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Witcher 3 downgrade arguments in here and nowhere else

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viveks86

Member
If we color correct that to match the 2013 E3 footage, it's really not that huge a difference. Would be nice to see a shot taken from the exact same position as the trailer though.

Also, I feel the need to see it on motion - my major concern is the LOD. TW2 suffered from bad pop-in and it's my number 1 most hated visual distraction.

This is the fully tweaked version, with absolutely no concern for framerate. This eliminates all LOD issues. But it is unplayable with a Titan X SLI at 4K. So, gotta figure out how close we can get to it
 

viveks86

Member
and said that wasnt even playable on sli titan x

I'd be able to achieve this at 1080p60 though. But IQ won't be remotely as good. And now that I have a 4K TV, I'm gonna have to make some tradeoffs. We'll see how close we can get. But if we are anywhere close to this, we are in 2013 reveal territory.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
The other PC shot with various cfg tweaks.

the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-config-file-tweaks-001-on.png
 

Genio88

Member
After reading the Nvidia guide(great as always) i think i'll play it with everything on ultra, HBAO+ and full Hairworks enabled at 1080p/30fps locked on GTX 980 OC
 
I'd be able to achieve this at 1080p60 though. But IQ won't be remotely as good. And now that I have a 4K TV, I'm gonna have to make some tradeoffs. We'll see how close we can get. But if we are anywhere close to this, we are in 2013 reveal territory.

its still nowhere near 2013 reveal territory
 

jett

D-Member
Just look how many npcs are being rendered in that compared to the 2015 version.
The downgrade is a fucking shame.

With this game struggling to reach 60fps at 1080p on ultra as-is, I wonder what that original vision would've performed like. I guess it would've ended up being a new Crysis, a game built for future hardware. I hadn't noticed it before, but that is indeed a HUGE amount of NPCs
 

pestul

Member
With this game struggling to reach 60fps at 1080p on ultra as-is, I wonder what that original vision would've performed like. I guess it would've ended up being a new Crysis, a game built for future hardware. I hadn't noticed it before, but that is indeed a HUGE amount of NPCs
Well it would have performed like Uber in The Witcher 2. We had no problems with this.
 

cripterion

Member
woah, thanks, found this interesting making of: http://www.cgmeetup.net/home/making-of-unreal-engine-4-the-kite-demo/



snip from the important part:



  • [*]better LOD with less pop ups
    [*]better shadows and lighting on vegetation
    [*]some weather effects now have a slight blur at the horizon
    [*]again better shadows
    [*]water is now more dynamic because of tessellation - it reacts to Geralts magic signs and other influences
    [*]different color grading at the same time and weather when compared between pre and post patch
    [*]less colourful
    [*]they conclude that the graphical differences between both versions equals to another detail level, like from "very high" to "ultra"


That is very, very good news!
 
I think sharpening helps improve the look of the foliage, another reason there's such a drastic difference between now and 2013.

2013:
2359.jpg


Current with added sharpening:
LnlCEqj.jpg
 
So at ultra with in tweaks at 4k it's pretty much just as good as the original footage. To me that is totally fine, even if it's barely playable on 2x titan x. We always ask for devs to push the graphical limits where at its best possible iq it can't even be handled on current consumer hardware. That seems to be the case here.

That 4k in tweak screenshots looks insane.
 
along with water that doesnt look terrible, foliage that doesnt look weird and is lit properly and has depth, non flat lighting, high quality effects work, tessellation and much more

I can agreee there is some stuff that doesn't look as good as 2013, but tesselation? The game only used it ever for terrain generation and ocean water... which is still obviously does. Where are you seeing tesselation in an obvious manner in the 2013 footage?

The plan for tonight is just to see how it runs at 1080p with everything ingame maxed... and then hitting to the config file and amping the shadow distance and grass distance. Those seem to have the largest impacts from what I can see in the tweak guide.

BTW andy, your tweak guide is legitimately super essential and amazing.
 
I think sharpening helps improve the look of the foliage, another reason there's such a drastic difference between now and 2013.

2013:
2359.jpg


Current with added sharpening:
LnlCEqj.jpg

There was still a downgrade (check the foliage detail) but it doesn't seem to be to the extent that everyone was freaking over.
 

viveks86

Member
and the clouds ?

the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-config-file-tweaks-001-off.png

What about the clouds?

There was still a downgrade (check the foliage detail) but it doesn't seem to be to the extent that everyone was freaking over.

That's not the best shot or angle for discussing near-foliage detail. It really shows draw distance and distant foliage detail. Will post better angles down the line so that we are making fair comparisons, if not 1:1.
 
I think sharpening helps improve the look of the foliage, another reason there's such a drastic difference between now and 2013.

2013:
2359.jpg


Current with added sharpening:
LnlCEqj.jpg

youre using the wrong 2013 footage.

I can agreee there is some stuff that doesn't look as good as 2013, but tesselation? The game only used it ever for terrain generation and ocean water... which is still obviously does. Where are you seeing tesselation in an obvious manner in the 2013 footage?

The plan for tonight is just to see how it runs at 1080p with everything ingame maxed... and then hitting to the config file and amping the shadow distance and grass distance. Those seem to have the largest impacts from what I can see in the tweak guide.

BTW andy, your tweak guide is legitimately super essential and amazing.

andy mentions the tessellation doesnt work
 

viveks86

Member
Single titan x? Or do I need to sli?

SLI at 4K. The current settings are blind overkill and we don't know what can be pared back due to diminishing returns. It's not playable at all right now. IT's gonna take a lot of time and patience to figure out how to achieve it with playable performance
 

bargeparty

Member
  • better LOD with less pop ups
  • better shadows and lighting on vegetation
  • some weather effects now have a slight blur at the horizon
  • again better shadows
  • water is now more dynamic because of tessellation - it reacts to Geralts magic signs and other influences
  • different color grading at the same time and weather when compared between pre and post patch
  • less colourful
  • they conclude that the graphical differences between both versions equals to another detail level, like from "very high" to "ultra"

Could any of this make it to the PS4 version?

Bueller?
 

viveks86

Member
What's the original?

the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-config-file-tweaks-001-off.png


the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-config-file-tweaks-001-on.png

The one with clouds is before tweaking and the one without is after tweaking. The clouds are gone because the engine does this thing called dynamic weather :)

As you can see, there is quite a bit of diminishing returns for very minimal improvement. We just need to find the right variables so that it stays playable.
 

BigTnaples

Todd Howard's Secret GAF Account
This looks good, sure. But still nowhere good as the 2013 and earlier pre-release footage.

It just cements the downgrade more.


Nowhere near?

Naw. Definitely looks ascetically different, but it's not that far removed on a technical level from that same area in 2013. Some things are much better, some worse. It's not a sweeping downgrade of the whole scene.
 
I wonder if The Witcher 3 (2013) had global illumination.

The lighting just doesn't compare.

Nope. Google this article: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Artist Talks About Weather, Lighting, Consoles, Graphics and Much More

"G: While many focus a lot on pixel and polygon count, lighting is possibly the most important element in making a game look great. Could you give us some details about the lighting solutions and tech used in The Witcher 3? How much of it is dynamic, and how much is baked?

JT: Lighting is absolutely crucial! And making an open-world game with always changing lighting conditions was a huge challenge. Every light in the game is dynamic, even some effects cast lights too, you can walk up to almost every light source and extinguish or ignite its flame, nothing is baked!

We ended up not using Global Illumination, light bouncing and reflecting… this is similar to what I mentioned previously with visual effects, an area where things keep getting better every year, but these really cool solutions are still far too expensive to use in a complex game. So to add more detail to the lighting, the whole world is covered in “lighting and reflection” probes, that analyse the surrounding area and light it accordingly. It does a pretty good job."

It would be an overkill to even use a static GI for such types of games, let alone a dynamic one.
 

RedSwirl

Junior Member
Nowhere near?

Naw. Definitely looks ascetically different, but it's not that far removed on a technical level from that same area in 2013. Some things are much better, some worse. It's not a sweeping downgrade of the whole scene.

One of the biggest problems of this thread is that we haven't been able to separate aesthetic differences from the objective level at which the game pushes tech. A lot of people say "better" lighting when they might actually just prefer the old color scheme. Do we actually know there's less technology under the hood today when it comes to the lighting? People have confirmed most of the stuff in the Nvidia effects video is still in, while the jury is out on other parts of it. And let's not forget the actual assets like model detail and textures, except the foliage, have either remained the same since 2013 or been slightly changed neither for better or worse.

I think the most important thing when everybody has the patched game in their hands is confirming precisely how much of that Nvidia showcase made it into the final game.

If you had a monster rig, this is what you can achieve in reality (pre-final build):

the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-config-file-tweaks-002-on.png

Once again, I can't find the quote but remember someone from CDPR (PR I think) at Gamescom last year suggesting the E3 2014 35-minute demo was running on a single Titan.
 
Shit, what a difference a GOOD capture from the most recent build makes.
Edit: Granted, that other pic is monster rig levels :p

You have no idea how many gaffers looked at this "comparison" and judged the game's appearance based on that.

True, it's "monster rig" levels, but the original comparison is from a high end dev PC, so it's far more appropriate than comparing it to the PS4, which that screen was from :p
 

viveks86

Member
This looks good, sure. But still nowhere good as the 2013 and earlier pre-release footage.

It just cements the downgrade more.

As I've said earlier, without 1:1 comparisons, people will use every screenshot to reinforce their confirmation bias, be it positive or negative. So I'll happily decline to comment until we get to a point where we can have a meaningful discussion. Just thought it needs to be posted here regardless of what the verdict is.
 

Denton

Member
please go watch the 2013 trailers again
www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqQ3LeBgGDM
www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ_G6XiHoUA

what Nvidia articles and new screenshots bring is that the PC version might be better looking the console version (and most likely will be at massive performance costs)

The screens and gifs from Nvidia don't make the game look better than the 2013 version.

I don't need to, I know those trailers by heart and I don't give a shit, going to be playing amazing game in 7 hours that also happens one of the best looking ones on the market, even if it looks slightly worse than those trailers.
 
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