The Witcher 3 Confirmed

The Witcher 3 has been confirmed, much to nobody’s surprise after the hidden message found in last months’ Cyberpunk 2077 trailer. Revealed in next month’s issue of Game Informer (damn you, American media!), it will be called The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and, according to the unnamed spokesperson in the video below, it will be the conclusion of the trilogy.

The game will be open-world and retain the strong focus on story that people love about the Witcher games. In contrast to The Witcher 2, this entry in the trilogy will have a much more personal tone, dealing with Geralt’s personal life and a threat to his loved ones.

Using CD Projekt RED’s new REDengine 3, we can expect to see even more improvements to animation for the characters in the game, ramping up the emotional scenes and “bringing us closer to the most life-like world ever created in video games,” as described in a recent press release. Let’s hope they improve the writing to match. While I do love the previous games, some of their seduction scenes were memorable, for all the wrong reasons.

“If we look at RPGs nowadays we find two approaches, one which emphasizes the story but limits the game world and one that builds a vast open-world but hampers and simplifies the story,” said Adam Badowski, head of CD Projekt RED studio.

“With the REDengine 3 we combine the positive aspects of both approaches for the first time, creating an open environment with a complex, multi-thread story. Together with believable characters, a captivating tale and a world where players can roam freely without loading times, we will be able to move gaming to a new level with a realistic feel and full player immersion.”

An open world without loading times? It’s an ambitious goal and I can only hope my meagre PC will be capable of running such a beast. The new engine has been described as a “next-gen ready solution” while Game Informer says that The Witcher 3 is “coming in 2014 on PC and ‘all high-end platforms available'”. I think it’s safe to assume that it’s planned for the next Xbox and PlayStation 4.

Here’s a crop of the full Game Informer March cover, the only image we have so far.

CD Projekt RED are revealing nothing about the person on the right but based on the fact that there’s no cleavage on display, we can assume that they’re probably male. The prominent sword may well indicate another Witcher. Got any other suggestions?

Edit: They’ve released a title reveal trailer. I guess everything is more dramatic when you do it slowly, right.

And more info from Badowski.

“The captivating and nonlinear story of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt takes place in a rich, truly open world environment. A world which is thrilling to explore, full of daring adventures, momentous quests, memorable characters, and unique monsters. Players will freely travel through woods, lakes, mountains, cities, and villages. Each region is inhabited by distinct populations with their own customs, legends and problems. The world of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is 30 times bigger than The Witcher 2,” said Adam Badowski, head of the studio.

“Imagine playing a dark fantasy game with the same great nonlinear story as in the previous Witcher titles, but now told in a world you can explore freely with no artificial boundaries. The war-ravaged world is so huge that to reach further places you will need to ride a horse or sail a boat to get there. A world where your choices have truly epic consequences. From the development side, this goal is extremely demanding. Our team had to make significant design changes and our tech had to be rebuilt. But we believe that this will lead to a completely new level of nonlinearity and a whole new, richer gaming experience. As a gamer, I would love to play this kind of RPG and I think this is what many players are waiting for. This is our dream come true at CD Projekt RED, and we hope it will be the same for you!”