Developer CD Projekt Red recently confirmed that Epic Games is directly assisting them in making the transition from the current REDengine to Unreal Engine 5. During a recent interview, the quest director at CD Projekt Red confirmed the news.
During an interview with the YouTube channel TheNeonArcade, Pawel Sasko, the Quest Director at CD Projekt Red, revealed the studious is transitioning to Unreal Engine 5 and that Epic Games is assisting it in the same.
CD Projekt Red confirms Epic Games is directly assisting them make the transition to Unreal Engine 5.
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Currently, CD Projekt Red uses its propriety REDengine, which is exclusively created for its nonlinear role-playing video games. CD Projekt has been using the REDengine ever since the launched The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings in 2011. The engine has developed some of the studio’s major projects, including Cyberpunk: 2077 and The Witcher 3.
However, back in 2022, Epic Games and CD Project Red entered into a multi-year strategic partnership. The partnership will enable CD Projekt Red to move to Unreal Engine 5 with the help of Epic Games.
Witcher 4 to be made on Unreal Engine 5?
During the interview, Pawel stated that there is a lot to be done with Unreal Engine 5, specifically in terms of the toolset. He further mentioned that the advantages of working on Unreal Engine 5 are quite apparent. The quest director said that working alongside Epic Games with a new challenge lying ahead of them is an honor for CD Projekt Red.
Pawel expressed that Epic Games has an amazing talent of seasoned engineers, which is proving to be a learning experience for CD Projekt Red. He said that is challenging, but it is also a great opportunity since there is so much room to do something “awesome”.
Further, he spoke about the next game in the Cyberpunk 2077 universe, codenamed Orion. He said that Sasko couldn’t reveal much about the project since there will be a time and place when the studio will officially discuss it in more detail.
Now that the deal with Epic Games is official, and the developer has confirmed that Epic Games is assisting in the transition to Unreal Engine 5, the immediate question falls on CDProjekt Red’s upcoming project, The Wither 4. In October this year developer officially announced that it is working on a new saga named The Witcher 4 Polaris.
Earlier reports suggest that during an earnings call with the investors, CDPR CEO Adam Kiciński had spoken about The Witcher 4 Polaris. He stated, “This is the first project to be released on the new engine, Unreal 5. There is a need for some extra work making this technology viable for huge, open-world, story-driven games” He also added that for the upcoming project, they will need to put in some extra effort to deliver.