The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

[escrow4]

780 Ti @ 1215MHz | 5930K @ 3.7GHz | 16GB DDR4 @ 2133MHz | 1200p

Game fully patched @ 1.02 as I type | Lastest Nvidia Witcher III drivers @ 352.86

All settings "High" preset (SSAO) with Ultra textures exception; rest on "High". Hairworks disabled, solid 60FPS in game 60FPS cap (Vsync disabled), no dips, some screen tearing. No tweaks in any files.

If I up it all to Ultra with Hairworks disabled 50 FPS to 60 FPS. I'll stick with a smooth 60FPS locked. Otherwise horse galloping seems rather stuttery and Geralt jumps like he is on crack. Stable so far, need to play some more. White Orchard looks way too storybook and untouched by war to me - didn't an army just pass through? The artsyle is also interesting.

Not as bad as that Kepler benchmark makes out. And now I'm playing it, spending $1600 on a Titan X to up 5 other settings a notch seems rather non-sensical. :whiste:

Early screenshots (click twice for full res):

 

[cmdrdredd]

So has anyone tested vsync on vs off with the fps capped to 60? Is there a noticeable difference in gameplay? Just wondering about lag due to vsync.

 

[chimaxi83]

So first impressions...

1: WTF is with the hurricane force winds all the time? Is there an option to make it so trees dont look like they are having constant seizures?

2: This game is RAM hungry, they were not lying about your system needing 8GB.

3: The game runs decent. On high settings and sitting around 45-55fps. But it doesn't feel as smooth as I would think for this frame rate. But maybe I am just too used to running games at much higher frame rates.

4: Having trouble getting used to the combat system. Its more responsive than TW2 for sure, but isnt as intuitive as I would like.

Lol yeah I'm mad that the trees sway like they're made out of paper, yet seemingly no vegetation responds to aard. I think combat just takes a little getting used to, but I like it. Riposte is tons better.

I have Hairworks "ON" and it doesn't drop the FPS that much, nothing noticeable. I'm still testing the game and i'll try is OFF for some time since, like you say, the hair doesn't look that bad without it.

Maybe its a combination of settings, not sure. All I see is that HairWorks on makes his hair not only graphically jacked up and shimmery, but it makes everything just stutter in general. Maybe its Crossfire.

 

[pandemonium]

So first impressions...

But it doesn't feel as smooth as I would think for this frame rate. But maybe I am just too used to running games at much higher frame rates.

High frametimes?

 

[zinfamous]

I am now a seasoned veteran of 3 battles! and I can say that combat is vastly improved from the previous two. Far more fluid and responsive. The dodge mechanic is everything that this combat system always should have had. Parry seems far more useful and effective. Roll sends your dude a bit too far for my liking, but maybe a good thing to reposition and group up a mob in front for a nice aard blast or something. anyway...

While none of my old friends are here, yet, I still have that damn tattoo of the big-tittied centaur lass on my neck from getting blackout wasted with Vess and the soldiers in Flotsam--never got it removed in my W2 playthrough. So, pretty awesome to see that it's still there, lol.

keyboard and mouse works great. I was gamepad all the way with Witcher 2 (mainly because garbage QTEs pissed me off early, and I preferred the button arrangement for that), but the responsiveness on KB/M is really great here. I mapped my dodge and sign to side mouse buttons, now I have 4 other buttons to see if they need programming. ...not sure what, though. Would be nice to make strong swing a single button, But I can get used to the shift+ mechanic--certainly saves you from inadvertently getting stuck in a longer animation.

Game looks great to me, and I'm not noticing any graphical nonsense or pop in or whatever. FPS could be faster, but I never pay attention to that crap unless I have a slideshow going on. I don't even know the proper lingo to describe what I may be seeing..though more than likely what I'm not even noticing, so fuck it. I'm gonna play.

Anyway, so far more than playable with no detrimental slowdown for me on a 280X + 16GB + Xeon v3 1231 (4770) at all High settings, HBAO+, Hairworks on. everything else on.

gonna try with Hairworks off. This is definitely eating up my resources though: alt-tabbing out, Win7 is asking if I want to default from glass to basic Win7 color scheme.

 

[IGemini]

Been tinkering with the game a bit to see how well it runs on my "lowly" 7870. So far I'm just past the first encounter with the griffin.

I have to say...doesn't handle all that bad, even at stock. I think CDPR is lowballing the AMD performance just a little. Running on 1080p with the High preset and Hairworks turned off (30 fps cap) is quite playable. I'm running Lucid Virtu as well and seems to cooperate just fine with Hyperformance turned on, though admittedly doesn't seem like a huge boost. Going to need all the frames I can get until I invest in an upgrade...either a 970 or 380 most likely.

 

[lilrayray69]

So far I can say it runs with almost all Ultra settings @ 1080p with a 970, pretty much constant 60 FPS. I did turn off hairworks, significant FPS hit there. I do see the game use a lot of RAM, but hardly ever more than 1.5GB of VRAM...

It looks good mostly, but I think Skyrim and GTA5 look better - especially Skyrim w/ mods. Definitely doesn't look "next-gen" to me, not nearly as cool as the gameplay E3 trailers made it look.

I too also notice there are like gale force winds going all the time. The amount the trees/grass wave around in the wind seems unnatural. The foliage all kind of looks like it's painted.

The game itself however does seem to be good. I could not get into TW2 at all because it felt so clunky to me. At first TW3 felt the same, but once I was out of the tutorial section it felt much smoother and so far I've had fun with it.

 

[tidy]

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[futurefields]

So has anyone tested vsync on vs off with the fps capped to 60? Is there a noticeable difference in gameplay? Just wondering about lag due to vsync.

I dont see why Input lag on this game would be a huge deal. Just set max pre-rendered frames to 1 in the control panel should get it feeling tight enough at 60fps.

 

[futurefields]

It looks good mostly, but I think Skyrim and GTA5 look better - especially Skyrim w/ mods. Definitely doesn't look "next-gen" to me, not nearly as cool as the gameplay E3 trailers made it look.

edit: nevermind, Oubadah pretty much covered it

 

[escrow4]

Nvidia does seem to have cremated Kepler in this game. All High works OK, solid more or less 60 some dips to 55 FPS, but a 980 cracking Ultra and a Ti no seems off. Other issues beyond the downgrade are the lack of NPCs, there are a couple in the initial village but the roads are scarce at least in the initial area. Other irritation is the removal of the the alchemy glossary from the first - you used to be able to look up ingredient descriptions making it easier to search for them. Sucks to play on console too, on PC you can shortcut to the main screens not constantly tab between them. Consolized full screen UI (and half screen tutorial pop ups built for TVs) but it does work.

The combat takes some getting used to, mouse is in concert with keyboard especially dodging and rolling but it works well enough. Crafting is interesting too, you need to pay everytime you repair (weapons and armour degrade) or dismantle or craft items and crafting some items needs a better skilled blacksmith. Honestly III feels like what II should have been.

More screens:

 

[StinkyPinky]

So far I can say it runs with almost all Ultra settings @ 1080p with a 970, pretty much constant 60 FPS. I did turn off hairworks, significant FPS hit there. I do see the game use a lot of RAM, but hardly ever more than 1.5GB of VRAM...

It looks good mostly, but I think Skyrim and GTA5 look better - especially Skyrim w/ mods. Definitely doesn't look "next-gen" to me, not nearly as cool as the gameplay E3 trailers made it look.

I too also notice there are like gale force winds going all the time. The amount the trees/grass wave around in the wind seems unnatural. The foliage all kind of looks like it's painted.

The game itself however does seem to be good. I could not get into TW2 at all because it felt so clunky to me. At first TW3 felt the same, but once I was out of the tutorial section it felt much smoother and so far I've had fun with it.

Whoa....settle down there, son. GTA 5 looks better without a doubt but vanilla Skyrim doesn't.

IMO the game would look better if it wasn't so bright. All the colors are very vivid and vibrant which looks kinda out of place in a grim fantasy setting.

Having a blast with the quests though.

 

[futurefields]

Ugh, that foilage in the midrange is not looking too good. It needs some better AA or something. What settings are you run?

 

[zinfamous]

Yes colors way too bright and as someone else mentioned, not enough devastation from the first "war torn" village.

However, if you venture away from the main village, to the outlaying areas, particularly follow "the deserter" quest form the first notice board, you will find a bit more strife. weeping, sacked buildings, corpses, etc...but still--the grass is vibrant and creeping up to the recently burned buildings. Soil and such could use more black and mud and smoldering.

This isn't a graphics issue--it's a style issue. It's just weird walking up to a recently sacked group of houses, frames burned to the ground, but right at the craters...tall green grasses and yellow flowers? wtf...

 

[futurefields]

Anybody here running the GOG version? Is it necessary to download GOG Galaxy?

 

[tidy]

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[escrow4]

Ugh, that foilage in the midrange is not looking too good. It needs some better AA or something. What settings are you run?

High, Ultra textures, SSAO, hairworks disabled. Any post-processing is enabled.

 

[MTDEW]

Anybody here running the GOG version? Is it necessary to download GOG Galaxy?

Nope, you don't need Galaxy at all.
Also, if you have the GOG version, don't forget you have to go to GOG and download your free DLC Temerian Armor and new Hair & Beard styles separately and install them if you want them.

Its kinda odd how you have to do it, you add them as a free purchase to your cart, then checkout, then they show up for download on your W3 page in your account library.
GOG Witcher 3 Free DLC

 

[Merad]

I don't know what it is, but there's something about Geralt's face in TW3 that irritates me. I thought he looked great in TW2. I don't know exactly what it is. Structurally, it seems true to the old one (not like they pulled a Crysis Psycho or anything stupid), but it's lost some character in the upgrade.

The scar across his face looks a little weird to me. It's almost kind of red and raw like it's newly healed instead of being an old wound. Also we're used to seeing Geralt wear probably a day or two's worth of stubble in the previous games, but when you start the tutorial in TW3 he's clean shaven, and that look will vary due to the whole dynamic growing beard thing.

 

[tidy]

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[MTDEW]

I only got two, but it said there were four on the page. Where is the alternative Yennifer and quest?

Yeah,only two are available right now.
If you look closely, the Yennefer and the New Quest "Contract:Missing Miners" both have (coming soon) next to them.
There are 16 all together.
So I guess we'll just have to keep checking back until they all eventually become available.

 

[tidy]

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[Carfax83]

OK I've finally gotten into playing, and I think it's the most beautiful game I've ever played! :thumbsup: Looks so much better playing it in person

Playing at 2560x1440p full ultra quality with all post processing enabled except vignette and CA at locked 60 FPS..

One thing I've found is that the in game V-sync is a bit bugged, so I suggest using the control panel version instead.. Makes the game smoother for SLI..

SLI scaling is awesome, I'm getting in the high 80s and low to mid 90s for the most part

 

[imaheadcase]

Whoever said this is not a console port is wrong, the UI is terrible. Still playable, just is clumsy made. They could of at least made a PC version UI and console separate.

 

[Mem]

My retail copy is stuck somewhere in the post,so have you guys encountered any game bugs yet?