Why did the graphics change?
"If you're looking at the development process," Iwinski begins, "we do a certain build for a tradeshow and you pack it, it works, it looks amazing. And you are extremely far away from completing the game. Then you put it in the open-world, regardless of the platform, and it's like 'oh shit, it doesn't really work'. We've already showed it, now we have to make it work. And then we try to make it work on a huge scale. This is the nature of games development."
It was captured PC footage, not pre-rendered, Badowski confirms, but a lot had to change. "I cannot argue - if people see changes, we cannot argue," Adam Badowski says, "but there are complex technical reasons behind it.
"Maybe it was our bad decision to change the rendering system," he mulls, "because the rendering system after VGX was changed." There were two possible rendering systems but one won out because it looked nicer across the whole world, in daytime and at night. The other would have required lots of dynamic lighting "and with such a huge world simply didn't work".
It's a similar story for environments, and their texture sizes and incidental objects. It was a trade-off between keeping that aspect of them or their unique, handmade design. And the team chose the latter. The data-streaming system couldn't handle everything while Geralt galloped around.
The billowing smoke and roaring fire from the trailer? "It's a global system and it will kill PC because transparencies - without DirectX 12 it does't work good in every game." So he killed it for the greater good, and he focused on making sure the 5000 doors in Novigrad worked instead.
"People are saying that 2013 was better but actually there's plenty of things that improved since 2013," Michal Platkow-Gilewski points out. "Size of the world, frames-per-second..."
"Yes!" realises Adam Badowski. "The game's performance: people say the game is well optimised. This is the first time for this company!" It's the first smile I've seen from him all interview.
Marcin Iwinski picks it up: "Maybe we shouldn't have shown that [trailer], I don't know, but we didn't know that it wasn't going to work, so it's not a lie or a bad will - that's why we didn't comment actively. We don't agree there is a downgrade but it's our opinion, and gamers' feeling can be different. If they made their purchasing decision based on the 2013 materials, I'm deeply sorry for that, and we are discussing how we can make it up to them because that's not fair.
"It's very important to stress: we are continuously working on the PC version, and we will be adding a lot of stuff, and there is more to come. We've proven it in the past that we support our games and we will be looking at the feedback and trying to make it better."
CJ_Parker wrote on May 21, 2015, 22:27:Slick wrote on May 21, 2015, 19:06:
and yes, EA currently makes the best FPS game on the market
Dude? And you called *me* the biggest troll on this site? Seriously? WTF???![]()
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Slick wrote on May 21, 2015, 19:06:
and yes, EA currently makes the best FPS game on the market
HorrorScope wrote on May 21, 2015, 18:22:
I think where some use the words favorites, I think it is safe to say they have built up their rep from previous actions, allowing some leeway. There is no secret hand-shake, or group BN meetings on who we like or don't like. EA, I'd like to think if they made a fantastic game, we'd give them some credit for that.
To me reading here, it seems overall that it's gfx or nothing. I bet the game still looks darn good, but then comes in "how fun is it to play?".
Malachii wrote on May 21, 2015, 09:11:
Even though I am more and more filthy console scum, these devs continue to win me over. They seem extremely honest and sincere.
Gamers are butthurt over a trailer from a couple years ago and they want to do something to make it right? Jeez.
Slick wrote on May 21, 2015, 16:21:
Great, so the only one on my side is the board's biggest troll ;P
descender wrote on May 21, 2015, 12:35:
The PS4 has a lower different draw distance and exhibits pop-in issues (which are obvious even in the video you posted), it also doesn't run at 60FPS... The PS4 version is basically "high" settings with a 30FPS lock. Woo! Bait and swi... bleh. Will it still be "bait and switch" in 2 weeks when they patch a bunch of the PC fidelity back in?
The fact that people looked at E3 demo's and trailers and think that's the game they are buying... /boggle Welcome to advertising.
Slick wrote on May 21, 2015, 12:16:
what short memories you apologists have.
"we're purposefully not showing PC footage, it just looks too good. Don't worry, the game on ultra will BLOW YOU AWAY."
gameplay showing ultra being more or less identical to PS4
they lied, and moreover, they lied up to the launch date, trying to squeeze more sales in. they purposefully didn't show off PC gameplay, because it was TOO GOOD. not my words, this is what they were saying a week before launch.
it's fucking disgusting. and the fact that this, like all gaming forums is littered with people apologising for this behaviour is nothing short of ridiculous. BAIT AND SWITCH.
It's hilarious that I was called an apologist with simcity (for being a fun game) but it was always-online, therefore i was a shill. even though the online DRM was WELL known for months ahead of launch. but CDPR pull this shit as a launch day surprise for all you pre-orders! and the whole internet explodes in apologies.
ItBurn wrote on May 21, 2015, 10:29:Squirmer wrote on May 21, 2015, 09:47:InBlack wrote on May 21, 2015, 09:34:Only thing that matters, time to move on.
The Witcher3 looks and runs GREAT. Even on older hardware.
It does not! Intel Xeon E5-1650 3.20GHz(essentially 12 threads), 48 gigs of ram and GTX 670 here and I can barely run the game in 1080p in medium. I sure as hell ain't getting 60 fps either. That game looks good, but not as good as it should for my hardware. I think the game is badly optimised. Also, the pre-rendered cutscenes run like sh*t. Like, 10 fps.
Is it playable? Yes. Does it run "GREAT"? Hellz no.