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The Witcher 2: Performance Thread [Enhanced Edition Patch - New content & 100+ fixes]

Darkkn

Member
With my i5 2500k, HD5770, 4GB combo game runs quite well, but if they could optimize the game a little bit more it would be awesome, since right now i'm getting 25-35 fps on ultra @1080p. Would be awesome if i could get 30 as a min fps.

Just turned on SSAO and unlike in many other games, it really makes the world more believable. It's the kind of effect that isn't fancy and mindblowing but it's really nice to have. Too bad it takes quite a lot of resources to enable..

Only disappointing aspect in the graphics department is shadow dithering. I wish they would let people to go crazy with shadow resolutions to get rid of that stuff if that is even possible with this shadowing technique. These kind of shadows didn't look good on GTA 4 and i wonder why devs choose this particular style...
 
cleveridea said:
I have a 1.5GB 460M should I set Texture Size to Very Large or Large?

And I often get flicking on minor items like a tiny portion of hair, or say on the ends of pieces of wood - is this because my texture memory isnt enough for my setting? Its usually not a big deal, just odd.

Set it to Very Large. Actually, just use one of my custom configs.


Darkkn said:
With my i5 2500k, HD5770, 4GB combo game runs quite well, but if they could optimize the game a little bit more it would be awesome, since right now i'm getting 25-35 fps on ultra @1080p. Would be awesome if i could get 30 as a min fps.

Just turned on SSAO and unlike in many other games, it really makes the world more believable. It's the kind of effect that isn't fancy and mindblowing but it's really nice to have. Too bad it takes quite a lot of resources to enable..

Only disappointing aspect in the graphics department is shadow dithering. I wish they would let people to go crazy with shadow resolutions to get rid of that stuff if that is even possible with this shadowing technique. These kind of shadows didn't look good on GTA 4 and i wonder why devs choose this particular style...


The dithering was really an odd choice, but it'll remain regardless of the shadow resolution chosen. You can go crazy with shadow resolution if you want.

I'm hoping the devs will offer an alternate shadow rendering method and that they'll optimize SSAO performance. I'm going to to try to make a custom config for my 6970M which will allow great performance with SSAO enabled, perhaps if I tweak the shadow settings I can keep great image quality without having SSAO rape my FPS.

I won't be able to do that until Tuesday though because fucking Fedex Ground won't let me pick up my m17x r3 at their facility 20 mins away on a Saturday, and they won't deliver it until Tuesday.
 
I know this is slightly off topic bbut I'm curious. Should this game be ported to the 360 as rumors suggest and be given better than expectd effort, what mix and match of settings do you think CDP will settle for? in terms like shadows = medium and things like that?
 

Pimpbaa

Member
BoobPhysics101 said:
Turn SSAO and AA off, and turn everything else (sans uber on). Watch your FPS go way up. :)

Honestly, SSAO and AA are the BIGGEST performance hogs out of all the [non-uber] settings (20-40% FPS loss), and they have the worst eye-candy:performance ratio. Turning those off first and enabling everything else usually results in a much better looking, performing game than with other stuff off and those two on.

Regarding AA, this seems to be true of any game that uses deferred rendering (AA being too much of a performance hit for midrange cards).
 

Aeana

Member
I dunno... in most games I can't really see the benefit of SSAO, but in this game, it seems to add tons of depth to the environments. They look much flatter with it off.
 

Rufus

Member
Aeana said:
I dunno... in most games I can't really see the benefit of SSAO, but in this game, it seems to add tons of depth to the environments. They look much flatter with it off.
Agree, unfortunately it's too much of a performance hit for my 4890. Still looks and runs great with BoobPhysics' high config for 1GB cards.
 

Salaadin

Member
Aeana said:
I dunno... in most games I can't really see the benefit of SSAO, but in this game, it seems to add tons of depth to the environments. They look much flatter with it off.

I agree. I actually deal with the performance hit because it looks THAT much nicer.
 
Minsc said:
Updated OP to include BoobPhysics excellent user.ini tweaking guide! Many people have reported fps gains from following it, thanks for putting it together.

Thanks man, just glad to help the community out. I guess all of those hours spent tweaking Red Alert 2 ini files as an 11 year old kid back in the day are finally paying off. Back then I was making custom units which included teleporting monkeys that threw lasers instead of their own crap, so I suppose i've come a long way.

If someone else doesn't do it first, I might try to takei some screenshots to showcase FPS gain and/or imge quality improvements with my custom configs vs CDP's settings. If anyone else has the inclination to do that, feel free. Really curious to see the results.
 
Aeana said:
I dunno... in most games I can't really see the benefit of SSAO, but in this game, it seems to add tons of depth to the environments. They look much flatter with it off.


how much of a hit is the SSAO?
 

Aeana

Member
Kabuki Waq said:
how much of a hit is the SSAO?
For me it seems to be about 10-15 FPS depending on what I'm looking at. But since I'm using Dxtory to limit the framerate to 30, it doesn't actually affect me at all since I never go below 30.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
I seen your post Exodus. I'm gonna find a similar lit scene and do 1 more compare as you are right, there are things that are more sharp but I will say this again, having uber on 1 does not show any different.

My current ini that I will be using....

[Rendering]
AllowAntialias=1
AllowBloom=0
AllowBlur=1
AllowCutsceneDOF=1
AllowDOF=1
AllowDecals=1.0
AllowMotionBlur=0
AllowRain=1
AllowSSAO=1
AllowScatterDOF=1
AllowShafts=1
AllowSharpen=1
AllowVignette=1
AtlasTextureDownscale=0
DanglesLimiter=0
DetailTextureDownscale=0
FoliageDistanceScale=1.6
Fullscreen=1
MaxAtlasTextureSize=4096
MaxCubeShadowCount=2
MaxCubeShadowSize=2048
MaxSpotShadowCount=4
MaxSpotShadowSize=2048
MaxTextureSize=2048
MeshDistanceScale=2.2
ShadowQuality=3
ShadowedLights=3
TextureDownscale=0
TextureMemoryBudget=1200
UberSampling=1
VSync=0
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
Uber 0

witcher22011-05-2820-5i78r.png


1

witcher22011-05-2821-0z7do.png


2

witcher22011-05-2821-0e7hz.png


How do you use that sharpen option some are mentioning?
 
rabhw said:
Upgraded to the latest AMD hotfix drivers.

The good: I'm now locked at 60fps (vsynced) with 6950's in CFX. 30fps locked with ubersampling on. 1920x1200, ultra, etc etc.

The bad: As others have reported, major issues with light sources as seen in some screenshots I took:

http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/560909687230466164/05918ECD54AB609EE95E20CDBE99CD1D195DA8FD/
http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/560909687230501505/B4CEC7E0D0FAEC4734B611B0EDE3DEE1ACFD3107/
http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/560909687230500228/3E12EF1B43A5BA9E38FEB50A8A1985765955C6E6/

No spoilers in pics. Besides the quest log in the top right, don't read that :)

Edit: Just tried with bloom off, same thing.
Edit 2: Also tried with RadeonPro closed (was forcing 16xAF), still the same thing.

AMD's incompetence continues!

Did anyone find a solution to this? I wasn't having this problem at first but now I am and it's really freaking annoying.
 

Coldsnap

Member
Does the pause menu take 5-6 seconds to show up for anyone else? Like press pause, game freezes for 5 seconds pause menu pops up...
 

Darkkn

Member
Coldsnap said:
Does the pause menu take 5-6 seconds to show up for anyone else? Like press pause, game freezes for 5 seconds pause menu pops up...
Your savegames folder is probably huge and game takes few seconds to read the data. Remove all unnecessary saves and you are good to go. http://www.gog.com/en/forum/the_witcher_2/savegame_cleanup_utility/page1

Hopefully they change it so that save data gets fetched only when you go to load menu and not in general pause menu.
 
Coldsnap said:
Does the pause menu take 5-6 seconds to show up for anyone else? Like press pause, game freezes for 5 seconds pause menu pops up...

Yeah, as the poster above said--you need to delete some of the files from your saved game folder.
 
Aeana can you describe an example where you can see SSAO making a big difference? Eg something in the prologue (I started a new game and deleted my old saves)

I dont see any difference using it except a drop in FPS...
 

knitoe

Member
EternalGamer said:
Did anyone find a solution to this? I wasn't having this problem at first but now I am and it's really freaking annoying.
Solution is to go back to 11.5a drivers or put up with it.
 
knitoe said:
Solution is to go back to 11.5a drivers or put up with it.

I found another easier solution; I just went into Catalyst and disabled Crossfire. I know I lose the extra performance, but I was getting 60fps anyway.

This completely eliminated the problem as the problem seems to only apply to CrossFire.
 

mileS

Member
I don't have that lighting issue but I did notice the lights from candles when on a table or something will light up underneath it, almost like the tables not even there. Best place to test it is inside the bar in Flotsam.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
scitek said:
What's this about Uber set to 2? I didn't know there was a 2.
2 is basically uber - on.

1 is supposed to be this workaround to make it look like uber is on but without the performance hit. The first 2 shots were the same FR wise. The shot with ubersampling=2 was about half the FR.
 

LiK

Member
The custom user.ini definitely looks better. smoother hair etc. i was curious why Bloom is off tho. not that good?
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
LiK said:
The custom user.ini definitely looks better. smoother hair etc. i was curious why Bloom is off tho. not that good?
Over rated and overdone in this game. Doesn't kill performance but often hinders detail.
 

LiK

Member
LiquidMetal14 said:
Over rated and overdone in this game. Doesn't kill performance but often hinders detail.

ah ok.

for some reason, i feel after i set it to the custom user.ini settings, a screen filter effect is more prevalent during conversations. what setting do i need to change to make it less noticeable?
 
LiK said:
ah ok.

for some reason, i feel after i set it to the custom user.ini settings, a screen filter effect is more prevalent during conversations. what setting do i need to change to make it less noticeable?

Turn off ScatterDOF and CutsceneDOF.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
Akkad said:
Anybody's gamepad just stopped working? The buttons just stopped working in the middle of the game.
I've had it happen 1 time and it happened today for some reason. I've probably sunk in about 12-15 hours and haven't had a hitch but my controller was still on but my character was running uncontrollably. I could move with a KB mouse but its as if the malfunction would not let me stop. And I couldn't get myself out of that so I was forced to manually shut the game down and redo the part. No issues at all other than that.
 

Pancakes

hot, steaming, as melted butter slips into the cracks, drizzled with sticky sweet syrup OH GOD
Akkad said:
Anybody's gamepad just stopped working? The buttons just stopped working in the middle of the game.
Never had it completely stop working, but for some reason the strong attack on the 360 controller seems to only work about half the time after the new patch.
 

TheExodu5

Banned
nextgeneration said:
After I've made the necessary changes to the user.ini file, how do I save it? Whenever I try and save it, it says "Access is denied."

Right click -> Properties. Make sure it's not set to read-only when you're trying to make changes.
 

Mohonky

Member
Quick question; when I try to use a customer user config it won't let me save at the end; tells me access is denied. I tried right clicking and setting it to read only but that won't let me save the custom config either, it tells me it won't save because it's read only :/
 

M.D

Member
Mohonky said:
Quick question; when I try to use a customer user config it won't let me save at the end; tells me access is denied. I tried right clicking and setting it to read only but that won't let me save the custom config either, it tells me it won't save because it's read only :/

Copy the file to another folder and edit it
Then paste it in the right folder
 

Edgeward

Member
nextgeneration said:
After I've made the necessary changes to the user.ini file, how do I save it? Whenever I try and save it, it says "Access is denied."

You could also save it somewhere else first. Delete the ini in the witcher folder, and then move the new ini back into the spot.

Gah, beaten
 

Mohonky

Member
Another question (can you tell I'm a pro at this?)

At the launch menu when I select Custom as my config, does this automatically boot the User.ini I played with? Initially I used a Custom config that had Uber Sampling on and the frame rate was awful, turned that and V-Sync off and the frame rate is now between 38-59fps, averaging around mid 40's. Is it actually still reading from the launch menu system at all or through the custom user.ini?

I copied the user.ini files for Ultra spec also using a GTX570.
 

subversus

I've done nothing with my life except eat and fap
I'm getting strange slowdowns at the beginning of cutscenes and dialogues. Anyway to fix that? This hasn't occured before.
 

Edgeward

Member
Mohonky said:
Another question (can you tell I'm a pro at this?)

At the launch menu when I select Custom as my config, does this automatically boot the User.ini I played with? Initially I used a Custom config that had Uber Sampling on and the frame rate was awful, turned that and V-Sync off and the frame rate is now between 38-59fps, averaging around mid 40's. Is it actually still reading from the launch menu system at all or through the custom user.ini?

I copied the user.ini files for Ultra spec also using a GTX570.

It wouldn't boot, it would overwrite the file if you didn't make the ini a read only file. If it is read-only, it shouldn't have any effect. I think.
 

Teleporter

Junior Member
Hello everyone! ok so im very addicted to the game right now but i have some questions i know u all can help.
First i downloaded the dlc .exe files, patched the game but i still can find none of thoes items ingame, like the new hood etc... Also where can i get the extra dlc misson? cant find it here on gog witcher 2 files.

Second is there a website that has alchemy super detailed like where to get * type of ingredient, wich monster to kill to get it, the area where to look etc. Something like wowhead would be perfect lol.
anyways i just love the game, just killed the Kayran (super epic battle) and im looking foward for more incredible moments!

thanks for all the help!
 

Minsc

Gold Member
Teleporter said:
Hello everyone! ok so im very addicted to the game right now but i have some questions i know u all can help.
First i downloaded the dlc .exe files, patched the game but i still can find none of thoes items ingame, like the new hood etc... Also where can i get the extra dlc misson? cant find it here on gog witcher 2 files.

It is supposed to be included with the 1.1 patch, but a link was posted earlier. I remember reading that the retailer specific DLC items don't mix with each other (you can only do one per installation), but maybe that's been fixed or was incorrect.
 
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