If your experience with role-playing games begins and ends with those created by Japanese developers and BioWare, you’re doing yourself a great disservice. One of the best roleplaying series of recent years was actually created in Poland by developer CD Projekt RED. The Witcher, and its sequel, The Witcher 2, are based on a series of stories written by Polish fantasy author Andrzej Sapkowski. Unlike American-made games or those created by the Japanese, The Witcher series prides itself on presenting a gritty, dark, mature version of traditional medieval fantasy that features bloody combat, copious nudity and a storyline that is equal parts political intrigue and hunting for biologically improbable monsters. As a result, we’ve been anxious to see a third Witcher title ever since the debut of The Witcher 2.
Luckily for us, CD Projekt RED doesn’t put much stock in silence and has instead opted to coyly tease fans with what appear to be screenshots taken from the development of The Witcher 3. The first appeared as part of a hidden message found in a promotional teaser clip for Cyberpunk 2077, the other big game that CD Projekt RED is currently working on. The second cropped us this morning as part of an update on the current status of a piece of software known as REDkit. REDkit is currently being beta tested and CD Projekt RED’s update seems designed purely to point this out, at least until you notice the image directly above it and the sly, winking description offered by the developer.
That image, which you can find above, is unmistakably of Geralt of Rivia’s iconic sword. Geralt is the titular “witcher” of CD Projekt RED’s series, and thus the simplest explanation for this picture is that it’s a not-so-subtle hint that the firm wants to reveal The Witcher 3. This is seemingly corroborated by the image found in the Cyberpunk 2077 teaser which suggests that CD Projekt RED will be making a big announcement on February 5.
Most damning of all though, is the company’s seemingly flippant attitude toward the importance of these images. Instead of outright stating what they are or what they might mean, CD Projekt RED contents itself by saying things like “… if you are wondering what’s that in that picture above — well, we’ll leave it for your imagination to answer.” If that doesn’t sound like the words of a developer giddy with anticipation for the imminent chance to reveal its next big project, then we don’t what does.
As we’re obviously excited by the potential these images represent, we’ll be sure to bring you word on what CD Projekt RED does end up revealing on February 5. If it’s nothing crucial you can all feel free to ignore everything we’ve just mentioned, but it seems very likely that something big will emerge on that date. More as it appears.
