The Witcher 4 is one of the most highly anticipated games in recent memory, and fans are already buzzing with excitement after the jaw-dropping teaser at The Game Awards 2024. With Ciri stepping into the spotlight as the protagonist for this new chapter, players are eager to dive into her solo adventure. But what’s even more fascinating is how the Witcher 4 team prepared for this massive leap—by revisiting The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and using a special sidequest to reawaken the magic.
Released back in May 2015, The Witcher 3 had players following Geralt’s epic quest to protect his adopted daughter, Ciri, from the terrifying forces of the Wild Hunt. Though Ciri was only playable in select sections, the new Witcher 4 trailer hints that she’s about to take center stage in the upcoming game. But here’s the twist: the journey to bring her story to life started not in 2022, but two years earlier, in late 2022, when a surprising addition came to The Witcher 3—the sidequest “In the Eternal Fire’s Shadow.”
This quest wasn’t just a way to promote the next-gen update for The Witcher 3; it also had an unexpected purpose: it gave players a canon reason for acquiring the armor worn by Geralt (played by Henry Cavill) in Netflix’s hit series. But more importantly, it served as a starting point for new developers joining the team, helping them get into the groove for what would become The Witcher 4.
In a recent social media post, Philipp Webber, who previously served as a quest designer for The Witcher 3 and is now the narrative director for The Witcher 4, revealed that this quest was a “perfect start” for newcomers to get a feel for the world of The Witcher. It was, as he put it, the ideal initiation for fresh talent before they jumped into the development cycle of The Witcher 4.
This revelation sheds light on the timeline behind the development process of The Witcher 4. Announced in March 2022, about nine months before the sidequest’s release, it shows that the seeds for The Witcher 4 were already being sown during the next-gen update phase of The Witcher 3. It also suggests that the game’s narrative journey has been carefully planned for some time, even before the official reveal.
Although Webber didn’t name the specific team members who worked on the sidequest, it’s widely speculated that some of the developers might have come from the Cyberpunk 2077 team, especially considering CD Projekt Red’s big hit was released in 2020. There’s even growing buzz around the idea that The Witcher 4 might feature a Phantom Liberty-like skill tree,
a theory that could be tied to this very timeline of new team members joining the fold.
In the end, it’s clear that The Witcher 4 has been in the works for a while, with a combination of returning faces and fresh talent all contributing to the creation of a game that promises to be every bit as legendary as its predecessors. As the Witcher franchise evolves and Ciri steps into her new role, the excitement is building—and the team is more than ready to bring her epic journey to life. The road to The Witcher 4 has been long, but with every step, the adventure is shaping up to be something truly magical.
