On March 13, CD Projekt launched the second big patch (opens in new tab) for The Witcher 3’s somewhat-beleaguered next-gen replace. “Amongst varied fixes, it additionally improves the general stability and efficiency of the sport,” the patch notes start, burying the lede. A little bit additional down, yow will discover 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.
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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 finest. 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. Except you have acquired a model new GPU that accepts plutonium gasoline rods, a secure 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 significant subject 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 secure.
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 method centered on small element, delicate shadows that actually assist lend 3D fashions visible depth.
The unique launch of The Witcher 3 carried each display screen area and horizon-based AO, with the latter usually 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:
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The Witcher 3’s AO makes a very noticeable distinction in its foliage, with HBAO including in just a little 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 nice card, an sincere, yeoman GPU that I will probably be proud to make use of for years to return. However The Witcher 3’s ray tracing serves the 3070 its personal tooth at 1440p.
In case you might reconcile your self with not tracing all of the rays, The Witcher 3 4.0 was already a nice replace as a complete, and 4.02 rights the historic mistaken 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 complete (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.
- Mounted a difficulty the place the “My Rewards” part was not localized in REDlauncher.
- Mounted a difficulty with a flickering panorama in Toussaint that occurred when NVIDIA HairWorks was disabled.
- Mounted a difficulty associated to particle optimization which might end in short-term stuttering.
Visible – PC and Subsequent-Gen Unique
- Improved immersion of water look by including refraction to SSR and ray-traced reflections.
- Mounted a visible subject 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 – Obtainable on all platforms
- Battle Preparations – Mounted the shortage of a dialogue possibility that might progress the hunt in the course of the goal “Let Avallac’h know every part’s prepared.”
- Purpose of State – Mounted a difficulty the place the door to the warehouse might change into completely locked if the participant knocked, entered after which instantly left the constructing.
- Scavenger Hunt: Cat College Gear Improve Diagrams Half 1 – Mounted a difficulty the place the hunt might keep lively even after the diagrams had been looted.
- Mounted a difficulty the place making an attempt to begin a New Sport+ on an incompatible save would block the participant from beginning the expansions in standalone mode till the sport was restarted.
Localization – Obtainable on all platforms
- Mounted a difficulty with the Korean localization of Ciri’s and Geralt’s Gwent card descriptions.
- Mounted punctuation points in Arabic localization.
- Up to date Conventional Chinese language font.
