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Gorgeous looking upcoming RPG The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt will mark the acclaimed series' debut on the new generation consoles, something that developer CD Projekt Red felt had to happen.

“We needed to be on the new consoles and in particular the PS4,” CD Projekt Red’s Mical Gilewski told VG247, “because a lot of people are attracted to them.”

It's not the first time the series has produced a console version, as The Witcher 2 had a generous special edition for Xbox 360, but the veteran PC studio had to work especially hard to make that version comparable to the original. With the new consoles, that's no longer such a struggle.

“It’s only with the next-gen consoles that we can do much more,” Gilewski explains. “Open-world was something we’ve always wanted to do and we believed that was the missing element for this story. To make it truly immersive we had to let people explore it their way. We always wanted this but we couldn’t because of technical limitations and because of the experience and size of the team.”

He also shed some light on the sequel's new openworld design, and how that will impact such a famously story-driven game. “We didn’t want to choose between a story driven game and a sandbox game,” he said. “We wanted to connect the two. Whatever you do you’ll be surrounded by the story and you’ll be attracted by things that are happening around you. We wanted to avoid repetition and we wanted diversity. Not just in the player’s adventures but in the assets. No one wants to stagger around the same place again and again.”

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt gallops into action on 24 February 2015 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC.