How to Have New Card Art Pc Witcher 3

on Monday, May xviii 2015 Featured Stories, Guides, NVIDIA GameWorks

Andrzej Sapkowski's short stories and novels about a white-haired monster hunter proved pop in his native Poland in the 1990s, chop-chop condign one of the acknowledged fantasy franchises. In 2007 they formed the footing of The Witcher, an action role-playing game congenital by a previously-unknown studio that specialized in localization. Featuring spectacular graphics, a large game earth, an engrossing story, and lots of satisfying action, the petty-hyped championship catapulted Smooth visitor CD Projekt into the limelight, resulting in the cosmos of CD Projekt RED, at present one of the world'south leading game developers.

In 2011, CD Projekt RED continued the white-haired monster hunter's saga in The Witcher two: Assassins of Kings, and today The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt will be released, bringing the trilogy to a conclusion.

Reviews are glowing, just nosotros're hither to talk graphics, not gameplay. Then join usa as we dive into CD Projekt Ruby'due south 100-hour action RPG to dissect its graphics settings and examine their performance impact, and to discover the numerous tweaks that bolster the game'due south much-discussed graphics.

Article Contents:

• System Requirements
• REDengine three
• The Witcher 3: Wild Chase PC-Sectional Graphics Enhancements
• NVIDIA HairWorks
• NVIDIA HBAO+ Ambient Apoplexy
• Additional Graphics Settings
• Anti-Aliasing
• Bloom
• Mistiness & Motility Blur
• Chromatic Aberration
• Depth of Field
• Detail Level
• Foliage Visibility Range
• Grass Density
• Calorie-free Shafts
• Number of Groundwork Characters
• PhysX
• Shadow Quality
• Sharpen
• Terrain Quality
• Texture Quality
• Vignette
• H2o Quality
• The Witcher iii: Wild Hunt Tweaking
• Config File Tweaks
• Particular Level Tweaks
• Leaf Quality Tweaks
• Grass Quality Tweaks
• Mipmap Bias Tweak
• NVIDIA HairWorks Tweak
• Particle Tweak
• Shadow Quality Tweaks
• Texture Streaming Tweaks
• NVIDIA Dynamic Super Resolution
• NVIDIA Command Panel Anisotropic Filtering
• Overclocking
• GeForce Game Ready 352.86 Drivers: A Recommended Upgrade
• GeForce Feel: Optimal Playable Settings With A Single Click
• Conclusion

System Requirements

The Witcher 3: Wild Chase's official organization requirements are posted below, suggesting the sort of organization needed for Depression and High settings, but not the far more than enervating Ultra options.

Minimum Specifications

• OS:64-bit Windows 7 or 64-flake Windows 8 (8.one)
• Processor: Intel Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz or AMD Phenom II X4 940
• Memory: 6GB RAM
• Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660
• DirectX: Version 11

Recommended Specifications

• Processor: Intel Core i7 3770 3.four GHz or AMD AMD FX-8350 4.0 GHz
• Memory: 8GB RAM
• Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 or above

To tailor settings for your system, use GeForce Experience's one-click Optimal Playable Settings.

REDengine iii

Creating game engines is an expensive business, and in the past few years nosotros've seen the majority of developers gravitate towards ready-made solutions like CryEngine and Unreal Engine that are constantly upgraded and backed by dedicated support staff. Given the number of models, textures, audio files, and other assets in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, you might look CD Projekt RED to follow this tendency to cut costs and ease the development of a gigantic open earth game. But no, CD Projekt Blood-red has opted to instead upgrade The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings Enhanced Edition's REDengine 2, which was itself an upgrade of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings'due south REDengine 1.

The biggest challenge in this upgrade process was the implementation of a streaming load system, enabling the developers to switch from smaller environments with frequent loading screens ,to big open worlds that load silently in the background during gameplay. This is no piece of cake feat, and has taken established engines some time to fully implement and perfect, just here in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt CD Projekt Carmine has created a fully functioning, most-flawless organization on their first try.

Similarly, just about every other system has been upgraded for come across modern-day standards, ensuring the appearance of detailed environments (in the context of an open earth game). Physically-based rendering, high-precision effects and DirectX 11 tessellation are all to be plant within the updated engine, along with other expected modernistic cons.

A Quick Word About Screenshots

A primal characteristic of a graphics guide is the ability to demonstrate the impact modified settings accept on visual allegiance. To practise this finer, movement and variance in a scene has to be avoided. In The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, nosotros've had to create relieve games in a debug .exe with time frozen, earlier opening them in the proper .exe to capture screenshots. On occasion this causes clouds to disappear or render incorrectly, objects to float, grass to clip through walls, and characters to spawn with outstretched artillery. Needless to say, this reduces image quality and immersion, and can make NPCs expect goofy, but this is the but mode to create constructive comparisons.

As you lot tin see for yourself in the screenshot below, these quirks exercise not occur during normal gameplay, and should therefore be of no concern.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt PC-Sectional Graphics Enhancements

Similar every multi-platform game, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt looks, runs and plays best on PC. Texture clarity, view distance, and all the usual suspects are improved, and to further bolster graphical allegiance we've worked closely with CD Projekt Red to innovate NVIDIA HairWorks and NVIDIA HBAO+ to their much-anticipated action RPG. Furthermore, you lot can utilize NVIDIA Dynamic Super Resolution (DSR) to crank upward the rendering resolution, NVIDIA G-SYNC monitors to eliminate screen fierce and stuttering, and NVIDIA GameStream to stream the game itself to SHIELD devices and your TV.

NVIDIA HairWorks

Normally, fur and hair in games is created by adding polygon strips and transparent textures to a character, and though this is a uncomplicated and inexpensive implementation the result appears completely static and visually uninteresting. With boosted layers and some bones animation, quality and realism can be improved greatly, simply dynamic movement and accurate shading remains off limits. The solution? NVIDIA HairWorks, which adds tens of thousands of DirectX 11, tessellated hair strands to characters, each reacting realistically to motion and external forces. In addition, the use of individual hairs and layers enables dynamic lighting to permeate throughout each strand and layer, for hairs to be accurately shadowed, and for deeper layers to be self-adumbral by other hairs, improving image quality further nevertheless.

For the The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt we've worked closely with CD Projekt RED throughout the game's development, calculation HairWorks to Geralt'south pilus styles and beards, to the mane of Roach, his trusty steed, to the manes of other horses, and to over three dozen monsters. Out in the open world, this pregnant undertaking results in the addition of HairWorks to the bulk of Geralt's animal and supernatural assailants, creating immersive scenes and encounters for the elapsing of the 100-hour activity RPG.

NVIDIA HairWorks enabled (click to enlarge)

NVIDIA HairWorks disabled (click to enlarge)

To achieve a realistic await for Geralt'southward hair and beard, which grows as the game progresses, we developed new, more than advanced stiffness and bending controls to let for intricate styling. And for realistic shading in a earth with dynamic conditions and numerous locations, we introduced new diffuse, specular, and glint controls, enabling Geralt's white hair to match surrounding conditions.

Another new improver is the ability for Geralt's hair to get visibly wet, matching the shading properties applied to his wardrobe when taking a quick dip. Over time he'll dry out, and the appearance of hair volition render to its normal state.

On average, 10,000 to 40,000 strands of tessellated pilus are applied to HairWorks-enhanced models at gainsay view distances, with up to 60,00 applied to the game'southward furriest creatures. Upwardly shut, when creatures are futilely trying to end Geralt's life, hair counts are cranked up to ensure maximum fidelity, bringing the 40,000 average up to 125,000 in some cases. Every bit they and so flee for their lives, hair counts are dynamically scaled dorsum until the enemy is a mere dot in the distance. On Geralt, hair counts average at thirty,000, and scale upward to 115,000, with around 6,000 hairs just for his beard.

Click to load an interactive comparison

In previous HairWorks-enhanced games, pilus aliasing was sometimes visible when players used post-process anti-aliasing or low levels of hardware anti-aliasing. Now, nosotros apply Multisample Anti-Aliasing (MSAA) by default straight to HairWorks hairs, ensuring high-quality, aliasing-free hair regardless of the player'south full general anti-aliasing settings. This new feature debuts in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and will exist available to other GameWorks users in the near hereafter via a gratuitous update on NVIDIA's Dev Zone.

Click here for an enlargement that better demonstrates the benefits of HairWorks MSAA

With wind, water, and spell interaction, in addition to accurate shading, shadowing and animation, and the application of MSAA, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt's NVIDIA HairWorks integration delivers the most realistic and immersive hair and fur seen to appointment in a playable game, significantly bolstering the game's graphical fidelity.

Click to load an interactive comparison

Performance: Three HairWorks options are on offer in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt: "Off", "Geralt Just", and "All". Equally the self-explanatory names suggest, they control whether HairWorks is switched off, applied only to Geralt, or applied to Geralt, his horse, and all other HairWorks-enhanced characters, creatures and monsters in the game.

Given the numerous scenarios and activeness sequences that tin can occur, and the varying number of HairWorks-enhanced actors in each, we've tested three scenarios to better demonstrate the performance cost of HairWorks. Note, patch 1.03 improved HairWorks rendering performance, adding a few actress frames per 2d in each of our tests.

In action sequences filled with HairWorks-enhanced actors, performance can decrease by a skilful fifteen to twenty frames per second. For many that volition exist a bit as well expensive; for those who can enable HairWorks, said sequences will be more dynamic and realistic, with hair reacting to movement, attacks, and spells.

Out in the open earth with a adept, wide side-view of Geralt and his equus caballus, HairWorks can cost a picayune over 10 frames per second. Given the time yous spend staring at Geralt, and riding Roach, it'south worth investing some frames for significantly improved paradigm quality.

Thanks to the dynamic level of particular organization, we can crank up the hair count in shut-ups, enhancing Geralt with upwardly to 115,000 DirectX 11 tessellated hairs. And while information technology may price thirteen frames per 2d to do this, it doesn't half expect practiced.

Do note, Maxwell GPUs are up to three times faster at tessellation than previous-generation GPUs, so you may feel lower HairWorks performance on other graphics cards due to the all-encompassing use of tessellated hairs.

NVIDIA HBAO+ Ambience Apoplexy

Ambience Occlusion (AO) adds contact shadows where 2 surfaces or objects meet, and where an object blocks low-cal from reaching some other nearby game chemical element. The AO technique used and the quality of the implementation affects the accuracy of shadows, and whether new shadows are formed when the level of apoplexy is depression. Without Ambient Apoplexy, scenes look flat and unrealistic, and objects appear every bit if they are floating.

In The Witcher three: Wild Chase, players have the choice of Screen Infinite Ambient Occlusion (SSAO), and NVIDIA HBAO+. Unusually, SSAO has been modified to compute AO at 1/2 resolution, 1/4 resolution, and one/8 resolution earlier combining the iii together and upsampling the upshot to full resolution.

In comparing, HBAO+ is rendered at total resolution from the off, is a newer technique with a variety of enhancements, detailed hither, and performs better, relatively speaking. As demonstrated in the interactive comparisons beneath, and the operation chart later, these enhancements enable HBAO+ to produce superior AO shadows that realistically shadow game elements, that avoid over-darkening fine item, and are free from the unrealistic halos that are occasionally visible around objects and characters.

In a room illuminated by a full-width, full-height window straight behind Geralt, HBAO+ accurately reflects real world conditions by removing the shadows placed unnaturally beyond Geralt's back.

Out in the open up globe, HBAO+ accurately shadows all game elements, including the distant mountains that you may ane 24-hour interval calibration.

Wherever you await, more accurate AO shadows are seen, increasing image quality during every moment of Geralt'due south epic quest.

Functioning: Given the significant increase in image quality, i would ordinarily wait an as meaning reduction in performance, but because of its efficient DirectX 11 programming, and NVIDIA hush-hush sauce, HBAO+ is only four frames slower per 2d than SSAO.

Additional Graphics Settings

Anti-Aliasing

To tackle jagged edges, CD Projekt Cherry-red has developed their own post-process anti-aliasing solution, as hardware anti-aliasing techniques such equally MSAA and TXAA are incompatible with REDengine iii's renderer. This unnamed mail service-processing technique operates with a level of allegiance similar to FXAA, but with an added temporal anti-aliasing component to reduce the crawling and shimmering of anti-aliased edges when the camera or player's viewpoint is in motion.

An identical interactive comparing taken at 3840x2160 demonstrates the impact of the game'due south postal service-process anti-aliasing at higher resolutions.

In a detailed urban surroundings filled with geometry, post-process anti-aliasing becomes even more important.

Once more than, an identical 3840x2160 comparison tin can exist perused. Note in particular the remaining aliasing on certain pieces of geometry, which survived 4K DSR and temporal anti-aliasing.

Operation: The Witcher three: Wild Hunt'due south anti-aliasing solution may exist mail-process, merely its temporal anti-aliasing component ramps upwards the operation cost, peculiarly at college resolutions.

Injectable SMAA and NVIDIA Command Panel FXAA are alternative anti-aliasing techniques for those seeking lower-price solutions, albeit without temporal anti-aliasing, which helps tackle the visible shimmering of the perpetually-in-move leafage at lower resolutions.

For all-time results, downsample from a higher resolution with NVIDIA Dynamic Super Resolution (DSR), and add FXAA or SMAA.

Unfortunately though, none of these alternative solutions can re-introduce

Bloom

Flower intensifies and improves the appearance of vivid lights, and the appearance of bight light bandage on a surface. Without Bloom, lighting can appear flat, and special furnishings slow.

Operation: Bloom is a postal service-processing technique and has a minor impact on performance, similar the bulk of the other mail service-process settings on offer.

Given the loss of fidelity seen in our comparison, Bloom's not something you'd wish to disable.

Blur & Motion Blur

If yous want to accentuate the speed of an attack or brute, or distort the screen when casting a spell, Blur & Movement Mistiness are your get-to settings. With "Blur", radial and Gaussian blur is introduced, and with "Motion Blur" we run into the introduction of general velocity-based blurring.

The precise performance bear on of the ii settings is tricky to define, but information technology would appear that together the ii settings price a few frames per 2nd in a fight.

Chromatic Aberration

Chromatic Aberration is an age-old visual artifact associated with cheaper camera lenses and improperly taken photos. In contempo years nevertheless, Chromatic Aberration has grown popular with game developers, much to the dismay of gamers who prefer cleaner images free of unsightly distortion. In the context of a photographer, or a security guard viewing the game world through a inexpensive camera, its use might make sense, but when playing in first or third person information technology merely suggests a trip to the optician is in society.

Thankfully, CD Projekt RED has made Chromatic Aberration an optional effect in The Witcher 3: Wild Chase, ensuring a clean, clear image is obtainable. When enabled, it distorts the picture slightly, but no where well-nigh the extent seen in other games featuring the upshot. This doesn't really come up through on screenshots, nonetheless.

Operation: Like other mail service-process effects, Chromatic Abnormality has a minute bear on on functioning, so low in fact that it's nearly invisible on our nautical chart (0.3 frames per 2nd average beyond multiple tests).

Depth of Field

The Depth of Field setting adds subtle out-of-focus blurring to distant detail, which can assist mask aliasing and lower-detail game elements seen on the horizon when using relatively low resolutions like 1920x1080 (the quality of distant item increases greatly with the resolution, as in simply virtually every other game).

Can't see the ever-and so-subtle divergence? Try this comparison:

Operation: Out in the open earth, Depth of Field costs less than two frames per second, simply on occasion its toll can increase if large swathes of close detail are blurred for stylistic effect during a cut scene.

Detail Level

With a name like "Detail Level" yous'd await this setting to adjust Level of Particular scaling, the amount of geometry that'south visible at any one time, or something else along those lines. Instead, information technology acts similarly to The Witcher 2'south 'Decals' setting, adjusting the visibility of blood spatter and other decals that are typically generated during gainsay.

In The Witcher iii, rather than disabling Decals, the setting but changes the distance from which they tin can exist seen.

Decals have an unnoticeable performance bear upon, and typically tin't be seen beyond a few feet anyhow due to the prevalence of foliage in almost all environments. As such, y'all can safely turn down this setting if you require a frame or ii extra in the largest of battles.

In the tweaking section we reveal how y'all can increment the visibility of the decals, the number of decals rendered simultaneously, and the visibility of other Detail Level settings that cannot exist changed in-game.

Foliage Visibility Range

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt utilizes the award-winning SpeedTree middleware to create detailed, varied forests, expansive fields of grass, and thick bushes throughout the game's world. Each piece of leafage sways realistically in accordance with the dynamic weather system, and is accurately lit, shaded, and shadowed.

When raising the Foliage Visibility setting, the maximum number of trees rendered at any one time is doubled at each detail level, primarily affecting the advent of distant views, and the detail level of these trees is increased. Similarly, the maximum rendering altitude and quality of grass and bushes is increased, as is the maximum rendering distance of Foliage Shadows (shadows cast past foliage).

Together, the various components of the Leaf Visibility setting take a considerable affect on visual fidelity, as demonstrated below in our interactive comparisons.

Operation: In the game's starting zone Foliage Visibility has a moderate performance cost. Once you striking the wide open landmasses with loma-tiptop views, however, its cost rockets, instantly making information technology the near expensive setting in the entire game (with the exclusion of HairWorks in combat encounters).

For most players, Medium's fidelity and rendering distances volition be adequate given the performance cost of High and Ultra, just if y'all tin, button for High for fully-formed fields and leafage shadows at decent distances.

Players with top-finish systems, meanwhile, volition want to check out our tweaking section to learn how to farther increment the visibility and quality of foliage.

Grass Density

As the proper name suggests, Grass Density adjusts the amount of grass yous'll see on the ground, simply even in the best case scenario the added density is minimal.

Operation: The minute amount of extra grass doesn't justify the loss of a further few frames per 2d, in our opinion. Instead, ameliorate results would exist accomplished past raising the Leaf Visibility setting.

If you accept the operation for Leaf Visibility and Grass Density you may wish to head on over to the tweaking section to find how to boost grass density beyond in-game limits.

Low-cal Shafts

Too known as God Rays and Crepuscular Rays, Calorie-free Shafts projection beams of light through leaf, into dark rooms through windows (meet recent Game of Thrones episodes for some splendid real life examples), and into darker areas through gaps in the geometry, equally highlighted in our interactive comparing below.

Performance: Light Shafts are postal service-process similar many other settings, and have a similarly small-scale impact on performance.

Lite Shafts add nicely to image quality, atmosphere and immersion, and are a must-have setting for any organisation.

Number of Background Characters

According to the game's config file, 'Number of Groundwork Characters' limits the number of NPCs simultaneously rendered to 75, 100, 130, or 150, depending on the item level chosen. To appointment we have been unable to find any location that features fifty-fifty 75 characters, let alone 150, so are unable to demonstrate the impact of this setting.

I has to assume a location where the setting is of utilise exists given its inclusion in the game. If yous discover it, delight permit u.s.a. know in the Comments section.

PhysX

NVIDIA PhysX is non an adjustable setting in The Witcher iii: Wild Hunt, but its implementation bears mention, every bit it adds dynamic cloth and destruction effects throughout the game on all platforms.

On PC, where CPUs are capable of far more calculations per second, these furnishings are more than realistic, incorporate additional particles, and persist for longer in the environment.

NVIDIA GameWorks Destruction

NVIDIA GameWorks Cloth

Shadow Quality

Hidden away within Shadow Quality'southward gubbins you lot'll find eleven options that modify the resolution of 3 shadow types, the visibility of shadows at 4 Level of Detail distances, the number of Cascaded Shadow Maps used, the quality of these Cascaded Shadow Maps, and the maximum number of visible terrain shadow atlas', which increase the quality of terrain shadowing.

Given the number of variables, Shadow Quality has a surprisingly insignificant bear upon on image quality, regardless of the scene tested.

Performance: Shadow Quality's performance cost is surprisingly slight given the many types of shadows and the number of shadows in the environment.

Digging deeper, ambitious level of detail options are revealed, which limit shadow rendering distances and shadow item to maintain breezy levels of performance. Thankfully, these limits can be overridden, every bit explained in our tweaking department.

Acuminate

If you lot've ever used Photoshop's prototype resize tool, SweetFX's paradigm adjustments, or something similar, yous'll be familiar with options to acuminate the picture, making everything that chip crisper, if slightly less natural in some circumstances. Here, the Sharpen setting enables yous to increment the crispness of the setting without the demand for the extra tools.

Not shown in screenshots is the increased temporal aliasing from the addition of the sharpening filter. This is peculiarly evident on blades of grass and other fine detail.

Operation: Acuminate's another postal service-processing choice with a negligible performance toll. In this case, half a frame per 2nd at the very most.

Terrain Quality

Terrain Quality is intended to increment the geometric detail of terrain surfaces through the application of tessellation, only in our supposedly-final build the setting has zippo impact in every one of the thirty-something locations tested.

One time it is working nosotros'll revisit this topic, as terrain tessellation is likely to have a noticeable bear upon on item levels throughout the game.

Texture Quality

Like other open globe games, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt employs a groundwork loading system, enabling you to travel freely across the game'south landmasses and oceans without encountering a single load screen. Unlike these other games, however, REDengine 3 manages to attain a high level of texture fidelity in these huge zones using as footling as 2GB of VRAM, enabling users of previous-generation GPUs to enjoy max-quality texturing.

On Depression, 1024x1024 textures are enabled, though there'due south also a double dose of Texture, Particular Texture and Atlas Texture downscaling, reducing VRAM usage at the expense of texture detail and clarity. Switching to Medium increases texture item to 2048x2048, and reduces the downscaling to 1x, marginally improving clarity. On Loftier, downscaling is dropped entirely, revealing max quality 2048x2048 textures, greatly improving paradigm quality.

On Ultra, there are no farther improvements to clarity or item, merely an increase in the memory budget, assuasive more textures to exist stored in memory at any given time. Running around on foot this makes little difference, only when galloping on horseback it minimizes the gamble of encountering the cruddy streaming-in of loftier-quality textures.

Much of The Witcher three: Wild Hunt'due south foliage is untouched by Texture Quality, leaving improvements to clarity and detail in the hands of NVIDIA Dynamic Super Resolution and NVIDIA Control Panel Anisotropic Filtering.

Update: As of patch v1.04, the in a higher place has inverse with the introduction of a Mipmap Bias variable that increases the sharpness of many game details on High and Ultra. The pros and cons of this characteristic, its visual impact, and information on how to tweak it can exist plant in the tweaking department.

Performance: With the introduction of Mipmap Bias, the performance cost of Texture Quality has increased considerably in v1.04. Before, operation between detail levels was minimal:

Now in that location's a much larger gap between settings, though this tin can exist mitigated by manually tweaking the Mipmap Bias.

Note: our old save no longer functions in v1.04, necessitating a new scene. Overall performance may be vastly different, simply the focus is the comparative performance between item levels. For the sake of thoroughness, we tested the revamped Texture Quality setting in multiple scenes and institute comparative performance to exist near-identical in each.

If you've got a 2GB GPU, High is the recommended setting. For those with more VRAM, select Ultra to shop additional textures in memory, minimizing the chance of visible streaming. You can also head on over to our tweaking section to further increase the memory budget on high-capacity cards.

Vignette

Our concluding Post Processing setting darkens the corners of the screen, which is squeamish if yous like that kind of thing.

Performance: Some other Post Processing setting, another minute functioning touch, though combined the toll of the numerous Post Processing settings certainly adds up.

Water Quality

Regardless of the setting chosen, the visual advent of water changes little in still ponds and lakes. Out in the oceans in wholly unsuitable boats, and on wind-swept lakes, the divergence between detail levels is immediately evident, with waves and ripples gaining increased particular as the setting is raised. Behind the scenes, it'south revealed that H2o Quality adjusts the DirectX xi Tessellation Gene of water, doubling the item level at every footstep.

On High and Ultra, h2o simulation is activated, enabling your boat to realistically bob up and down, and for Geralt to create ripples when swimming or wading through water. Without the simulation, things become real funky, with Geralt and boats unaffected by waves, as you can see below in our video clips.

Water simulation enabled

Water simulation disabled

Performance: Given the wackiness that occurs without water simulation, every player will want to aim for High. Luckily, its price is minimal.

Please note, Maxwell GPUs are up to three times faster at tessellation than previous-generation GPUs, decreasing the performance price of Water Quality on our latest range of graphics cards.

The Witcher 3: Wild Chase Tweaking

With an attainable configuration file at that place's plenty of opportunity to meddle with The Witcher 3: Wild Chase'southward settings, pushing them across their defined maximum values to further increment image quality, assuming you have the necessary hardware, of course.

First, configure in-game settings to your liking, then exit the game. Caput to C:UsersUSERNAMEDocumentsThe Witcher 3 and fill-in user.settings. Open user.settings with a text editor, such as Notepad++, and edit ane or more than of the values described below. Save your modified file, and in Windows Explorer right click on it, selecting Properties. Click "Read-just", and finally, "Employ". This will prevent The Witcher iii: Wild Hunt from overriding your changes, allowing you lot to enjoy the tweaked visuals.

Item Level Tweaks

The in-game Particular Level setting is limited to adjusting the visible range of static decals. In the config file yous can further increase their visibility, and the visibility of other related items, too.

[LevelOfDetail]
DecalsHideDistance= [Ultra value: eighty]
DynamicDecalsHideDistance= [Default value: 20]
DimmerHideDistance= [Default value: sixty]
StripeHideDistance= [Default value: 60]
SwarmHideDistance= [Default value: 200]

Nosotros're fairly certain that DynamicDecals are the blithe pools of blood that ooze out of slain monsters, but the other options we can only gauge at given the limited time bachelor to usa.

In another department of the config file you can increase the chance of decals spawning (not every sword strike results in an emitted decal on '1'), and increment the distance at which decals will spawn, assuasive distant enemies to emit claret spatter when hit.

[Rendering]
DecalsSpawnDistanceCutoff= [Default value: 10]
DecalsChance= [Default value: 1]

You can as well experiment with the cvMaxAllowedDecalsDynamic and cvMaxAllowedDecalsSS values under [Upkeep], which could event in an increased number of decals in large battles. Nosotros can't say for sure though considering battles and decal spawning are impossible to precisely replicate.

Foliage Quality Tweaks

If wish to increase the number of trees visible on the horizon, MaxVisibilityDepth would exist a safe bet, yous'd expect, seeing how it controls this exact function in the Leaf Visibility Range setting. Notwithstanding, higher values had zero impact in our testing, suggesting a difficult-coded limit.

[Leaf]
MaxVisibilityDepth= [Ultra value: 24]

Something that does work is pick to increase the rendering quality and visibility of trees via FoliageDistanceScale.

[Rendering/SpeedTree]
FoliageDistanceScale= [Ultra value: one]

In most scenarios, the impact of higher values is the addition of extra item on distant copse, and an increase of fidelity on leaves and smaller branches.

The hit to operation for such a minimal increment in image quality certainly isn't justified, making this tweak one for top-finish systems just.

You tin can besides effort to edit the cvMaxAllowedSpeedTree value nether [Budget], which may increase the number of loftier-quality SpeedTree trees rendered in the distance (at a certain point high-quality SpeedTree models are transitioned to lower-quality versions for performance reasons). To date we accept been unable to identify a location that benefits, but with more time you lot may. Do let us know if yous find a working instance.

Grass Quality Tweaks

The in-game Grass Density and Leafage Visibility Range settings arrange the visibility and allegiance of grass, and in the config file you can push things significantly further at the expense of many, many frames per second.

[Rendering/SpeedTree]
GrassDistanceScale= [Ultra value: ane]
GrassGenerationEfficiency= [Default value: 0.075] - Increases amount of grass when value reduced

The biggest improvement comes from GrassDistanceScale, which increases the rendering distance and quality of every bush-league, every blade of grass, every reed, and every weed.

As the interactive comparisons show, cranking upward GrassDistanceScale adds foliage across the valley until information technology hits a hard limit on the opposite slope.

A value of "iii" delivers good improvements with only a moderate performance cost, merely doubling that once more to "six" slaughters performance fifty-fifty on our mighty SLI TITAN X test system. At lower resolutions, "half dozen" would be playable, though much of the added detail would be obfuscated past the unavoidable reduction of clarity from decreasing the pixel count.

GrassGenerationEfficiency slightly increases the density of grass, most visibly around Geralt. The trade-off appears to exist less authentic grass placement, causing some tufts to clip through walls and other surfaces (not pictured).

The performance cost of GrassGenerationEfficiency is tiny; the question is, "practice you want thicker grass, or more authentic grass placement"?

If you have spare performance after ramping upwards grass' rendering quality, you can further increment Grass Density beyond the in-game 2400 'Ultra' value.

[Rendering]
GrassDensity= [Ultra value: 2400]

Unlike other settings where we tin can beneficially increment the detail level until the cows come home, or we hitting a hard-coded limit, here we run into a loss of foliage variety as the grass goes all "Day of the Triffids" and takes over the entire map.

At "4800" this scene looks pretty good, but in others "4800" continues to cause the overgrowth issue. At "3600", however, no issues were seen, and as such nosotros'd recommend information technology for anyone looking to increase the density of grass.

Mipmap Bias Tweak

v1.04 introduces TextureMipBias, a new [Rendering] setting that is tied to Texture Quality. If you're interested, the ins and outs of Mipmaps tin can be discovered here. For everyone else, the cliff notes: mipmaps are lower-resolution versions of textures that are utilized to increase performance and minimize VRAM employ. In the case of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, mipmaps are aggressively used for the innumerable layers of foliage that can exist seen for miles, and for just almost every other texture in the game. This improves performance and keeps VRAM requirements down, just results in some lower-quality foliage and surfaces in the immediate vicinity of Geralt.

Past reducing the bias, every bit this new setting does, higher-resolution mipmaps are loaded at near-range, and the rate at which mipmaps are scaled down across afar views is reduced, increasing visible detail considerably. Unfortunately, this also increases aliasing and shimmering on fine detail, such as the mesh shoulder pads of Geralt'southward starting armor, and the many thin pieces of swaying grass. As the bias is further reduced these problems intensify, though they can be somewhat mitigated past increasing the rendering resolution and by downsampling. As well, make sure to disable sharpening filters, which profoundly exacerbate these problems.

Beneath, nosotros demonstrate the visual impact of TextureMipBias at "0", the v1.03 level, and the level used on Low and Medium Texture Quality settings in v1.04; at "-0.4", the value used for High; at "-i.0", the value used for Ultra; and at "-2.0", our tweaked value. Focus primarily on the left side of the screen, paying detail attention to the thatched roofs, the tree and foliage near to them, and the trees before the river (concord downwardly ctrl and press + to overstate these sections for a ameliorate view).

If we were to proceed to decrease the bias, the distant copse on the other side of the river would be further improved, though the level of shimmering screen-broad would be intolerable.

Our second example demonstrates the reduced impact of the bias setting in urban environments, where objects are larger and mostly seen in closer proximity. If you magnify portions of the comparisons you volition note slightly increased detail on floors, walls, baskets, and other surfaces, and a particularly nice improvement on the houses' wooden panels and beams in the corner of the square.

What we can't adequately demonstrate in images or compressed video is the same shimmering, which is truly egregious as the bias is reduced below the default values. At 3840x2160, "-2.0" was just about OK, but at 1920x1080 it was an eyesore. Dropping downwards to "-one.0" was improve at 1920x1080, simply still a bit besides shimmery for our tastes. In contrast, "-0.4" offered little in the way of improvement. In the end, nosotros settled on "-1.0" for 3840x2160, and "-0.seven" for 1920x1080, though your opinion may differ, specially if you're using sharpness filters or injected anti-aliasing.

If you just want things back the way they were, whilst retaining maximum-quality texturing, simply set TextureMipBias to "0" to render to v1.03's await and feel.

Y'all may likewise wish to set up the new value to "0" to avoid the added performance toll TextureMipBias, which comes to a little over 5 frames per second at 3840x2160:

In conclusion, TextureMipBias delivers decent improvements to texture allegiance and overall image quality when used in moderation, and is a fantastic tool for making incredible bullshots when cranked way, way up.

NVIDIA HairWorks Tweak

Equally already revealed, NVIDIA HairWorks in The Witcher three: Wild Hunt utilizes Multisample Anti-Aliasing (MSAA) to reduce cruddy aliasing artifacts on Geralt's dynamic hair. By adding HairWorksAALevel= under [Rendering], y'all can manually conform the level of anti-aliasing, trading image quality for functioning. Valid values are 8 (8xMSAA), 4 (4xMSAA), 2 (2xMSAA), and 0 (Off).

The visual impact of irresolute this setting can be seen below.

By modifying the setting yous tin gain a few actress frames per 2nd on Maxwell GPUs, and a few farther frames per second on other cards that lack the MSAA rendering enhancements of our latest compages.

In motion, aliasing artifacts are particularly evident beneath 4xMSAA, and equally such nosotros'd recommend going no lower in the search for faster operation.

Particle Tweak

It's unclear if this is operation, only under [Upkeep] you tin can alter cvMaxAllowedParticlesCount=, potentially increasing the number particles rendered. Our tests suggest information technology may, but given the difficulty in creating 1:1 tests for a dynamic game chemical element it's difficult to say with certainty.

Shadow Quality Tweaks

As mentioned earlier, Shadow Quality modifies a ton of values, just its in-game maximums are express. Via the config file, we can take full command of these many values and creepo them way upwards, far beyond their 'Ultra' levels. Alternatively, one could edit them to retain 'Ultra' shadows, simply with a reduced Leaf Shadow value to improve performance, for example.

Here's an overview of Shadow Quality's settings and how you can dispense them for improved shadow fidelity:

[Rendering]
CascadeShadowFadeTreshold= [Ultra Value: one] - Subtract the value to improve the maximum view altitude of shadows
CascadeShadowDistanceScale0= [Ultra Value: one] - Increase the value to meliorate the quality of close-range shadows
CascadeShadowDistanceScale1= [Ultra Value: ane] - Increment the value to ameliorate the quality and visibility of close and medium-range shadows
CascadeShadowDistanceScale2= [Ultra Value: 1.5] - Increase the value to improve the quality and visibility of distant shadows
MaxTerrainShadowAtlasCount= [Ultra Value: four] - Increase the value to potentially improve the quality of terrain shadows
CascadeShadowmapSize= [Ultra Value: 3072] - Increase the value to slightly better the fidelity of shadows
CascadeShadowQuality= [Ultra Value: ane] - Increase the value to slightly better the fidelity of shadows

Foliage shadows are linked to the in-game Leaf Visibility Range setting, merely tin be independently modified in the config file for greater control of fidelity and performance.

[Rendering/SpeedTree]
FoliageShadowDistanceScale= [Ultra Value: 54] - Increment the value to enable a few extra trees, bushes, and grass clumps to cast shadows

Beneath, interactive comparisons and functioning charts demonstrate the improvements and mensurate the cost of each tweak.

CascadeShadowDistanceScale0 is one of the more impactful tweaks, greatly improving the allegiance of shut range shadows with just a small functioning touch on.

Similar its sibling, CascadeShadowDistanceScale1 nicely improves shadows, though in its case the benefits are less clearly or equally oftentimes seen.

Given the right lighting weather condition, CascadeShadowDistanceScale2 can considerably improve the fidelity of distant views.

CascadeShadowmapSize increases the accurateness of shadowing, which in some circumstances can ground small-scale objects to the terrain through a newly-connecting shadow. In most areas though, the benefits are low. If you've got the performance, nonetheless, you may as well increment the setting to at least "4096" to make things that bit improve.

CascadeShadowQuality works best in concert with CascadeShadowmapSize, further improving the particular and accuracy of shadows throughout the game.

Our concluding shadow tweak enables additional bushes, copse, and clumps of grass to cast shadows on other game elements.

If you're applying all of the shadow tweaks presented above, be prepare for greatly reduced performance. Our advice: utilize tweaks to the more visible close and medium-range shadows first, evaluate performance, and if there's still plenty in the tank continue tweaking.

Texture Streaming Tweaks

Earlier, we revealed that the Ultra Texture Quality setting merely increases the maximum number of textures stored in video retention, minimizing the hazard of visible texture streaming. To increase this number, edit TextureMemoryBudget= in the [Rendering] section.

[Rendering]
TextureMemoryBudget= [Ultra Value: 800]

Several other values are likewise editable, supposedly increasing the distance at which characters, character heads, and general textures are streamed in, though we observed no do good even with values doubled.

[Rendering]
TextureStreamingCharacterDistanceLimit= [Default Value: l]
TextureStreamingHeadsDistanceLimit= [Default Value: 10]
TextureStreamingDistanceLimit= [Default Value: 40000]

Tweaking Wrap-Up

Above we've documented what we believe to exist the most useful of tweaks, improving image quality in the vast majority of scenes. Testing time has been limited though, so nosotros can't rule other options just still. For case, many cvMaxAllowed settings under [Budget] prove promise, merely in brief tests we've been unable to discern any paradigm quality improvement. With more time we can undertake comprehensive testing of every setting, and with other PC enthusiasts too evaluating they're worth we're hopeful further tweaks volition be found. If they are we'll document them hither, and so be certain to let usa know in the comments if an improvement is identified elsewhere on the Net.

Using the tweaks verified so far, we've already gained a considerable amount of particular as the interactive comparisons below demonstrates.

Game Prepare The Witcher iii: Wild Chase Driver

For the best The Witcher three: Wild Hunt experience we recommend updating to the new The Witcher three: Wild Hunt GeForce Game Set up Drivers. Included are the latest functioning optimizations and tweaks for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, too a SLI profile, maximizing performance on multi-GPU systems. Download from GeForce.com, or via GeForce Experience.

SLI scaling in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt at 3840x2160

NVIDIA Control Dynamic Super Resolution

To amp up your graphics even further, actuate Dynamic Super Resolution (DSR) to receive up to 4K-quality graphics on your Hd monitor. How it works is uncomplicated: uniform games, such as The Witcher 3: Wild Chase, are rendered at a higher, more than detailed resolution, and the paradigm intelligently shrunk dorsum down to the resolution of your monitor using a custom-fabricated filter, giving you up to 4K-quality graphics on your screen. The video below explains more, and the images bear witness how to actuate the setting in the NVIDIA Command Console.

With DSR enabled, textures benefit from improved clarity, aliasing is almost entirely eliminated, objects take ameliorate definition, vegetation is more detailed, and distant game elements are significantly clearer. If you've used DSR in other games yous'll know of these benefits already, only if you oasis't had the adventure hither's a look at how The Witcher three: Wild Hunt's graphics calibration with rendering resolutions.

Interactive Comparisons
1920x1080 vs. 2103x1183	1920x1080 vs. 2351x1323	1920x1080 vs. 2560x1440
1920x1080 vs. 2715x1527	1920x1080 vs. 2880x1620	1920x1080 vs. 3325x1871
	1920x1080 vs. 3840x2160

Interactive Comparisons
1920x1080 vs. 2103x1183	1920x1080 vs. 2351x1323	1920x1080 vs. 2560x1440
1920x1080 vs. 2715x1527	1920x1080 vs. 2880x1620	1920x1080 vs. 3325x1871
	1920x1080 vs. 3840x2160

If you have the operation, increasing the rendering resolution in The Witcher three: Wild Chase delivers an impressive range of improvements that affect nearly every game element and scene. Together with the game'southward temporal anti-aliasing solution, almost all jagged edges are removed, and at that place's minimal temporal aliasing, giving players a highly detailed, super shine, flicker free experience.

NVIDIA Control Console Anisotropic Filtering

If yous wish to sharpen afar textures and those viewed on an angle, forcibly enable High Quality Anisotropic Filtering (AF) via the NVIDIA Command Console, like and so:

In-game, a clear improvement can be seen on soil and dirt, on foliage, on distant copse, and on certain man-made surfaces.

Overclocking

If you lot need actress performance, overclocking your GPU will pay dividends in The Witcher iii: Wild Hunt. Learn how with the help of GeForce Garage.

GeForce Experience: Optimal Playable Settings With A Single Click

The best way to configure and apply The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt'south settings on your system is through GeForce Experience, an invaluable tool for all GeForce GTX users. In addition to optimizing over 250 games, the free GeForce Feel application can automatically update drivers and profiles, record and stream gameplay with ShadowPlay, and wirelessly stream PC games, including The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, to NVIDIA SHIELD devices.

Taking into business relationship your GPU and CPU, likewise as many additional factors, GeForce Experience's game recommendations can exist applied with a single click, and are updated over time should developer patches and NVIDIA drivers improve operation farther withal. This 1-click solution is perfect for gamers who wish to play instead of fiddling, and for those with piddling feel in configuring settings for an optimal experience.

The Witcher iii: Wild Hunt: A Task Well Washed

With 100 hours of gameplay, plus free DLC and two upcoming expansion packs,The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is likely the merely RPG yous'll need in 2015. Reviews for console versions are glowing, and when the avant-garde graphics, improved controls, and modding options are factored into forthcoming evaluations of the PC edition, it's entirely possible that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt volition be crowned equally the best ever RPG. And let's non forget, with its extensive graphics options and config file tweaks, information technology volition give your system a good run for its money all the way into 2016 and beyond.

If you've yet to get The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, do so at present from GOG or Steam. Alternatively, grab the 'Two Times The Adventure' NVIDIA GeForce GTX graphics carte du jour package, which includes a costless copy of The Witcher iii: Wild Hunt, and next month's Batman: Arkham Knight.

Take questions about The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt PC, or thoughts on this guide? Allow us know in the Comments section below.

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Source: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/news/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide/