CD Projekt's upcoming RPG Cyberpunk 2077 is more ambitious than Witcher 'on every single front'

The Polish videogame developer CD Projekt Red, best known for their critically-acclaimed Witcher series, has spoken about the "ambitious" nature of its upcoming role-playing game Cybepunk 2077. Although it's still on its early stages of development, it's already aiming to be much larger than Witcher. In an interview with GI.biz, CEO Marcin Iwinski says that the great success of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (it sold 10 million copies) gave the developer more resources and opportunity to go bigger with Cyberpunk 2077.

Iwinski knew that the scale of Cyberpunk 2077 is going to be greater and "more ambitious on every single front, in the development and on the marketing side," Iwinski said.In March, CD Projekt Red's Adam Badowski described Cyberpunk 2077 as a game that's "even better, even bigger, even more revolutionary" than The Witcher series.

CD Projekt Red

CD Projekt is aiming to make Cyberpunk 2077 mature and ambituous, and to support its grand vision for the game, CD Projekt Adam Kicinski said during an earnings presentation last month that the studio has plans to at least double its headcount, which currently stands at about 400 people, but not everyone will work on Cyberpunk 2077, however, as he said that the team members will be split into distinct groups, some of which will "penetrate segments".

Cyberpunk 2077 puts players into a "dark future" in 2077 where advanced technologies have become "both the salvation and the curse of humanity." The action RPG promises a nonlinear story designed for "mature" players and is set in the metropolis of Night City. CD Projekt already reveale that Cyberpunk 2077 will feature sandbox elements, though this has not been specified. In the Gl.biz interview, Iwinski discussed CD Projekt's modeling itself after Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption developer Rockstar Games

"For us, it's never about money," Iwinski said. "Yes, we deliver results, but we always explain to our investors that we have a long-term perspective. They shouldn't expect us to annualise, or suddenly start releasing games just because there's a business opportunity. Fundamentally, The Witcher 3 has proven that...and right now, we have a lot of credit, so we should use that and take the time to make Cyberpunk something really meaningful for the whole industry. It has to reach the next quality bar, and I'm not talking just for us, but for the market," he added "If we look at our role models, what Rockstar is doing is amazing. It's not like, 'We have to ship a game or we may not hit our financial goals.' It's, 'Here's GTA V, and by the way it's the best game ever made.' We're all looking forward to Red Dead Redemption 2, because you know they'll show something and you'll be like, 'Oh my god.'"

Cyberpunk 2077 is expected to be released sometime in the 2017-2021 window. CD Projekt hasn't announced which platforms it will be released on, but it will most likely be released on Playstation 4, Xbox One, and PC.

You can read Gl.biz's full interview here