CDPR's Secret Edgerunners Beat-'Em-Up May Already Be Dead

Zero to two years of development, a codename, a vertical slice, and then layoffs. That's the apparent trajectory of Project Gemini, a 2.5D Cyberpunk: Edgerunners brawler that CD Projekt Red and WayForward were building together, according to a report from MP1st. The project was uncovered through the portfolio of a former WayForward developer, whose identity MP1st withheld for privacy reasons.

Gemini was described as a "rollback-driven 2.5D brawler" with references to "rollback-safe architecture" and "online transport integration," pointing to online multiplayer built on rollback netcode. River City Girls with a Night City skin is exactly what I'm thinking. WayForward made Double Dragon Neon and both River City Girls entries. Pairing that studio's side-scrolling brawler expertise with Edgerunners' hyper-stylised anime violence is one of those pitches that sells itself in a single sentence.

Which makes the rest of this story sting.

Funding dried up

The portfolio data places Gemini in development at WayForward between 2025 and early 2026, firmly in the R&D phase where studios prototype mechanics and test concepts before committing to full production. Separately, MP1st found that WayForward had an Unreal Engine 5 project based on a licensed IP in active development during at least 2025. Funding for that UE5 project was delayed after the team delivered a vertical slice, leading to halted development and a round of layoffs at the studio in September 2025. Whether the UE5 project and Gemini are the same game remains unconfirmed, but the timelines overlap closely enough that it's hard not to connect the dots.

MP1st was unable to confirm Gemini's current status. The developer whose portfolio surfaced the project no longer works at WayForward. CDPR hasn't commented. I'd love to be wrong here, but everything about this reads like a concept that got prototyped, ran into money problems, and quietly died during a wave of studio cuts that hit dozens of mid-sized developers last year.

The frustrating part is how well the idea fits. Edgerunners already proved that Cyberpunk's world translates brilliantly outside of first-person RPG territory. Studio Trigger's anime brought in an audience that never touched Cyberpunk 2077, and a pick-up-and-play brawler would have been the perfect entry point for those fans. CDPR clearly saw that potential; the Edgerunners brand was stamped right on Gemini's internal logo alongside the codename.

CDPR has plenty of other Cyberpunk plates spinning. Edgerunners Season 2 is expected this year, a Cyberpunk trading card game is in the works, and the full sequel to 2077, codenamed Project Orion, remains in development. But a WayForward-developed Edgerunners brawler with rollback netcode would have been the most exciting thing on that list for me, and I suspect for a lot of players who grew up on side-scrolling beat-'em-ups. If Gemini really is dead, CDPR left one of the best pitches in its portfolio on the cutting room floor.