Screenshot included in press release. Is this our first look at The Witcher 3?
CD Projekt RED has detailed its new REDengine 3, the third iteration of its in-house technology created for RPGs set in “vast open-worlds” and “truly non-linear stories” based on player choice.
“If we look at RPGs nowadays we find two approaches, one which emphasizes the story but limits the game world and one that builds a vast open-world but hampers and simplifies the story,” said CD Projekt boss Adam Badowski.
“With the REDengine 3 we combine the positive aspects of both approaches for the first time, creating an open environment with a complex, multi-thread story. Together with believable characters, a captivating tale and a world where players can roam freely without loading times, we will be able to move gaming to a new level with a realistic feel and full player immersion.
“When working on our previous titles, I didn’t dream that we would achieve something like this. Thanks to the support of all our fans, now we have the possibility to use REDengine 3 and create something many RPG fans dream of.”
So what’s REDengine 3 all about?
- It can stream and handle fully explorable open-worlds.
- It can create immense universes filled with exciting, non-linear adventures.”
- It can make an RPG comparable to “top-shelf” shooters, both in terms of game world presentation and the proportion of events players are drawn into.
- It is a next-gen ready solution “that begins to blur the line between pre-rendered CGI movies and real time rendered graphics.”
- It has new face and body animation systems that offer “realistic expression of emotions, movie quality scenes and character interactions.”
- It uses high dynamic range rendering with 64-bit precision.
- It has a flexible renderer prepared for deferred or forward+ rendering pipelines.
- It has a high performance terrain system allows “multiple material layers to be efficiently blended and uses tessellation for the best possible detail.”
- It can “seamlessly” blend between animations and physics.
- It uses new version of REDkit editor with tools created specifically for RPG development.
- The new editor can create “complex, branching quests and set them in a free roaming environment with a simplicity not achieved by similar toolsets.”
Stay tuned. CD Projekt RED is set to announce its latest project, which will be out before Cyberpunk 2077, on February 5. And it’s likely The Witcher 3.