The Witcher tabletop RPG has been placed on a “disappointing” hiatus while CD Projekt Red works on The Witcher 4, codenamed Polaris.
Tabletop developer R. Talsorian Games announced the hiatus in August but has now told IGN it doesn’t know when it can continue work on the game.
“We’re doing alright over here at Talsorian though the news is disappointing to say the least,” line manager and lead developer Cody Pondsmith told IGN. “We don’t have a time frame yet as many things are still up in the air with [CD Projekt Red].”
We’re doing alright over here at Talsorian though the news is disappointing to say the least.
Polaris isn’t launching until 2025 at the earliest so the hiatus could be lengthy. Though grander story details are likely to be locked in earlier on in development, content could be cut for several reasons later on, leaving it unclear what stories actually make it into the main game.
Pondsmith said its story — which takes place between The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt — isn’t directly related to Polaris, but Talsorian and CD Projekt Red work closely together to ensure its Witcher canon remains consistent.
“The new content we have planned isn’t directly related to The Witcher 4 but it touches on a lot of parts of the lore of The Witcher that are integral to the entire canon,” he said.
Pondsmith delved into this further in the initial announcement: “As CD Projekt Red begins work on the fourth Witcher video game we’ve been collaborating to make sure that the information between our two products stays as connected as possible.
“We’ve had countless meetings covering days’ worth of time discussing the lore of The Continent and the direction of the Witcher franchise. What we’ve come to realize is that it would be extremely difficult or perhaps impossible to continue work on The Witcher TTRPG line at the moment and still maintain the connection with CD Projekt Red’s upcoming plans.”
Fans of The Witcher TTRPG might have some new content to look forward to though, as Pondsmith made clear in the post that the game “is not dead”.
He also told IGN that some smaller content drops are a possibility: “Currently, we don’t have any plans to release substantial new content during this hiatus but we are hoping to be able to release free downloadable content on our website focusing on well established concepts in the Witcher canon that won’t be touched by The Witcher 4.”
Polaris was revealed in March 2022 with a single teaser image and, though the game is due to get a big development boost soon, CD Projekt Red has said very little else about the long-awaited sequel.
The teaser still spawned myriad fan theories centred around a new medallion, which led some to believe The Witcher 3’s Ciri would be the protagonist of the new game. CD Projekt later confirmed the image to be that of a Lynx, but whether it’s a new witcher school or not is still up for debate.
We don’t know too much else about the game, other than that CD Projekt Red has partnered with Epic Games to build it in Unreal Engine 5 and that its director has promised no crunch on his watch.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.
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