reflections (albeit on vehicle paint and transparent objects). Finally, there’s Performance Mode, which offers 60 FPS on normal displays and up to 90 FPS on those with high refresh rates. It’s the best ideal option for those who care about performance above all else.

Of course, there are several other improvements, including Variable Rate Shading, 8-way Bounding Volume Hierarchy (BVH8) for enhanced ray-tracing performance, and so on. Check out the full patch notes here for more details, or learn more from global art director and VP Kuba Knapik.

Unfortunately, this is likely it as far as new features for Cyberpunk 2077, which has sold over 35 million copies as of November 2025. There’s still Cyberpunk 2 to look forward to, but since it entered pre-production in May 2025, the wait will be long indeed. At least we know that it takes place in a new city, which creator Mike Pondsmith refers to as “Chicago gone wrong.”

Global art director and VP Kuba Knapik said on the PlayStation Blog that, “We wanted to make the most of the PS5 Pro’s cutting-edge technology by bringing 4K visuals, powered-up performance, advanced ray tracing, and more to the Cyberpunk 2077 experience. The goal was to bring the very best out of both the hardware and our game to make Night City shine as brightly as possible.”

Besides PSSR, which upscales the visuals to 4K resolution in stunning detail, the development team added 8-way Bounding Volume Hierarchy to its ray-tracing for the more complicated scenes, “bringing the lighting even closer to our artistic vision for this world.”

“Imagine the sunlight catching off the front fairing of your Yaiba Kusanagi CT-3X as you park up, depart down a mysterious dark alley, and uncover secrets glowing under neon light. Players’ overall immersion in the world of Cyberpunk 2077 gets a serious boost from PS5 Pro,” says Knapik.

Speaking of ray tracing, you get not one, not two, but three different modes to choose from. Ray Tracing Pro Mode enables everything, from ray traced reflections and emissive lighting to ambient occlusion, shadows, and skylight. Those with variable refresh rate monitors can play at 40 FPS, while everyone else can experience it at 30 FPS.

Performance Mode delivers up to 90 FPS on VRR displays, while Ray Tracing Mode is a balance between the two, delivering ray tracing and 60 FPS.

Of course, we’ll need to go hands-on with the update to properly detail all the improvements (and anything else that CD Projekt RED may have snuck in), so stay tuned. Cyberpunk 2077 is available for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, PC, and Nintendo Switch 2 – check out our review here. A sequel, Project Orion (unofficially called Cyberpunk 2), is also in the works.

In its full GDC 2026 session outlining the future of Path Tracing, Nvidia’s Martin Stich talked about how one non-gameplay scene (based on assets provided by CD Projekt RED) featured 60 million plants and one million trees across a 5×5 km terrain. Despite featuring 200 different plant species and some trees having more than 10 million polygons, it loads without any streaming.

All of this is complete with fully path-tracing lighting. Perhaps the most impressive part of all this is that it runs at 4K/80 FPS, but there are some caveats. It’s running on an RTX 5090, and the 4K resolution is upscaled from 1440p with DLSS Quality mode. Comparatively, an RTX 4070 would eke out 58 frames at 1440p (upscaled from 960p).

As noted previously, none of this represents the actual gameplay or the hardware you’ll need to run The Witcher 4 on PC. At this point, it’s a cool tech demo of what RTX Mega Geometry is capable of using the game’s assets. Whether it reaches this level of fidelity and complexity remains to be seen, so stay tuned.

The Witcher 4 doesn’t currently have a launch date, though there are claims of a late 2027 launch. Officially, it’s still in full production with CD Projekt RED recently scaling up its team (among others) for the same.

During an earnings call, one investor actually asked when the company would start marketing, and whether it would be a “longer” campaign or a possible shadow drop. Co-CEO Michał Nowakowski responded, “I’d like to say everything is a possibility. But having said that, our experience and our preference, given the types of games we make, is for longer-term marketing campaigns; we think they tend to work a little bit better than, say, a live drop at some conference or event. So I’d point in that direction.”

Long story short, if The Witcher 3’s new DLC ends up real, don’t expect it to drop out of nowhere suddenly. Then again, whether it will be announced several weeks or months out from launch remains unknown.

Either way, Chief Financial Officer Piotr Nielubowicz reiterated that the company needs to earn 527 million zloty or roughly $143 million to meet its net profit goal. “As always, I’d like to emphasize we still see it as a very ambitious goal. We continue to believe that with strong back catalogue sales performance this year and the new content we’re planning to release, we have a fair chance of reaching it.”

With Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt still racking in the sales (to say nothing of Phantom Liberty, which crossed 10 million sales in May 2025), this new project would certainly put the developer over the top. The question is: When can we expect an announcement?

An analyst told Strefa Inwestorów that they expect it to launch in Q3 2026, taking into account that Grand Theft Auto 6 is expected in November. They felt that September was the “best window,” especially since it would be a nice “back to school” period. Noble Securities analyst Mateusz Chrzanowski believed it could launch in May, retailing for $30, but if an announcement were to happen, it must be in April.

Of course, as we continue to debate when it could launch, CD Projekt RED is hard at work on The Witcher 4 and Cyberpunk 2, for which it’s scaled up both teams. Project Hadar, a brand new IP, is also making progress with the developer prototyping “specific elements.”

“In the coming quarters, the Studio will focus primarily on further development work on ongoing projects; we also plan to publish one of the heretofore unannounced gaming projects,” wrote the company in its earnings report. “In parallel, the studio will continue scaling its dev teams, adapting their respective structures and headcount to the growing needs associated with our multi-project strategy.”

While CD Projekt RED didn’t really reveal any more details about what this unannounced gaming project might be, rumors have been indicated that there are plans for a new DLC for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. This DLC is noted as being a transition point in the story, and reports have indicated that it will primarily focus on protagonist Geralt.

Earlier this week, one analyst expressed the belief that CD Projekt RED is aiming for a September launch for this DLC, since it allows the company to avoid the release of Grand Theft Auto 6, which is coming out on November 19th.

“I didn’t include DLC for The Witcher 3 in the model, but like everyone else, I assume that CD Projekt will try to release the DLC before the new GTA release date to avoid this difficult period for other titles,” said the analyst (via machine translation). “So definitely before November, probably around Q3. I think September is the best window. In the summer, gamers are on vacation, and September seems like a nice ‘back to school’ period. However, things could change. They might come up with the idea to release it in two or three months.”

The company has also revealed its other plans for the future during the earnings report. Co-CEO Michał Nowakowski revealed that one of the projects under development at the studio – Project Hadar – had been moving along, to the extent where developers were working on “multiple prototypes” for its gameplay systems.

“We have an important development update regarding our third franchise, Hadar,” he said during the earnings call. “Work on the project is progressing dynamically, and the team has established the foundations of this entirely new IP. Now, we have clearly defined distinguishing features of this world, and established key pillars that will not only provide the foundation for the game itself, but also, potentially, for other future products.”

“The team is now actively designing specific elements that might be included in the game,” he continued. “We are creating multiple prototypes and implementing them directly in Unreal Engine. This allows us to live-test and verify how selected mechanics and gameplay elements can perform.”

Project Hadar had been revealed back in 2022, with the company noting that it was being developed “100% internally”. What sets it apart from Cyberpunk and The Witcher is the fact that it will not be an adaptation of an already-existing work.