{"id":1837346,"date":"2026-03-20T16:57:03","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T13:57:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1837346"},"modified":"2026-03-20T16:57:03","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T13:57:03","slug":"has-cd-projekt-red-just-ruled-out-a-witcher-3-expansion-shadow-drop-the-studio-was-coy-when-facing-a-barrage-of-questions-about-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1837346","title":{"rendered":"Has CD Projekt Red just ruled out a Witcher 3 expansion shadow drop? The studio was coy when facing a barrage of questions about it"},"content":{"rendered":"<article class=\"article \" data-ads=\"true\" data-article-type=\"news\" data-article-group=\"news\" data-paywalled=\"false\" data-premium=\"false\" data-sponsored=\"false\" data-type=\"article\">\n<header class=\"article_header\" data-component=\"article-header\">\n<div class=\"breadcrumbs\">\n<nav class=\"nav_breadcrumbs\" data-component=\"nav-breadcrumbs\" aria-label=\"Breadcrumb\">\n<ul class=\"nav-links\">\n<li>\n                <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/\" data-active=\"false\"><br \/>\n                      Home<br \/>\n                <\/a>\n            <\/li>\n<li>\n                <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/news\" data-active=\"false\"><br \/>\n                      News<br \/>\n                <\/a>\n            <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/nav><\/div>\n<div class=\"headline_details\" id=\"main-content\">\n<h1 class=\"title\">Has CD Projekt Red just ruled out a Witcher 3 expansion shadow drop? The studio was coy when facing a barrage of questions about it<\/h1>\n<p class=\"strapline\">&#8220;I&#8217;d like to say everything is a possibility.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"headline_asset\">\n<figure class=\"headline_image_wrapper\">\n<p>        <img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"headline_image\" src=\"https:\/\/assetsio.gnwcdn.com\/the-witcher-3-10-years-piece.jpg?width=570&amp;quality=85&amp;format=jpg&amp;dpr=3&amp;auto=webp\" alt=\"A side-on image of whitish-grey-haired witcher Geralt, holding his sword above his head and tilted forwards in an &quot;ox guard&quot; position. The scene is dark but the blade and his face are lit in a yellow light, and there's a cape just visible flowing from his shoulders.\" loading=\"eager\" data-uri=\"the-witcher-3-10-years-piece.jpg\" data-lightbox width=\"570\" height=\"321\"><figcaption>\n          <span class=\"attribution\">Image credit: <cite>CD Projekt Red<\/cite><\/span><br \/>\n        <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"metadata\">\n<div class=\"avatar\">\n<p>    <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Robert Purchese avatar\" src=\"https:\/\/assetsio.gnwcdn.com\/user-9946-originalxoriginal-14-03-23.jpg?width=2048&amp;height=2048&amp;fit=bounds&amp;quality=85&amp;format=jpg&amp;auto=webp\" style=\"aspect-ratio: 1\" width=\"1024\" height=\"1017\"><\/p>\n<p>  <img alt=\"Robert Purchese avatar\" data-autosize=\"crop_lossy\" data-uri=\"user-9946-originalxoriginal-14-03-23.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\" style=\"aspect-ratio: 1\" width=\"1024\" height=\"1017\">\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"text\">\n<div class=\"byline\">\n                  <span class=\"article_type\" data-slug=\"news\"><br \/>\n                    News<br \/>\n                  <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"by\">by<\/span> <span class=\"author\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/authors\/robert-purchese\">Robert Purchese<\/a><\/span>                    <span class=\"job_title\"><br \/>\n                      Associate Editor<br \/>\n                    <\/span>\n            <\/div>\n<div class=\"published_at\">\nPublished on <time datetime=\"2026-03-20T16:57:03+00:00\">March 20, 2026<\/time>              <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"mypop-header-wrapper\">\n<p><button class=\"mypop-button button wide\" data-state=\"follow\" data-type=\"tag\" data-uuid=\"5602a568-15bf-416c-8edc-63042b171df5\" data-name=\"The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt\" data-follow-text=\"Follow The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt\" data-unfollow-text=\"Following The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt\" data-aria-follow-text=\"Follow The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt\" data-aria-unfollow-text=\"Following The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt\" data-popup=\"true\" data-force-login=\"true\" aria-label=\"Follow The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt\" title=\"Follow The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt\"><br \/>\n  Follow The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt<br \/>\n<\/button>          <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"article_body\" data-component=\"article-content\">\n<div class=\"article_body_content article-styling\">\n<p>CD Projekt Red has suggested that if it did have something to release this year, like oh I don&#8217;t know, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-witcher-3-dlc-expansion-rumours-strengthen\">a secret expansion for The Witcher 3<\/a>, it probably wouldn&#8217;t favour a surprise release or &#8216;shadow drop&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Joint CEO Micha\u0142 Nowakowski said this while answering a question during <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdprojekt.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads-en\/2026\/03\/transcript-fy2025-earnings.pdf\">a CDPR financial earnings call <\/a>yesterday. An investor asked: &#8220;When do you plan to run up marketing efforts for the new game content you&#8217;ve announced for this year? Should we expect a longer marketing campaign \u2013 several months or weeks \u2013 or is a shadow [drop] still a possibility?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>To which Nowakowski replied: &#8220;I&#8217;d like to say everything is a possibility. But having said that, our experience and our preference given the types of games we make is for longer-term marketing campaigns; we think they tend to work a little bit better than, say, a live drop at some conference or event. So I&#8217;d point in that direction.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The reference to &#8220;new game content you&#8217;ve announced for this year&#8221; likely relates to a remark chief financial officer Piotr Nielubowicz made during the earnings call, mentioning &#8220;new content we&#8217;re planning to release&#8221;. CDPR has not widely announced any new game content, otherwise, for this year.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We continue to believe that with strong back catalogue sales performance this year and the new content we&#8217;re planning to release, we have a fair chance of reaching [our incentive program target],&#8221; Nielubowicz said.<\/p>\n<p>The incentive program mentioned is a key part of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/games\/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt\">The Witcher 3<\/a> expansion rumour. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/witcher-3-expansion-rumours-analyst-100-percent-certain-cd-projekt-red-will-release-significant-new-content-this-year\">I explored this CDPR incentive program in detail with a Polish analyst<\/a>, but briefly, it&#8217;s a financial target set that will offer bonuses if reached. But the studio is currently under target and it will need something considerable to make up the shortfall. &#8220;After three out of four years, we are at 74 percent of the goal,&#8221; Nielubowicz said in the call. &#8220;527 million zloty (\u00a3107m) still remains to be earned this year to reach the target.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"1\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The first question CDPR faced was whether the project Fool&#8217;s Theory was making will contribute to the company&#8217;s revenues this year. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/witcher-1-remake-will-be-open-world-modern-reimagining\">Fool&#8217;s Theory is the studio remaking The Witcher 1 in Unreal Engine 5<\/a>, and helping on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/games\/the-witcher-4\">The Witcher 4<\/a>, but it&#8217;s also the suspected developer of the new expansion. &#8220;In terms of the project from Fool&#8217;s Theory &#8211; as was said, we will come back with more news later this year,&#8221; Nielubowicz answered. &#8220;For now, we have nothing to share; we&#8217;re not sharing anything yet.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In another question about making the incentive program target, Nielubowicz said &#8220;we need products to launch successfully&#8221;, but didn&#8217;t say what they were. And when asked if CDPR had more than one unannounced project to help reach the target, Nielubowicz added: &#8220;Unfortunately, I cannot comment on that, as there&#8217;s probably no good answer that would be definitive and sure.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Someone else asked about the number of unannounced projects in development at the studio, and how many might be released in 2026. &#8220;In general, we have a wider number of unannounced projects,&#8221; Nielubowicz answered, &#8220;but from those that are at a more advanced stage and are being capitalised &#8211; as of December 31, 2025, as we discussed under the &#8216;expenditures on development projects in progress&#8217; \u2013 we actually have four such projects, unannounced but already capitalised, out of which one was a non-gaming project while three were gaming projects.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Then someone probed CDPR about the motivation behind releasing The Witcher 3 recently on Xbox Game Pass. This question was more direct. &#8220;Could this be related to the planned new content for existing games?&#8221; the investor asked.<\/p>\n<p>Nowakowski answered this one. &#8220;I like that question, it&#8217;s very detailed,&#8221; he said. &#8220;But the truth is, the game has been out there for almost 11 years \u2013 11 years in May this year \u2013 and for most of that time we&#8217;ve been selling the complete version, with two expansions, as you know. And I think we&#8217;ve just come to that moment in the lifecycle of the game where this was more attractive from the new players&#8217; perspective. As we&#8217;ve mentioned, we want to bridge that generational gap; this is a more attractive offering, to allow them to familiarise themselves with The Witcher adventures before the upcoming release of The Witcher 4.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"2\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Impressive evasive manoeuvring, but it begs the question of when CDPR might announce something, assuming it has something to announce. If CDPR wants a longer marketing campaign, a Witcher 3 anniversary release in May seems to be out of the question &#8211; it&#8217;s too close. But perhaps it might announce something then? If so, when would it launch &#8211; in the summer? Leave it too late in the year and the release window narrows.<\/p>\n<p>Aside from the rumoured Witcher 3 expansion, the next game to come from CDPR will probably be The Witcher 4, which now has 499 developers working on it, the company said in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdprojekt.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads-en\/2026\/03\/cd-projekt-group-presentation-fy-2025-4.pdf\">the financial earnings report<\/a>. But we&#8217;ve been told in the past not to expect The Witcher 4 before 2027 (at the earliest). We got <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-witcher-4-unreal-tech-demo-was-running-on-a-standard-ps5-at-60fps-with-ray-tracing\">a glimpse of The Witcher 4<\/a> last summer during Epic&#8217;s Unreal showcase event, and we&#8217;re due another look at the game at the same event this year.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"poll_wrapper\" data-fixed=\"true\" data-hashid data-init=\"false\" data-poll-position=\"1\"><\/span><\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"preferred-source\" data-component=\"preferred-source\">\nLove Eurogamer.net? Make us a <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\">Preferred Source on Google<\/a> and catch more of our coverage in your feeds.  <\/div>\n<\/article>\n<div class=\"article_body\" data-component=\"article-content\">\n<div class=\"article_body_content article-styling\">\n<p>CD Projekt Red has suggested that if it did have something to release this year, like oh I don&#8217;t know, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-witcher-3-dlc-expansion-rumours-strengthen\">a secret expansion for The Witcher 3<\/a>, it probably wouldn&#8217;t favour a surprise release or &#8216;shadow drop&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Joint CEO Micha\u0142 Nowakowski said this while answering a question during <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdprojekt.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads-en\/2026\/03\/transcript-fy2025-earnings.pdf\">a CDPR financial earnings call <\/a>yesterday. An investor asked: &#8220;When do you plan to run up marketing efforts for the new game content you&#8217;ve announced for this year? Should we expect a longer marketing campaign \u2013 several months or weeks \u2013 or is a shadow [drop] still a possibility?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>To which Nowakowski replied: &#8220;I&#8217;d like to say everything is a possibility. But having said that, our experience and our preference given the types of games we make is for longer-term marketing campaigns; we think they tend to work a little bit better than, say, a live drop at some conference or event. So I&#8217;d point in that direction.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The reference to &#8220;new game content you&#8217;ve announced for this year&#8221; likely relates to a remark chief financial officer Piotr Nielubowicz made during the earnings call, mentioning &#8220;new content we&#8217;re planning to release&#8221;. CDPR has not widely announced any new game content, otherwise, for this year.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We continue to believe that with strong back catalogue sales performance this year and the new content we&#8217;re planning to release, we have a fair chance of reaching [our incentive program target],&#8221; Nielubowicz said.<\/p>\n<p>The incentive program mentioned is a key part of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/games\/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt\">The Witcher 3<\/a> expansion rumour. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/witcher-3-expansion-rumours-analyst-100-percent-certain-cd-projekt-red-will-release-significant-new-content-this-year\">I explored this CDPR incentive program in detail with a Polish analyst<\/a>, but briefly, it&#8217;s a financial target set that will offer bonuses if reached. But the studio is currently under target and it will need something considerable to make up the shortfall. &#8220;After three out of four years, we are at 74 percent of the goal,&#8221; Nielubowicz said in the call. &#8220;527 million zloty (\u00a3107m) still remains to be earned this year to reach the target.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"1\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The first question CDPR faced was whether the project Fool&#8217;s Theory was making will contribute to the company&#8217;s revenues this year. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/witcher-1-remake-will-be-open-world-modern-reimagining\">Fool&#8217;s Theory is the studio remaking The Witcher 1 in Unreal Engine 5<\/a>, and helping on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/games\/the-witcher-4\">The Witcher 4<\/a>, but it&#8217;s also the suspected developer of the new expansion. &#8220;In terms of the project from Fool&#8217;s Theory &#8211; as was said, we will come back with more news later this year,&#8221; Nielubowicz answered. &#8220;For now, we have nothing to share; we&#8217;re not sharing anything yet.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In another question about making the incentive program target, Nielubowicz said &#8220;we need products to launch successfully&#8221;, but didn&#8217;t say what they were. And when asked if CDPR had more than one unannounced project to help reach the target, Nielubowicz added: &#8220;Unfortunately, I cannot comment on that, as there&#8217;s probably no good answer that would be definitive and sure.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Someone else asked about the number of unannounced projects in development at the studio, and how many might be released in 2026. &#8220;In general, we have a wider number of unannounced projects,&#8221; Nielubowicz answered, &#8220;but from those that are at a more advanced stage and are being capitalised &#8211; as of December 31, 2025, as we discussed under the &#8216;expenditures on development projects in progress&#8217; \u2013 we actually have four such projects, unannounced but already capitalised, out of which one was a non-gaming project while three were gaming projects.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Then someone probed CDPR about the motivation behind releasing The Witcher 3 recently on Xbox Game Pass. This question was more direct. &#8220;Could this be related to the planned new content for existing games?&#8221; the investor asked.<\/p>\n<p>Nowakowski answered this one. &#8220;I like that question, it&#8217;s very detailed,&#8221; he said. &#8220;But the truth is, the game has been out there for almost 11 years \u2013 11 years in May this year \u2013 and for most of that time we&#8217;ve been selling the complete version, with two expansions, as you know. And I think we&#8217;ve just come to that moment in the lifecycle of the game where this was more attractive from the new players&#8217; perspective. As we&#8217;ve mentioned, we want to bridge that generational gap; this is a more attractive offering, to allow them to familiarise themselves with The Witcher adventures before the upcoming release of The Witcher 4.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"2\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Impressive evasive manoeuvring, but it begs the question of when CDPR might announce something, assuming it has something to announce. If CDPR wants a longer marketing campaign, a Witcher 3 anniversary release in May seems to be out of the question &#8211; it&#8217;s too close. But perhaps it might announce something then? If so, when would it launch &#8211; in the summer? Leave it too late in the year and the release window narrows.<\/p>\n<p>Aside from the rumoured Witcher 3 expansion, the next game to come from CDPR will probably be The Witcher 4, which now has 499 developers working on it, the company said in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdprojekt.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads-en\/2026\/03\/cd-projekt-group-presentation-fy-2025-4.pdf\">the financial earnings report<\/a>. But we&#8217;ve been told in the past not to expect The Witcher 4 before 2027 (at the earliest). We got <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-witcher-4-unreal-tech-demo-was-running-on-a-standard-ps5-at-60fps-with-ray-tracing\">a glimpse of The Witcher 4<\/a> last summer during Epic&#8217;s Unreal showcase event, and we&#8217;re due another look at the game at the same event this year.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"poll_wrapper\" data-fixed=\"true\" data-hashid data-init=\"false\" data-poll-position=\"1\"><\/span><\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Home News Has CD Projekt Red just ruled out a Witcher 3 expansion shadow drop? The studio was coy when facing a barrage of questions about it &#8220;I&#8217;d like to say everything is a possibility.&#8221; Image credit: CD Projekt Red News by Robert Purchese Associate Editor Published on March 20, 2026 Follow The Witcher 3: [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,253],"class_list":["post-1837346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-eurogamer-net"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1837346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1837346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1837346\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1837346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1837346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1837346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}