CD Projekt Red Develops The Witcher 4 With Console-First Approach

The console-first development approach for The Witcher 4 was explained by Charles Tremblay, CD Projekt Red’s VP of technology, in talks with Digital Foundry following a Witcher 4 tech demo showcased in a trailer as part of State of Unreal 2025.

“When we started the collaboration, we had super high ambition for this project. We always do PC first and push, then try to scale down, but we had so many problems in the past that this time around, we really want to focus more on console-first development,” said Tremblay, answering the question of why they decided to showcase the game on PS5 first, targeting 60fps.

“The company (CDPR) started as a PC company, and we’ll definitely want to have the best experience for the PC gamer for sure. But it’s too early to say what this will mean for The Witcher 4,” said Tremblay.

The Witcher 4, developed and published by CD Projekt Red, is planned for release on PlayStation 5, Windows PC and Xbox Series X|S.

The game is planned to become the first installment of a new trilogy in The Witcher universe, based on the book series of the same name by Andrzej Sapkowski. The upcoming title will feature Ciri, the adoptive daughter of Geralt of Rivia, as the main protagonist.

As of March 2023, the previous installment in the series, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, has sold over 50 million units. As of the time of writing, the game has an “Overwhelmingly Positive” rating on Steam with 764,221 reviews and an all-time peak of 103,329 players, according to SteamDB.