Multiplatform Official Next-gen WITCHER 3 Discussion

[rikwebb]

My suggestion - Don't get your hopes up too high. There's been alot of speculation of what they're going to add besides raytracing & Netflix series DLC... especially since its been in development for over 2 years.

Before I say the rest of the post, let me acknowledge I have absolutely no idea how difficult it is to add raytracing to a 2015 game, but it sounds difficult. It wouldn't surprise me if the hardware performance takes such a significant hit that neither the PS5 or SeriesX will be able to get above 30FPS with raytracing on.

Overall - given how busy CDPR has been over the last 2+ years, it wouldn't be surprising if they had only a few employees working on this update at any one time, if for months there was any work done on it at all. It wouldn't surprise me if at the beginning of the year the head-honcho of the studio had to be reminded about the promise made a year and a half ago about the next-gen update being in development, and he said...

'Ok, lets focus on doing two CP2077 updates in the first 10 months of 2022, then we'll take a dozen personelle and get them to work on the Witcher 3 update and it'll be done before Christmas.'

Or... I could be 100% WRONG... and they've had a dozen personelle working on this major overhaul of the Witcher 3 with significant improvements to every aspect of the entire game, solidifying it as the GOAT game for decades to come.

Guess we'll see when its previewed next week.

Don't forget it was being done externally for a while then brought in house so that probably had some sort of effect. I've seen that its looking like its ray traced shadows not reflections but i'm sure you'll get more info on that next week.

 

[rikwebb]

Also looks like its an automatic upgrade on the PC version



If anyone can't run the newer version for whatever reason and you brought the game through GOG, GOG offers downloads of older versions of games on there.

 

[Hitman81]

I probably won't play the re-release unless the updates are significant. Love the game but I played it at least 3 times and don't think I can find a reason to do it again just for slightly better graphics.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

Just hours away.

That'll be Noon Eastern, 11am Central, 10am Mountain, and 9am western.

 

[rikwebb]

The game is on sale on Steam again also, £6.99 on the UK store for the GOTY edition,

https://store.steampowered.com/sub/124923/


also on the Xbox store for the same price
https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-game-of-the-year-edition/c261457lcnmj

 

[GearSolidMetal]

Its live.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

Ok....

4K models/textures... that's expected and welcomed.

Ray Tracing.... on the 30FPS mode, probably. Wonder if that'll be at 4K or 1440P.

'IMPROVED GAMEPLAY' TELL ME MORE

60 FPS mode...... better be 1440P at least without Ray Tracing.

Photo Mode..... okay, I can't wait to use it, once.



Lots of big ass textures for a big ass game.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

 

[rikwebb]

 

[Law Talkin’ Guy]

Ray traced global illumination eh? That’s good, I was worried they were going to cheap out and limit it to just ray traced shadows like they did with the next-gen upgrade to Cyberpunk which was disappointing because nobody gives a fuck about ray traced shadows. All anyone wanted for cyberpunk was ray traced reflections but they weren’t able to deliver sadly.

Edit: I misread. They didn’t say RT GI, but “real time” GI. Not sure what that means. Hmmm.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

Edit: I misread. They didn’t say RT GI, but “real time” GI. Not sure what that means. Hmmm.

It means at 4K with Ray Tracing it'll get about 15FPS.

 

[Slobodan]

Does anyone know if you can still continue your save with the new update or would you have to start a new game?

 

[GearSolidMetal]

Does anyone know if you can still continue your save with the new update or would you have to start a new game?

They made no mention of any complications with being able to use old saves with the new update, but they wouldn't at this point.

Perhaps its an issue they already made sure wouldn't be an issue, or they may need an update for the update. We shall see.

 

[rikwebb]

Does anyone know if you can still continue your save with the new update or would you have to start a new game?

Pretty sure you can, and port your save to certain different platforms with a GOG galaxy account like Cyberpunk

https://www.ign.com/wikis/cyberpunk-2077/How_to_Enable_Cross-Progression

• PC saved files can't be transferred to console
• Console saved files can be transferred to PC
• PC saved files can be transferred between PCs
• Console saved files can be transferred between Consoles

 

[Slobodan]

They made no mention of any complications with being able to use old saves with the new update, but they wouldn't at this point.

Perhaps its an issue they already made sure wouldn't be an issue, or they may need an update for the update. We shall see.

Cool, not a big loss for me either way as I only have 10 hours play time (other games took my time).

 

[GearSolidMetal]

Cool, not a big loss for me either way as I only have 10 hours play time (other games took my time).

CDPR does claim ALL previous bugs are fixed, including previously bugged save games.

Just heard that so I thought to mention it.

 

[Leon]

Does anyone know if you can still continue your save with the new update or would you have to start a new game?

It should work because this update is basically a patch. I have a NG+ save right at the beginning of the game I'd like to use so I don't have to start completely fresh.

 

[Hitman81]

Eh. Ok. It looks exactly the same which would be less surprising if it didn't feel like it took them the same length to put it out as it would to just make a new game.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

These are my thoughts as of now, without seeing the complete patch notes.

I'm somewhat satisfied.

Given this is a FREE update, I didn't expect for it to be practically a remaster on newer hardware but I do certainly feel like they could have done more.

I've said for a LONG time the PS4 & XB1 were moderate upgrades to their previous generations and they would have been awesome if they had been released in 2010 as opposed to 2013, so they played Witcher 3 moderately well given their hardware limitations.

But with the PS5 & Series X, those limitations are practically smashed given the power of both new consoles in comparison to their previous generations. Moderately-powered PCs could play Witcher 3 at 1440P at a somewhat high framerate even in 2015, so I've been wondering why they've taken so long (27+ months) to get it to play on the modern consoles when they're so much more powerful than PC were 7 years ago.

All of the side bells & whistles are great, but the performance upgrades is what I've been looking forward to seeing, and... they're 'meh.'

So far we know there's a 60FPS mode, and a 30FPS mode with ray-tracing. Is ray tracing so taxing within a 2015 game that modern consoles will only be able to play it at 30FPS (without knowing the resolution)?

And is the 60FPS mode at 1440P or 4K? (Not that it matters to me) But it does matter if the 30FPS (with ray tracing) is only at 1440P, because based on other games of around that time playing on the SeriesX I bet they could have gotten more performance out of it if they really made it a priority.

I just get the feeling that so many within the industry believe ray-tracing is a much bigger deal than it actually is, so they put a much higher priority on its implementation into developing new games AND updating older games than it actually deserves.

Don't get me wrong, I've seen ray tracing and its impressive but it using it shouldn't be sucking 50% of the GPU power, especially when that power (and development time) could be used on better performance of the game and other immersive graphical effects other than lighting & shadows.

Like this Witcher 3 graphics mod list from 2017 -

If they can get it to look this good - with updated textures - at 60FPS/1440P I'll be quite satisfied, and it may look that good because we actually didn't get a CLOSE look at the game yesterday because the stream was at 1080P.

Yep, that's right, it was streamed at 1080P, and we saw a few seconds of quick-cuts and never any long & detailed gameplay segments we could analyze. And they never clarify if the gameplay is from PC or PS5/XBX, but I'm going to guess it was all PC gameplay... so we haven't seen ANY gameplay of the PS5/XBX versions.

So this update is still 'wait & see' for me to gauge its all it could have been. And yes its a FREE update but I absolutely would happily pay $10+ for an update that would make this GOAT game everything it could, and deserves, to be for modern audiences.

 

[ripsta619]

The game is on sale on Steam again also, £6.99 on the UK store for the GOTY edition,

https://store.steampowered.com/sub/124923/


also on the Xbox store for the same price
https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-game-of-the-year-edition/c261457lcnmj

Just picked it up on Steam. Never played the DLC's and that was on a base PS4. This update and all the other DLC's I missed seemed like one hell of a bargain for $9.99.