The Witcher IV Gets Cinematic Trailer and Gameplay Tech Demo - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 03 June 2025 / 7,198 Views
CD Projekt RED during the State of Unreal 2025 showcase revealed a new cinematic trailer and the first gameplay footage for The Witcher IV.
"We started our partnership with Epic Games to push open-world game technology forward," said CD Projekt RED joint CEO Michal Nowakowski. "To show this early look at the work we’ve been doing using Unreal Engine running at 60 FPS on PlayStation 5, is a significant milestone — and a testament of the great cooperation between our teams. But we're far from finished. I look forward to seeing more advancements and inspiring technology from this partnership as development of The Witcher 4 on Unreal Engine 5 continues."
Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney added, "CD PROJEKT RED is one of the industry’s best open-world game studios, and we’re grateful that they’re working with us to push Unreal Engine forward with The Witcher 4. They are the perfect partner to help us develop new world-building features that we can share with all Unreal Engine developers."
View the Unreal Engine 5 gameplay tech demo for The Witcher IV below:
Read new details on the game below:
As Unreal Fest 2025 kicked off, CD PROJEKT RED joined Epic Games on stage to present a tech demo of The Witcher 4 in Unreal Engine 5 (UE5). Presented in typical CDPR style, the tech demo follows the main protagonist Ciri in the midst of a monster contract and shows off some of the innovative UE5 technology and features that will power the game’s open world.
The tech demo takes place in the region of Kovir — which will make its very first appearance in the video game series in The Witcher 4. The presentation followed main protagonist Ciri — along with her horse Kelpie — as she made her way through the rugged mountains and dense forests of Kovir to the bustling port town of Valdrest. Along the way, CD PROJEKT RED and Epic Games dove deep into how each feature is helping drive performance, visual fidelity, and shape The Witcher 4’s immersive open world.
Since the strategic partnership was announced in 2022, CDPR has been working with Epic Games to develop new tools and enhance existing features in Unreal Engine 5 to expand the engine’s open-world development capabilities and establish robust tools geared toward CD PROJEKT RED’s open-world design philosophies. The demo, which runs on a PlayStation 5 at 60 frames per second, shows off in-engine capabilities set in the world of The Witcher 4, including the new Unreal Animation Framework, Nanite Foliage rendering, MetaHuman technology with Mass AI crowd scaling, and more. The tools showcased are being developed, tested, and eventually released to all UE developers, starting with today’s Unreal Engine 5.6 release. This will help other studios create believable and immersive open-world environments that deliver performance at 60 FPS without compromising on quality — even at vast scales. While the presentation was running on a PlayStation console, the features and technology will be supported across all platforms the game will launch on.
The Unreal Animation Framework powers realistic character movements in busy scenes. FastGeo Streaming, developed in collaboration with Epic Games, allows environments to load quickly and smoothly. Nanite Foliage fills forests and fields with dense detail without sacrificing performance. The Mass system handles large, dynamic crowds with ease, while ML Deformer adds subtle, realistic touches to character animation — right down to muscle movement.
The Witcher IV is in development for PlayStation, Xbox, and PC.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can follow the author on Bluesky.
More Articles
That looks.......INSANE! Seeing it run on a base PS5 at 60fps in UE5 with ray tracing makes me salivate at the thought of how great this is going to look and run on PC! About time developers start taking proper use of this generation's consoles horsepower.
the demo was running on a base PS5 so im hopeful…tho im also very ignorant on graphics.
Typically tech demos are lighter than actual games because there is less logic calculations & mechanics operating in the background. For example, in this demo there is no quest, inventory, enemy, UI etc operating in the background. Even with the NPCs they can afford to be more selective with what logic is run.
If for example this game was further along and the core game was running like this on PS5 they would just release a gameplay demo, but this is a "tech demo"
I suspect any 60fps mode will have a graphical downgrade but this reflects their ambition and what are able to achieve in a very bespoke environment/showcase.
Epic is saying that 60fps with ray tracing on base console is what they were able to accomplish specifically with UE5.6. So it looks like it's under the hood tech that will be able to accomplish this. However, Epic didn't give any other specifics like native resolution or graphical presets.
I have no doubt UE5.6 is more efficient but the point remains that it is a tech demo and so doesn't carry the hardware demands of a fully realised game. How many games have managed to match what Epic first showed of UE5 on PS5 back in 2020? This demo is now 5 years old and we still haven't got there:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8B1LNrBpqc
I don't think you don't fully understand what Epic is saying here. Supposedly, 5.6 is the version of the engine that is able to take full advantage of the consoles hardware. That's why they're making those claims. The version of UE5 from 2020 and the tech demo they showed then is no longer relevant in this particular case with this specific version of the engine. Epic is currently claiming that Witcher IV will run at 60fps on a base PS5.
Whether that ends up being the case remains to be seen, but that's why Epic is making these claims. UE5 released way too early imo. Hell, only at version 5.5 did the infamous stuttering finally stop in UE5 games lol
Respectfully I don't think you understand what I'm saying.
Firstly Epic is not claiming Witcher IV will run at 60fps on base PS5, no one has said that. They said this "Tech demo" is running at 60fps on base PS5.
A tech demo is designed to show off features and what is possible, but they never reflect real game conditions because they are not an actual game with all the technical grunt that an actual game has to run in order to make full gaming experience.
"CD Projekt Red has confirmed to VGC that what was shown at the State of Unreal presentation today was a tech demo set in The Witcher 4 world, "but not The Witcher 4 itself"
UE5 is constantly updating and being optimised. The version showed in 2020 is very old and developers have been working with newer/better versions for years but still haven't matched it. The reason why, is because real games are more demanding (99% then tech demos) .
The closest achievement is Hell Blade 2 (arguably better) and that is reflected in the games limited scope and lack of interactivity of the world. We obviously know a busy open world game like Witcher 4 will of course be way more demanding that what the tech demo offers. The technology shown here will definitely be in the game, but what they've managed to achieve detail and performance wise will be chipped away when all the actual game content, open world systems, AI etc are incorporated. Essentially wait for a gameplay reveal of the witcher 4 running on PS5, not the "Tech Demo"
ah i see. Yeah in that case, there is no way they’re getting that kind of performance in the full game. That’s just too good to be true. Maybe on the highest spec PCs, but not on a base PS5.
Bullshit. Gears of War E-Day will show phenomenal graphics at 60 frames on x and ps5.
(?)
I'm sure they will. This game is probably still at least another year or two out, so there's still plenty of time to ensure each platform is optimized. I doubt they want another CP2077 launch lol. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it ends up being a PS6 launch title.
It is a very hard thing to believe, but even Unreal's social media accounts are consistently promising 60fps in the games delivery. Here's to hoping! They're saying it's possible with the current version of UE5.6
Why a hard time? Look at death stranding on ps4, and the ps5 is light years ahead on tech.
Yeah, that won't be native.
Nobody believed that it would be. Probably using TSR or FSR.
This is a game very likely being designed to release cross-gen between gen 9 and gen 10 in probably 4 years (it only entered full production in November 2024, and AAA games usually need at least 4 years of full production these days, sometimes more), so yeah, considering on the upper end it will be targeting PS6 and NeXtbox, there will definitely be sacrifices to get it to run on PS5 and Xbox Series, including liberal use of FSR most likely (probably FSR quality for 30 fps mode and FSR performance for 60 fps mode).
There are so few games released this gen that are native 4k that this should honestly go without saying
It has a lot of motion blur.
Before anyone gets too excited by this, it's important to know this isn't the actual game. It's a tech demo. I have enjoyed every game this company has released and I very much looking forward to the Witcher 4, but CDProjectRed has a history of releasing misleading gameplay. It happened with Cyberpunk 2077, and to a lesser extent the Witcher 3. It really bit them in the ass with Cyberpunk so I'm surprised they agreed to show this. Almost like they didn't learn from the last time.
Was the stream in 60fps because it didn't present the usual 60 look?... Maybe they've got the motion blur configured in a way which makes it remind me of games in 30fps. And this is not a complaint, Im usually disappointed that 60fps modes don't adjust the shutter angle to compensate for higher amounts of frames. This manages to maintain the "cinematic" aesthetic. I think this looks amazing
Further along than I thought and looks amazing. Prehaps we'll see this sooner rather than later.
What the f....
I had my jaw on the floor watching that gameplay video.
Hard to believe the finished game will look like this, but maybe. They are playing it on a PS5 controller in the video.
Jesus, I can't wait. I know it's a tech demo, but I think the final product will be absolutely beautiful as well. Gonna put my Pro to work with this one, or maybe it'll be PS6 at that point. And Ciri looks like Ciri again, yay.
