The Witcher 4 director Sebastien Kalemba has sought to set expectations for fans on what CD Projekt RED is trying to do with the title.
As reported by PSU, this is what Kalemba said in a new interview:
“We must follow a very specific path and innovate on that. At the same time, it’s clear that we have to try to appease a new public.
The Witcher 4 won’t be out for some years, and it’ll be a long time since the previous one, so we cannot just target the audience already fond of the saga. We must also build a new community.
Our priority is always trying to break boundaries. We want to go beyond them. We want to try and do something new compared to what’s currently in roleplaying games, especially since we work within that genre and target RPG fans.
I can’t say too much, as you can guess, but the idea is to build something that surpasses The Witcher 3, telling a more intense story and crafting a more intense gameplay as well.”
Kalemba makes this statements in light of CD Projekt RED finally managing to turn the narrative around on Cyberpunk 2077. Obviously CD Projekt RED doesn’t want to have a repeat of this massive launch failure, that ruined the company’s reputation completely.
It certainly seems far away now, but sentiment around CD Projekt RED had turned around so completely that it did not seem like they would ever get back in gamer’s good graces.
Obviously, even with the turnaround that Cyberpunk 2077 pulled off, it cost CD Projekt RED a lot of years’ extra work and money to pull it off. Even with the recent release of Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, CD Projekt RED clearly gave up on a lot of money that they could have made if they got it right the first time.
CD Projekt RED made similarly difficult decisions earlier this year, when they were forced to fire some staff in the studio The Molasses Flood. They had just acquired The Molasses Flood, and set them to work on a The Witcher spinoff, Project Sirius. The company now has to commit to making The Witcher 4 in this difficult environment for making games, and to take their time with the project to ensure that it will really be ready for release.
But we also presume that CD Projekt RED is now going to be more reasonable, about moving deadlines instead of trying to placate investors looking for quicker development timetables. Doing the things gamers want isn’t just to placate gamers; it’s what’s best for the studio and their individual employees as well.
At least, CD Projekt RED can rest assure that they still have fans willing to wait it out until they really get The Witcher 4 ready.
