Ever since CD Projekt Red released The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt in 2015, fans of the action RPG series have been patiently waiting for another main installment in The Witcher franchise. Thankfully, the wait appears to be over, as the Polish video game developer announced that a fourth installment was in early development earlier this month, setting fan curiosity ablaze with a teaser image. The Witcher games have proved to be hugely popular, with multiple awards wins and commercial successes under their belts, and it will be interesting to see if the next Witcher game can live up to its predecessors.
However, it seems like CD Projekt Red will be shifting the focus of its next game, pursuing a new saga instead of a direct continuation of the stories established in the previous three titles. The teaser image for the as-yet-untitled The Witcher 4 featured an unfamiliar medallion, and the developer has since confirmed that it belongs to the School of the Lynx. Not much else is known about the upcoming game or this new school, but Witcher fans may want to read up on the previously established schools in preparation, like the School of the Cat and the hidden joke that links it to some unlikely places.
The Witcher Schools
The Witcher schools are a collection of organizations that train the monster-slaying Witchers and equip them with all the tools of their fatal trade. Each school has its own headquarters, as well as a slightly different approach when it comes to how they prepare their Witchers, with varied philosophies and methods that help distinguish one school from another. The most well-known of these schools is the School of the Wolf which is headquartered at Kaer Morhen and counts Geralt and Vesemir among its members.
While the School of the Wolf may be the most famous, it is far from the most controversial. That dubious title surely belongs to the School of the Cat, which is the only Witcher school to train non-humans. The school was once based in Stygga Castle, but after word of their mutation-enhancing experiments and their other questionable practices reached the surrounding villages, the school was attacked. Those who survived chose to become nomadic, traveling with the Dyn Marv Caravan and keeping the severely diminished School of the Cat alive.
Schrodinger’s Significance
The Witcher 3 may be full of some surprising Easter eggs and in-jokes, but it was probably the last place players would expect a reference to quantum mechanics to pop up. Nevertheless, the crafty minds at CD Projekt Red managed to sneak it in, and it can be found if players completed the side quest ‘Take What You Want’ and decided to spare Gaetan (who is a member of the School of the Cat) during ‘Where The Cat And Wolf Play…’ If they do, then they can collect a letter from Joel to Gaetan, who references an attack and another member of the Witcher school called Schrodinger.
In the letter, Joel says he is unsure of Schrodinger’s fate, as he “might be alive, might be dead.” This is a direct reference to the Schrodinger’s Cat thought experiment, in which Austrian-Irish physicist Erwin Schrodinger tries to explain the paradox of quantum superposition. In the theoretical experiment, a cat that has been sealed away in a box with a flask of poison can be considered both alive and dead at the same time, depending on the outcome of a random subatomic event. Because the outcome is uncertain, it is true to say the cat is both alive and dead, with each one equally possible, and it seems the member of the School of the Cat faces the same fate as Schrodinger’s feline.
It is unlikely Schrodinger’s demise or survival will be determined in the next Witcher game, but players are still speculating about many other elements in the upcoming title, from the identity of the protagonist to where the story will take them. CD Projekt Red will no doubt reveal more details about the next installment in The Witcher franchise as development gets underway.
A new Witcher game is in development.
