On March 13, CD Projekt launched the second large patch (opens in new tab) for The Witcher 3’s somewhat-beleaguered next-gen replace. “Amongst numerous fixes, it additionally improves the general stability and efficiency of the sport,” the patch notes start, burying the lede. A little bit additional down, you could find The Whopper:
“Restored horizon-based ambient occlusion. Gamers who had beforehand turned Ambient Occlusion off will want to take action once more. You’ll find it in Choices → Video → Graphics.” We’re saved. They mounted the grass shadows.
The following-gen, 4.0 model of The Witcher 3 has been a confounding factor. The brand new quests, gear, and zoomed-in digital camera particularly are game-changers, however its implementation of DX12 graphical options is sloppy at greatest. Flip ray tracing on, and the eight-year-old sport brings every part however the mighty RTX 40-series GPUs to their knees.
Loading into replace 4.02, that a lot hasn’t modified. Until you’ve got bought a model new GPU that accepts plutonium gasoline rods, a steady 60 fps most likely simply is not within the playing cards with RT enabled. I did discover a extra evenly-spread utilization of all my CPU cores, matching the patch notes and addressing a serious difficulty famous by Digital Foundry (opens in new tab), for what it is value. After some preliminary stuttering, presumably because of the shader cache getting wiped and needing to compile, my efficiency has been steady.
A way more welcome change for the everyman gamer is the aforementioned return of HBAO. For these of you who’ve by no means been shoved in a locker, ambient occlusion extra broadly is a shadow rendering approach centered on small element, tender shadows that actually assist lend 3D fashions visible depth.
The unique launch of The Witcher 3 carried each display area and horizon-based AO, with the latter typically heralded because the superior possibility. The preliminary 4.0 next-gen patch, vexingly, did away with HBAO as an in-game possibility, leaving solely the inferior SSAO or the gorgeous-but-GPU-grinding ray traced AO possibility. Here is one other gallery for comparability:
The Witcher 3’s AO makes a very noticeable distinction in its foliage, with HBAO including in slightly extra shadow and pop. The ray traced possibility seems to be unimaginable, naturally, however I am not Mr. Moneybags over right here! The RTX 3070 is a positive card, an trustworthy, yeoman GPU that I shall be proud to make use of for years to return. However The Witcher 3’s ray tracing serves the 3070 its personal enamel at 1440p.
For those who might reconcile your self with not tracing all of the rays, The Witcher 3 4.0 was already a positive replace as a complete, and 4.02 rights the historic fallacious of HBAO’s eradication. My beloved grass shadows are again, and we are able to lastly take a while to heal. I’ve additionally included the total (console-excluded) patch notes under:
PC-Particular
- Improved CPU core utilization within the DX 12 model.
- Restored horizon-based ambient occlusion. Gamers who had beforehand turned Ambient Occlusion off will want to take action once more. You’ll find it in Choices → Video → Graphics.
- Fastened a problem the place the “My Rewards” part was not localized in REDlauncher.
- Fastened a problem with a flickering panorama in Toussaint that occurred when NVIDIA HairWorks was disabled.
- Fastened a problem associated to particle optimization which might end in non permanent stuttering.
Visible – PC and Subsequent-Gen Unique
- Improved immersion of water look by including refraction to SSR and ray-traced reflections.
- Fastened a visible difficulty with brick textures the place black artifacts coated stone arches.
- Added a Movement Blur slider. It may be present in Choices → Video → Graphics.
Quests & Gameplay – Out there on all platforms
- Battle Preparations – Fastened the dearth of a dialogue possibility that will progress the search throughout the goal “Let Avallac’h know every part’s prepared.”
- Purpose of State – Fastened a problem the place the door to the warehouse might turn into completely locked if the participant knocked, entered after which instantly left the constructing.
- Scavenger Hunt: Cat College Gear Improve Diagrams Half 1 – Fastened a problem the place the search might keep energetic even after the diagrams have been looted.
- Fastened a problem the place attempting to start out a New Recreation+ on an incompatible save would block the participant from beginning the expansions in standalone mode till the sport was restarted.
Localization – Out there on all platforms
- Fastened a problem with the Korean localization of Ciri’s and Geralt’s Gwent card descriptions.
- Fastened punctuation points in Arabic localization.
- Up to date Conventional Chinese language font.