CD Projekt Red unveils early look at The Witcher 4 powered by Unreal Engine 5

CD Projekt Red has partnered with Epic Games to present a first public demonstration of The Witcher 4 running on Unreal Engine 5, offering a glimpse of the next instalment in the acclaimed fantasy RPG franchise. The showcase opened this year's State of Unreal keynote at Unreal Fest in Orlando, marking a key milestone in the ongoing collaboration between the two developers.

The live demonstration, set in the mountainous region of Kovir—a previously unexplored location in the game series—featured the series' protagonist Ciri, navigating terrain on horseback and engaging in a monster contract mission. According to the presentation, the demo ran in real-time at 60 frames per second on a PlayStation 5 console and highlighted several core technologies in UE5 designed to support large-scale open-world games.

Among the technical innovations on display were the Unreal Animation Framework, Nanite Foliage rendering, Mass AI for dynamic crowds, and the FastGeo Streaming system, co-developed by CDPR and Epic, which allows for efficient real-time loading of expansive environments. Also showcased was MetaHuman character modelling with ML Deformer, used to deliver detailed muscle movement and facial expressions.

While the demonstration was conducted on a PlayStation platform, CD Projekt Red confirmed that The Witcher 4 will launch across PC, PlayStation, and Xbox systems, with cross-platform support for all key UE5 features.

CD Projekt Red joint-CEO Michał Nowakowski said the demo was the result of three years of collaboration with Epic Games, aimed at pushing the boundaries of open-world game development. "To show this early look at the work we've been doing using Unreal Engine running at 60 FPS on PlayStation 5 is a significant milestone — and a testament of the great cooperation between our teams," he said.

Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney also emphasised the significance of the partnership: "CD Projekt Red is one of the industry's best open-world game studios, and we're grateful that they're working with us to push Unreal Engine forward with The Witcher 4. They are the perfect partner to help us develop new world-building features that we can share with all Unreal Engine developers."

All tools and features demonstrated are expected to become available to other developers through Unreal Engine 5.6, which launched today.