In March 2022, CD Projekt announced that a new Witcher game (opens in new tab) was in development. We immediately called it "The Witcher 4" (opens in new tab) - which makes sense, since it is the next game after "The Witcher 3," but CD Projekt assured us that they had not announced a game called The Witcher 4.

"This was the first confirmation regarding a new saga in the Witcher franchise," Global PR Director Radek Grabowski tweeted at the time.

"Right now, we are not discussing specifics on story, characters, mechanics, or plot details.

But that was then and this is now. And now, for the first time to my knowledge, CD Projekt is calling Polaris "The Witcher 4". The statement was made in response to a question about CD Projekt's transition to Unreal Engine 5, during the company's year-end financial report. [CD Projekt CEO Adam Kiciński said, "We are preparing on the pipeline side and on the toolset side. At the same time, we have a team working with Epic on all the aspects required for an open-world, story-driven RPG," said Adam Kiciński, CEO of CD Projekt. And make no mistake, we will not slow down, but we will not accelerate, on our first project, 'Polaris'.

"But for the next project, however, we envision smoothing out the production. That's one of the reasons behind our strategy: we want to release three big 'Witcher' games (open in new tab) within six years, starting with the release of 'Polaris,' which is 'The Witcher 4.'"

This prompted my colleagues at GamesRadar (opens in new tab) to reassure me that Kisinski did not say "The Witcher 4" in a Polish accent, but "The Witcher, but more." There was no question in our ears: he said "The Witcher 4."

You can hear for yourself at this time-stamped YouTube link (opens in new tab).

To be clear, this is not big news about the fourth Witcher game: we've been calling it "Witcher 4" all along, despite CD Projekt's protests. Still, we feel this is a notable moment: the head of CD Projekt himself has finally thrown in the towel and called it "The Witcher 4" just like everyone else.

The new game may not be "The Witcher 4" when it is finally released. It is still in the early stages of development, and no official title has been officially announced: it could be The Witcher: Infinite, The Witchers, Witcher: Novigrad City, or something equally fanciful and unlikely. Or maybe even something equally fanciful and unlikely. Indeed, in an e-mail sent to PC Gamer, CD Projekt described Kiciński's statement as a "slip of the tongue."

"Polaris will be the first game in the new Witcher saga," a CD Projekt representative said. The saga will consist of three games." The project's official name is Polaris."

From an in-house development standpoint, that is fair enough. Nothing has changed, at least on paper, and for now it remains "Polaris". But we all heard it, and frankly, we were glad that someone at CD Projekt finally said it out loud: The Witcher 4 will be released.