CDPR dropped its at big Geoff's Game Awards last night, and surprise: You're Ciri now. Little Zireael has followed in her adoptive dad's footsteps and taken on the mantle of witcher, seemingly confirming the 'Witcheress' ending for The Witcher 3 and turning our Ciri into an itinerant monster-slayer and probable Gwent addict.
Which at least answers the big question as to who the heck we're gonna be playing as if not Geralt, but also opens up a load more. How did Ciri survive the Trial of Grasses? What happened to her Elder Blood powers? And where did that giant spider-lady come from?
Jody has some theories about the first two in his piece on , but it's that last one that's set my brain whirring and fan tongues wagging. Right now, the dominant theory is that the Second Conjunction of Spheres—the syzygy of dimensions that happened while everything was going to hell in a handcart in the third game's climax—has introduced a bunch of new monsters into The Witcher's world, perhaps creating a whole new demand for witchers.
In The Witcher 3, no one makes too much fuss about it happening again—it seems like it was too quick to cause much havoc—but it wouldn't be hard for CDPR to retcon that to say that no, actually there's a load of new beasties about now, and at least one of them is the horrible [[link]] spider-lady from the trailer. It'd give Ciri a new bit of impetus to dedicate herself to witchin', too: She might feel partially responsible for the state of the world (even though she really isn't), maybe even enough to start a whole new witcher school about it.