File this under "things we already knew but which are nice to have confirmed." In a recent video for Fall Damage, Doug Cockle, the voice of Geralt in all of CD Projekt Red's games, explained our favorite gruff monster-slaying dad guy will be back for the next game in the series.
"Witcher 4 has been announced," he said. "I can't say anything about it. What we know is that Geralt will be part of the game, we just don't know how much, and the game won't focus on Geralt. So it's not about him this time. We don't know who it's about. I'm excited to find out. I want to know! I have not seen any script yet—I mean, I couldn't tell you if I did. This is the thing, so I could be lying through my teeth. But I'm not. Or am I?"
Back in 2013 when CD Projekt Red was talking up The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, they made it explicit that this would be the end of Geralt's saga. They did, however, leave the door ajar for his return. "We might even include Geralt in later games potentially," executive producer John Mamais told Polygon. "We just need to talk about it and figure out what we're going to do next."
As for who the protagonist of the next Witcher game will be, that we don't know. Ciri would be an obvious choice—though it would involve making one of the endings of The Witcher 3 canon, the official comic books haven't been shy about doing that. And they'd probably have to depower her a bit, though that's nothing new in videogames, where even Batman has to level up to regain all his iconic abilities in each new Arkham game.
The other possibility is a custom character, perhaps built a little like V was in Cyberpunk 2077. Ditching the idea of playing a preset character with an existing backstory would be a significant departure for The Witcher series though, and one that would remove something that makes them distinct from other RPGs.
Given that one of the only clues we have about the next Witcher game is a lynx-shaped medallion, perhaps from the School of the Cat, it's entirely possible we'll be playing an entirely new witcher from this secretive school. Since The Witcher 4 only entered pre-production in mid-2022, and if Cockle is to be believed he still hasn't seen a script, it'll be a while before we know either way.
