It's easy to forget, but it's now been four years since The Witcher 4 was officially announced by CD Projekt RED in a statement that immediately made one thing clear: no, the game would not be running on REDengine, but on Epic Games' Unreal Engine 5. The news surprised more than a few people, given that the Polish studio's in-house engine has powered Geralt of Rivia's adventures ever since The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (2011).
Its most recent iteration (REDengine 4) was used to build Cyberpunk 2077 which, as you'll no doubt recall, went through hell at launch thanks (among other things) to a truly uncountable number of graphical bugs.
Speaking on the Deconstructor of Fun podcast, Michał Nowakowski was keen to point out that the bad press surrounding Cyberpunk 2077's release was not a deciding factor in choosing Unreal Engine 5 for The Witcher 4. "A lot of people think that, but the theory is wrong, because in Cyberpunk 2077's case the problem wasn't REDengine," he explains.
In fact, it was the Matrix Awakens demo that convinced CD Projekt RED to turn to Epic Games. "We asked ourselves: "Is Unreal Engine 5 suitable for games like ours?", explains Michał Nowakowski. At first, we thought it wasn't – at least not as it stood. But then we reckoned that if we worked closely with Epic Games, if we worked on a number of specific things we need for games of this scale (particularly on the technical side), it could work. That's how we ended up sitting down at the table with Epic Games' representatives."
The blue pill or the red pill?
Should we be worried about The Witcher 4's visual identity? According to Michał Nowakowski, no. "I believe that, outside of Epic Games, we're the only studio in the world with access to Unreal Engine 5's "black box", he says. It's a genuine partnership." In other words, The Witcher 4 will look faithful to the series and will stand apart from other titles running on Epic Games' engine.
In the same interview, Michał Nowakowski stressed that CD Projekt RED's ambition was never to create new technology, but to make games. "Of course we wanted to deliver games at the cutting edge visually and technically, but our priority has always been to tell stories in the most compelling and immersive way possible," he insists.
The Witcher 4 won't be the only CD Projekt RED game to benefit from Unreal Engine 5. The remake of The Witcher (announced back in 2022) will run on it too. As for REDengine, it isn't bowing out just yet, since it's handling the remastered version of The Witcher 3 (due on 29 September on Xbox Series, PS5, Nintendo Switch 2 and PC) and the Songs of the Past expansion (which won't arrive before 2027).
Finally, it's worth remembering that The Witcher 4 is scheduled for release in 2028 on Xbox Series, PS5 and PC.
