CD Projekt Red creating Unreal Engine Witcher remake

The developer of the Witcher series and Cyberpunk 2077, CD Projekt Red, has announced that it will be releasing an Unreal Engine Witcher remake.

The wildly popular Witcher series was CD Projekt Red’s major success that propelled the developer to AAA status, and now it’s going back to design the first game from the ground up with help from Fools Theory. The remake of the original Witcher game will be completely remade in Unreal Engine 5, according to CD Projeckt’s official report.

Unreal Engine 5 Witcher remake announced

While CD Projekt Red has already announced the development of a new Witcher game, but that doesn’t seem to be stopping them from going back to rebuild an old one too. On October 26, 2022, CD Projekt Red publicly announced that it was working with developer Fools Theory to build a new version of the original Witcher game, constructed from scratch using Unreal Engine 5.

We're thrilled to reveal that, together with @Fools_Theory, we're working on remaking The Witcher using Unreal Engine 5 (codename: Canis Majoris)!

We want to do this right, so please be patient — it's gonna be a while until we can share more details.
⚔️ https://t.co/6VCAokPgXs pic.twitter.com/ERFOXQrUEP

— The Witcher (@witchergame) October 26, 2022

The Witcher 1 was released in 2007 by CD Projekt and published by Atari for retail. The game would become a cult hit, granting CD Projekt the opportunity to create The Witcher 2. That game is what would propel the property into the public eye for many international markets. The Polish developer has clearly decided that you can’t beat a classic, and is teaming up to bring The Witcher a serious facelift by using Unreal Engine 5.

The developer says it will be quite a while before more details are available, but this now makes two Witcher titles currently in development in association with CD Projekt Red. Fans won’t be getting to see any footage for what will assumedly be years, but the community sentiment seems to be quite positive. The Unreal Engine has vastly more capabilities than developers had in 2007 when it was first released, so this is an opportunity for the Polish studio to reinvent the game that launched its journey.