Support NeoGAF

[Skyzard]

I don't know this gameplay preview from last year looks a lot better than the current build.

https://youtu.be/N4ony2r0QFs?t=8m44s

Yeah it does look better, not as good but better. Maybe they switched from PC to PS4.

or, much more likely, they were running on outrageous hardware. i dev on a pc with quad titan x video cards, as an example.

That makes sense, the graphics weren't miles beyond reach like Battlefront so I can believe that. Jealous of course, but it's still sleezy when they made it look like achievable gameplay graphics [for 99.99% of people].
No way they believed they could optimise it to that level.

 

[LostMyNarbles]

As I mentioned on a previous page this trailer was released August last year and the game doesn't look close to the same. It looks like it lost that "Realistic" effect in favor of a lot more color Dragon Age Inquisition style. It's like they changed the whole art style.

https://youtu.be/N4ony2r0QFs?t=42

I mean, I have the game preordered so I'll hold my full judgement until I get to play it and get to those areas in the game, but from the videos I've seen they just don't look close to the same thing.

 

[shandy706]

To compare with the gif in the OP

It's a pretty massive downgrade.

That comparison doesn't work (and I think things have been lessened a bit)

The time of day alone in the two gifs makes them look different. The view distance, trees, even the fog in the distance is in both shots. Not a good comparison.

 

[Vamphuntr]

Holy shit I just noticed the hair on the monster as it charges.

I like the look of this downgrade.

Isn't it using Nvidia's hairworks? I thought it was considered an Ultra setting? I doubt most version will look like this.

 

[Krejlooc]

wait...WHAT??

while many people are overreacting to the whole thing..they are still developers selling a game to us..if they lied when advertising the game,they deserve any backlash they got and they will get

we really should start behaving like customers that have rights and not as paladins of developer and publishers

Are they still using that old footage right now? no.

Is their old footage preceded with the usual disclaimer that "this is a work in progress and not indicative of the final product"? Yes.

Then how did they "lie"?

 

[Intheflorsh]

A downgrade sounds good to me, now I don't have to suffer the indignity of using low settings.

 

[Meffer]

the graphics may have been downgraded, but the biggest thing is the change in art style.

went from dark and gritty to quite colorful.

IMO that will help the game age better over time.

 

[jim-jam bongs]

Some things look better, some things look worse. At the moment I'd call it sidegraded rather than downgraded, though I reserve the right to adjust my opinion once I play it.

 

[Valnen]

And these gifs aren't exactly small.

They're not 1920x1080.

 

[Mass_Pincup]

What am I supposed to explain? do you think I work for CDPR or something to give you and statement, even if they are denying it I don't expect a game to look the same after a year of development.

I think that lying about how your product is going to be is false advertisement.

They tried to bullshit their way out of it and they are rightfully getting called out for it.

 

[dakun]

This is so fucking ridiculous. Things change during development. These people owe you NOTHING. Mother of god, watching people react this way is just sad.

while i agree with the first part of your post.. it's ridiculous to say that the people who make and promote this game don't owe customers who pay for their game the very game that was advertised to them..

now you can argue whether or not a downgrade of graphics should be considered false advertising.. some people do. And i can't fault them for it considering CD Projekt Red still has those "gameplay" videos up on its youtube channel ending with a "pre-order here" link embedded

 

[Femmeworth]

Nothing says objective comparison like compressed images and .gifs made from compressed video.

 

[XANDER CAGE]

Yes but they're more representative of the actual game than compressed screenshots. This is what the game looks like.

They're practically just as disingenuous, just going the other direction.

Talking about changes between reveal and release footage is interesting, but if this thread descends into nothing but comparing poorly compressed screenshots designed to make the game look worse and downscaled gifs designed to make it look better, I'm gonna lock it.

Discuss the changes by all means, but let's not fling shit at each other from Castle Bad Grafix and Castle Best Grafix, please.

 

[Mechanized]

This is so fucking ridiculous. Things change during development. These people owe you NOTHING. Mother of god, watching people react this way is just sad.

Actually, as a business, they owe everyone truth in advertising.

 

[hey_it's_that_dog]

The camera is different.

The old camera is more cinematic,is closer and shows off more detail,making everything seem bigger and more visceral.

The new camera compromised the cinematic quality of the game ,but it may be better from a functional gameplay perspective.

I think you make a very good point about the camera contributing to the difference in these shots, but the rendering quality is clearly different.

Do we know for sure they are the same area in the game, though? They don't look that similar in terms of geometry, so it could be a poor comparison for that reason.

edit: after looking more carefully, they look similar enough to be the same area

 

[Inuhanyou]

A games's development process yields changes! What a shock!

Yes OP, the graphics did change to yield higher performance dividends(on console and elsewhere most likely), but the Witcher 3 still is an absolutely beautiful game.

I can't think of many games that don't change during development in this way. Some times we see the change in trailers, other times not

 

[tuxfool]

Come on man, the downgrade is pretty darn obvious, even considering compression in the mix.

Doesn't matter. The issue is ostensibly about visual quality.

How can somebody complaining about visual quality be taken seriously if they don't care enough to post screenshots that are an accurate representation of what should be shown on screen as opposed to a compressed mess?

 

[Primethius]

I'm not sure why admitting a game got downgraded is inconsistent with thinking the game still looks good.

Shocker, yes the game still looks good. Fantastic even. In fact, it looks downright amazing. But that's not inconsistent with also acknowledging that certain aspects might have been downgraded.

Now, I don't agree with the OP pictures because they are awful quality and not entirely proper for a comparison. But in regards to something like the foliage, it's immediately noticeable the difference in quality.

Acknowledging that doesn't somehow automatically make someone as one who thinks the game looks like shit.

 

[Acerac]

WHen I get the game, I will crank up the contrast, desaturate the image, and pump up that post-sharpen.

Then it will be reupgraded according to this thread.

Yup. That is the only difference. Everything else looks exactly as good.

 

[artsi]

Game got downgraded good, not a shocker. It's weird though how people won't admit it since it's the almighty CDPR.

I don't care for the downgrade, content is king, but it's sad to see some people in denial that it's because of YouTube compression, or CDPR still has a setting in the game that makes everything look better.

Downgrade happened but it's still looking good enough.

 

[StrongBlackVine]

The game doesn't look great now, it just looks okay. Like an average game like we all knew (deep down) how it'd look.


We get it, you guys don't care about graphics (yeah right).

I care about graphics, but this looks good enough where it's not an issue.

 

[draetenth]

I hate these downgrade threads. It's so hard to tell who's serious and who's trolling. :/

Don't really get the comments about "if this were Ubisoft people would be upset, but people are defending CDPR". I think as many people comment on that as there are people who are defending CDPR. Most people seem to be saying downgrade (some say only a little, some say a lot) or that they don't care (do these count as people defending CDPR?).

Some of those pics look really bad, but unless I know what platforms they are on, I don't really want to make too big of an issue about it.

 

[Pharaoh 117]

I'm not sure why admitting a game got downgraded is inconsistent with thinking the game still looks good.

Shocker, yes the game still looks good. Fantastic even. In fact, it looks downright amazing. But that's not inconsistent with also acknowledging that certain aspects might have been downgraded.

Now, I don't agree with the OP pictures because they are awful quality and not entirely proper for a comparison. But in regards to something like the foliage, it's immediately noticeable the difference in quality.

Acknowledging that doesn't somehow automatically make someone as one who thinks the game looks like shit.

.

 

[Nesther]

So consoles don't get that fabulous monster hair tech? That's a shame, it looks incredible.

 

[Crossing Eden]

They're not 1920x1080.

Neither are the gifs in the OP. But here's the video link if you want to see it uncompressed.
http://www.gamersyde.com/hqstream_the_witcher_3_wild_hunt_dev_diary_3-34597_en.html

 

[Hrothgar]

I think that lying about how your product is going to be is false advertisement.

I agree, but luckily CDProject have been showing what the shipped product (on PC) will look like for a year now, so no false advertisement there.

 

[1st Course]

To compare with the gif in the OP

It's a pretty massive downgrade.

Yeah lighting clearly was downgraded.

I knew that 2013 was too good to be true, but still was hoping they would hit close at least.

 

[Majukun]

Are they still using that old footage right now? no.

Is their old footage predicated with the usual disclaimer that "this is a work in progress and not indicative of the final product"? Yes.

Then how did they "lie"?

development usually should work the other way..you start bad,then you get better..but nowadays the opposite happens,first they show you shiny things they know they will never be able to deliver,then they shrug and just start with the real graphics and textures..and in the meanwhile they have still benefit from all that good press,people posting gifs on neogaf and what not.

if that is not dishonest for you...well good for you,I find it a bullshit practice (one of the many in the modern videogame industry) that we should stop forgiving publisher and develpers for..especially since the one who need to be defended nowadays it's the customer..otherwise they will never stop,they will just coontinue pushing the boundaries of how much they can get away with.

 

[tuxfool]

Isn't it using Nvidia's hairworks? I thought it was considered an Ultra setting? I doubt most version will look like this.

So? Did people really expect those gifs from the trailer to run on a ps4?

 

[Turkoop]

I hate these downgrade threads. It's so hard to tell who's serious and who's trolling. :/

Don't really get the comments about "if this were Ubisoft people would be upset, but people are defending CDPR". I think as many people comment on that as there are people who are defending CDPR. Most people seem to be saying downgrade (some say only a little, some say a lot) or that they don't care (do these count as people defending CDPR?).

Some of those pics look really bad, but unless I know what platforms they are on, I don't really want to make too big of an issue about it.

.

 

[StrongBlackVine]

It might "look great" but downgrades still deserve to be called out, especially when the developer claims one didn't happen.

Called out for what? Every one who wants to buy this game will get a chance to see what it looks like before releases. CD Projekt Red has absolutely nothing to apologize or be held accountable for.

 

[exmachina64]

We'll talk about the game when we get to play it, don't worry. The game still manages to look gorgeous for an open world game, but the foliage in general took a big hit. They obviously had that higher quality foliage somewhere and if they didn't put that in then it probably was too much for the systems to handle.

The higher quality foliage was never real, it was made for a vertical slice presentation.

To be clear, what you call higher quality foliage was "lower-tier" (grass and brush) made out of geometry instead of being sprites and transparencies. All of that added geometry would come at a significant cost. We will never see games move over to geometry-based foliage until that becomes the minimum shippable product in the relatively distant future when it doesn't come at a high performance cost.

 

[Valnen]

So? Did people really expect those gifs from the trailer to run on a ps4?

Considering what Sony promised, yes.

Called out for what? Every one who wants to buy this game will get a chance to see what it looks like before releases. CD Projekt Red has absolutely nothing to apologize or be held accountable for.

The claimed there was no downgrade, when there absolutely was.

 

[SomedayTheFire]

All games will be. It's marketing, sales. You promise the world, then sell it. Same reason McDonalds burgers look nothing like the advertising photos. The outrage is usually hilarious

 

[Apoleptica]

I wonder why CD projekt red went through with the downgrade. It's clear they had a much prettier looking game running in 2013, couldn't they just leave those settings, textures, assets, etc in the game and set that as the ultra graphical setting and let the pc gamers worry about whether or not their pc's could handle it? It seems like they took out whatever a single 980 gtx couldn't handle at 1080 60 fps. I have a feeling they didn't want the pc version with high settings to look like an entirely different game compared with the console versions. Similar to the story we had with ubisoft and watchdogs where they gimped the game on pc so that the differences between the pc and console versions weren't as extreme.

 

[XxRampage07xX]

I care about graphics, but this looks good enough where it's not an issue.

Watch_Dogs looked good too, yet that game received tons of shit.

 

[Vamphuntr]

So? Did people really expect those gifs from the trailer to run on a ps4?

I was just saying to people not to expect that from most PC/consoles. Don't really care about the PS4.

 

[Krejlooc]

development usually should work the other way..you start bad,then you get better

that's not how development works at all. You can't just wave a magic wand and produce more from less. You don't generate new detail out of thin air. Going backwards is how it always works.

 

[StrongBlackVine]

I can only imagine the thread if Half Life 3 were revealed and then a couple years later suffers a big graphics downgrade like this.

A downgrade is a downgrade. No matter the developer.

If I remember correctly were you shitting up the Bloodborne threads with this same type of talk? Seems to be your thing. Do you even play games? Correct me if it wasn't you.

 

[Kriken]

I'm not sure why admitting a game got downgraded is inconsistent with thinking the game still looks good.

Shocker, yes the game still looks good. Fantastic even. In fact, it looks downright amazing. But that's not inconsistent with also acknowledging that certain aspects might have been downgraded.

Now, I don't agree with the OP pictures because they are awful quality and not entirely proper for a comparison. But in regards to something like the foliage, it's immediately noticeable the difference in quality.

Acknowledging that doesn't somehow automatically make someone as one who thinks the game looks like shit.

I agree, the game still looks amazing, not as good as those previous trailers, but still one of the best looking games this year`

 

[Pop]

Yeah lighting clearly was downgraded.

I knew that 2013 was too good to be true, but still was hoping they would hit close at least.

I glad they toned down the bloom. That seconded gif, yikes

 

[Clarkus Darkus]

And yet still i'll go WOW at E3 and get brainwashed again by trailers using " ingame engine etc "

I'll never learn.

Clearly been downgraded, But still looks fantastic, If a little too similar to DAI now.

 

[-tetsuo-]

It is what CDPR gets fir showcasing the game in a state that it will never look. If you are tired of hearing about it, then why enter the thread? The game clearly and obviously looks worse. Yes, it still looks good but that isn't the point.

 

[Valnen]

If I remember correctly were you shitting up the Bloodborne threads with this same type of talk? Seems to be your thing. Do you even play games? Correct me if it wasn't you.

I was pretty unhappy with the heavy aliasing in the videos compared to the bullshots they were releasing, yes.

Why do you have a problem with criticism of a game's visuals?

 

[Angel_DvA]

It won't have the same hate cause they aren't Ubisoft but if someone think that The Witcher 3 looks as good as their reveal/first videos, they're delusional.

 

[His Majesty]

development usually should work the other way..you start bad,then you get better..but nowadays the opposite happens,first they show you shiny things they know they will never be able to deliver,then they shrug and just start with the real graphics and textures..and in the meanwhile they have still benefit from all that good press,people posting gifs on neogaf and what not.

Makes more sense to start with the best assets and then when you hit some bumps you start optimizing the game. Probably what happened here too.

 

[Hypron]

Called out for what? Every one who wants to buy this game will get a chance to see what it looks like before releases. CD Projekt Red has absolutely nothing to apologize or be held accountable for.

This. It would be worth being called out if all the pre-release footage looked super good and then suddenly when you play the final game it looks massively inferior. This is not the case, we've gotten representative footage of the game for months. And the Sword of Destiny trailer didn't even look that much better, it had some sharpening going on and some carefully picked time of the day which made the biggest difference.

 

[dakun]

that's not how development works at all. You can't just wave a magic wand and produce more from less. You don't generate new detail out of thin air. Going backwards is how it always works.

all the years of seeing pre-alpha videos of games in development proves that wrong.. Games start out simply in graphical fidelity and are improved over time. Usually through improvements in hardware (PC) or just simple optimization

 

[Jedi2016]

Every one who wants to buy this game will get a chance to see what it looks like before releases.

Will? Shit, if people don't know what the game looks like until they play it, they deserve whatever surprises they get. There's damn near enough footage out there right now to watch a couple hours a night until release.

 

[TronLight]

I wonder why CD projekt red went through with the downgrade. It's clear they had a much prettier looking game running in 2013, couldn't they just leave those settings, textures, assets, etc in the game and set that as the ultra graphical setting and let the pc gamers worry about whether or not their pc's could handle it? It seems like they took out whatever a single 980 gtx couldn't handle at 1080 60 fps. I have a feeling they didn't want the pc version with high settings to look like an entirely different game compared with the console versions. Similar to the story we had with ubisoft and watchdogs where they gimped the game on all versions so that the differences between the versions weren't as extreme.

Just because they showed some areas it doesn't mean that they had the FULL game done with that quality.

Still, I'm still skeptical, I'll only judge when the game is out and people on gaf start posting screen on ultra with no compression.