CD Projekt Red Poaches Another Warhorse Lead

CD Projekt Red continues to add talented developers to its team, particularly those who were working in lead roles at Warhorse Studios, as noticed by b0ysbrokenheart on X (formerly Twitter). The latest addition is Zbynek Zelinka, whom b0ysbrokenheart showed using a screenshot of Zelinka's LinkedIn profile showing his current job as a Senior Gameplay Designer at CD Projekt Red, starting in October 2026.

Zelinka was previously a Lead Technical Designer at Warhorse Studios, where he worked for a total of seven years and 10 months, rising from Technical Designer to Senior Technical Designer and eventually Lead Technical Designer before departing for CD Projekt Red.

This is the Third Lead to Leave Warhorse for CD Projekt Red

In addition to Zelinka, Zdenek Glatz and Karel Kolmann have also left Warhorse Studios for CD Projekt Red in the last year. All three of these developers were at Warhorse Studios for seven or eight years, meaning CD Projekt Red is picking up some highly experienced employees, at least two of whom have been involved in the development of both Kingdom Come: Deliverance and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2.

Glatz joined CD Projekt Red in May 2026, according to his LinkedIn, as a Senior Open World Designer. Before that, he was a Lead Level Designer at Warhorse Studios, having previously worked as a Game Designer/Writer and Senior Game Designer/Writer at the studio. He's bringing eight and a half years of experience to CD Projekt Red with him.

In addition to Zelinka, Zdenek Glatz and Karel Kolmann have also left Warhorse Studios for CD Projekt Red in the last year.

Kolmann joined CD Projekt Red in November 2025 as a Senior Quest Designer. She spent just over eight years at Warhorse Studios before that, starting as a Writer and Game Designer in 2017, then moving to Senior Game Designer and eventually to Lead Gameplay Designer. With them together, CD Projekt Red gains a combined 24 years of game design experience to add to their in-progress projects.

CD Projekt Red and Warhorse Both Have Projects in Development

CD Projekt Red has a few highly anticipated games in the works, and the company is clearly doing its best to grab talented developers to help bring those games to life. We know that CD Projekt Red is working on a sequel to Cyberpunk 2077, which has the placeholder name of Project Orion, and a job listing shows that they aren't finished searching for developers to help with the game.

Then, you have The Witcher 4 in development from CD Projekt Red, which continues the series by putting Ciri in the role of main character, and this project would be particularly fitting for the devs who left Warhorse Studios to work on it. The world of The Witcher has more magic and fantasy elements, but the general setting isn't that different from Kingdom Come: Deliverance. If I had to guess, I'd bet that the Witcher series is where the former Warhorse devs are going to be working.

They could also be put on The Witcher 3's Songs of the Past expansion's development team, but the release date for that is close enough that I imagine a lot of the development is finished, and it's in the final stages, which leaves The Witcher 4 as the most likely choice, or the secretive Project Hadar new IP that we don't really know anything about.

Meanwhile, Warhorse Studios has another Kingdom Come game in the works and a Lord of the Rings game, but the comments on b0ysbrokenheart's X post show that people are a bit worried about these games as devs are leaving the studio for CD Projekt Red. One even asked CD Projekt Red to "hold their horses" for the sake of the next Kingdom Come game so it can be as good as the first two.

I'm not very worried about the projects, as all the studio closures mean that there are, unfortunately, a ton of talented developers currently out of work, and I'm sure many of them would be a great fit to join Warhorse Studios.