CD Projekt Red has offered a notable progress update on Project Hadar, its long-running and still largely secret new franchise. The project has reached the point where the studio has a coherent vision for its setting and its most important elements, while developers are beginning practical work through smaller prototypes and gameplay tests.
There is an important qualification: Project Hadar is not yet in pre-production. That places it well before the stage at which players should expect a trailer, a detailed premise, character reveals, or any firm discussion of launch plans. Still, the update is significant because it provides the clearest indication in years that the game's earliest creative groundwork has moved beyond pure exploration.
Joint studio CEO Michal Nowakowski described the undertaking as the biggest in CD Projekt Red's history, saying it has required several years of work. For a developer associated with enormous open-world role-playing games, including The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and Cyberpunk 2077, that is a particularly ambitious way to frame a project that remains almost entirely unknown to the public.
A world before a game
Project Hadar was first disclosed in 2022 as a new intellectual property being developed internally by CD Projekt Red. Unlike the studio's two established pillars, it is not based on an existing fictional universe. The Witcher draws from the literary work of Andrzej Sapkowski, while Cyberpunk is rooted in Mike Pondsmith's tabletop role-playing setting. Hadar is intended to be something the company owns and creates from the ground up.
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That distinction makes worldbuilding especially central. With an adaptation, a development team can build upon a pre-existing foundation of history, cultures, conflicts, terminology, visual identity, and audience expectations. An original setting has to establish all of those elements internally before the wider game can be designed around them. The work is not simply about choosing a genre or sketching maps. It includes deciding what kind of world the player will inhabit, what rules govern it, what themes define it, and which details make it recognizably distinct from other fantasy or science-fiction universes.
Nowakowski indicated that this phase is nearing completion. CD Projekt Red has developed a coherent outlook for the world and its key components, allowing the team to begin working more directly on the game itself. The company is also making small prototypes and testing gameplay concepts, an expected but meaningful step for a title at this stage.
Prototype work does not mean that core mechanics are final. In game development, small prototypes are often used to answer basic questions quickly: whether an interaction feels satisfying, whether a particular progression system supports the desired player experience, or whether a technical idea can scale to a full production. Some of those experiments may become part of the finished game; others may be discarded entirely. For Hadar, they show that creative planning is being paired with early hands-on experimentation.
What "biggest undertaking" may mean
The description of Project Hadar as CD Projekt Red's biggest undertaking to date should not be read as a confirmation of its eventual map size, budget, team count, or scope in any single measurable category. None of those specifics have been announced. Instead, the statement reflects the breadth of the effort required to create a new franchise while the studio is simultaneously supporting and developing major projects in its better-known universes.
It also suggests that Hadar is not being treated as a minor side project. CD Projekt Red has publicly outlined a broad pipeline that includes The Witcher 4, the next mainline entry in its Witcher saga, as well as Cyberpunk 2, a sequel to Cyberpunk 2077. A new original universe must find its own identity within a company whose reputation has been built by those two properties. The studio has not explained whether Hadar will resemble either series in structure, perspective, setting, combat style, or role-playing systems.
That absence of detail leaves room for many possibilities, but it also means that none should be mistaken for confirmation. Project Hadar has no disclosed story, protagonist, genre, target hardware, release window, or gameplay footage. Even the name remains a working project title rather than a revealed commercial title. The current update is about the project's internal development status, not a formal unveiling of the game audiences will eventually play.
Still before pre-production
The phrase "not yet in pre-production" is the most useful guide for setting expectations. Pre-production commonly involves turning broad creative ambitions into a production-ready plan: defining pillars, determining what features are feasible, establishing pipelines, building more representative prototypes, and preparing teams to create final game content at scale. A project can have a strong world concept before it reaches that point, particularly when its creators are still testing how gameplay should express that world.
For Project Hadar, the stated sequence appears to be clear. CD Projekt Red spent years shaping a new universe and its major ideas. It is now moving into a period of smaller gameplay experiments. A later transition into pre-production would signal another milestone, but the studio has not provided a date for it. That makes a substantial public reveal seem unlikely in the immediate future.
This slower, foundation-first approach is understandable for a proprietary franchise. The earliest decisions will influence not only one game but potentially years of future stories, sequels, expansions, adaptations, and other uses of the setting. Establishing a strong internal framework now may give the studio more room to develop Hadar as a lasting property rather than a one-off release.
Hiring points to continued expansion
Recent recruitment activity has also suggested that the project is growing. CD Projekt Red had been seeking to bring roughly 50 additional developers onto the secret project by the end of the year. Job growth alone does not reveal the game's final form, but it is consistent with a team progressing from initial concept work toward a more structured development phase.
Large studios frequently adjust staffing as projects evolve. Early concept development can be led by a comparatively focused group of writers, designers, artists, technical specialists, and leadership. As a game's direction becomes clearer, more disciplines may be needed to validate ideas and construct the tools that later teams will use. In Hadar's case, the push for new hires arrives alongside confirmation that the foundational worldbuilding is substantially in place.
CD Projekt Red has not said how many people are currently assigned to Project Hadar, nor has it broken down the disciplines involved. It has likewise not outlined how the project's staffing compares with work on the next Witcher title or the Cyberpunk sequel. Those details matter because the company has several major productions underway, but they remain private for now.
An unusual moment for CD Projekt Red
Project Hadar gives CD Projekt Red an opportunity that it has not had before: the chance to define an entire interactive universe without inheriting another creator's canon. That freedom can be creatively valuable, allowing the company to set its own mythology and rules. It also brings more responsibility, because the studio must give players a reason to become invested in a world with no prior recognition.
The company's established franchises carry powerful associations. The Witcher is known for monster hunting, morally difficult choices, political fantasy, and Geralt of Rivia's legacy. Cyberpunk is associated with a dystopian future, dense urban environments, augmentation, and personal survival amid corporate power. Hadar will need its own clear identity, particularly if it is to stand alongside those properties as a major internal pillar.
For now, CD Projekt Red is keeping that identity under wraps. The latest comments do not answer the biggest questions surrounding Project Hadar, but they do establish that the setting is no longer merely an abstract idea. Its world and defining elements have been shaped into a cohesive vision, early game concepts are being tested, and the studio is continuing to build the team that will carry the project forward.
Players waiting for concrete details will need patience. Project Hadar remains at an early stage and has not begun pre-production, so any launch is clearly far away. Yet for an original property whose existence has been known since 2022, confirmation that its creative foundations are nearing completion is a meaningful sign that CD Projekt Red's most mysterious game is steadily taking form.
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