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Cyberpunk director and other former CD Projekt Red devs form new studio, Blank

IbizaPocholo

NeoGAFs Kent Brockman

Mateusz Kanik, game director of Cyberpunk 2077 and co-game director of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, as well as Witcher and Cyberpunk executive producers, Jędrzej Mróz and Marcin Jefimow, have formed Blank, a new game studio based in Warsaw, Poland.

It’s the second major spin-off studio announced this year by CD Projekt leads, after Poland-based Rebel Wolves, which was formed by Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, who was The Witcher 3’s director and head of production/secondary game director for Cyberpunk 2077.

“We’re thrilled to announce Blank. and to start expanding our incredible team,” said Kanik. “After working for years in an increasingly conservative industry, we’re ready to make bold, impactful projects that share our unique creativity and values.”

He added: “Where the industry champions a dictatorship of the creative individual, we want to give ownership to the team. Where the industry leans on crunch culture, we prefer work-life balance. Where the industry says bigger is better, we’re setting our sights on highly polished games with a focus on emotion, story, and craftsmanship.”

Mateusz Kanik left CD Projekt last year after 15 years at the studio. Kanik joined in 2006, originally working on a game design for The Witcher, as well as the cancelled console port The Witcher: Rise of the White Wolf.

He would then serve as the lead game designer on The Witcher 2. Between 2013 and 2016, Kanik was also the game director of Cyberpunk 2077 before moving on to serve as the studio’s design director.

The Blank founders have brought together an experienced team of developers: Michal Dobrowolski (CD Projekt Red) joins as Design Director, Artur Ganszyniec (CD Projekt Red, 11 Bit Studios) as Narrative Director, with Grzegorz Przybyś (Division 48 Studio, Artificer) as Art Director.

“Our game development philosophy comes from our own stories and experiences,” said Marcin Jefimow, Blank. Co-founder and executive producer.

”With Blank. we want to build a space where we can honor our histories, but also be playful and open to brand-new inspirations as we collaborate creatively. We’ve already got a head start on a budding new project that we can’t wait to share with players and craft with new team members.”

The studio currently has 10 team members, but they are looking to expand to almost 60 people to support the development of their unannounced project.
 

Kurotri

Member
One one hand, it's cool to see more and more studios being established. On the other hand, man. For me, Cyberpunk 2077 was an absolute masterpiece and I will die on that hill. Reading that the director of that game has left CDPR is not the kind of news that I wanted to read..hopefully there's people that can carry the torch still left in CDPR.
 

kikkis

Member
If your previous games didn't exactly feature anything particularly creative or bold, how is it going to this time?
 

keraj37

Member
Flop? The game sold more than 20M copies , sponsors and investors ll be no problem for them.
Yes flop, they sold a lot, true, but consuming their reputation and hype and share value of their company alongside it.
If the investors believe this guy can cheat one more big time like this, they probably would go for it.
But this is not what investors should expect from game directors - only making great games, not faking for money.
 

leizzra

Member
Between Rebel Wolves and this studio, I wonder how many devs from the Witcher 3 days are still left at CD Projekt Red?
There are still some. Unfortunately people that made CDP Red not great place to work are also there still.

There are at least few studios in Poland that were started by ex-CDP Red employees. This is how it works with this company - many people don't want to work there because they've been there or know many people that worked there before. That's why CDP Reds has a problem with specialists.
 

Luigi Mario

Member
There are still some. Unfortunately people that made CDP Red not great place to work are also there still.

There are at least few studios in Poland that were started by ex-CDP Red employees. This is how it works with this company - many people don't want to work there because they've been there or know many people that worked there before. That's why CDP Reds has a problem with specialists.
Thank you for the explanation.
 
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