With Cyberpunk 2077's only expansion, Phantom Liberty, now firmly in the rearview, CD Projekt RED is free to look to the future. There's the new The Witcher trilogy, of course, but also the Cyberpunk 2077 sequel codenamed Project Orion.
Announced about a year ago, Project Orion will be developed by the core team behind Cyberpunk 2077, although they will move to Boston to establish a US branch of CDPR, with help from the studio's Vancouver and Warsaw offices. The game is currently in concept phase, with proper development slated to begin in late 2024. It will be directed by Gabe Amatangelo (who also directed Phantom Liberty).
Speaking to PC Gamer, CDPR narrative director Igor Sarzyński has now explained that the developers are looking to evolve Cyberpunk 2077 in a similar way to The Witcher.
Consider The Witcher games and how much they changed with each installment. We want a similar evolution here. Cyberpunk 2077 was our first venture into a futuristic sci-fi world with a ton of new gameplay mechanics, narrative tone, themes, and art direction. Some of the stuff worked almost right out of the box, such as the art, city design, music, interactive scene system, and playstyles. Other aspects took more time to get right, like character progression, NPC interactivity, and optimization. That’s natural; it’s impossible to nail everything on your first try. Now, with all the game elements iterated and working well, we’ll focus on connecting them even tighter and creating a coherent, total immersion experience.
While it is true that a sequel is expected to improve upon the first iteration, The Witcher is known as a trilogy where each game vastly surpassed its predecessor. That's mostly because CD Projekt RED experienced massive growth from an indie team all the way to triple-A (The Witcher III: Wild Hunt had a budget of $81 million). The same kind of leap cannot realistically happen for Project Orion since the Polish studio is already massive (it employs around 1,200 employees).
Still, Cyberpunk 2077 was indeed different from The Witcher in many ways, requiring an adjustment from the studio even if just to accommodate for the different setting and playstyle. While a great game in its own right, it can undoubtedly be improved upon.
Fans may have to wait a long time, though. CD Projekt RED's priority is currently The Witcher 4, also known as Project Polaris. This team already had over 250 developers in August, and some who worked on Phantom Liberty have now been added to it.
While the Cyberpunk 2077 sequel will take several years to materialize, at least there's a live action project in development in partnership with Anonymous Content.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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