Getting some pretty serious visual bugs.

[Sucaru]

Getting some pretty serious visual bugs.

As shown above. These are all around the world, but it's especially bad in Novigrad. They are consistently there across saves, and still there after reinstalling twice (steam), at the exact same locations. I cleaned my PC extensively of anything related to the Witcher in attempt of trying to curb any possible file corruption, along with verifying the integrity on steam. I was also originally running mods, and made sure they were cleaned out as well. I also ran a clean save as well as older saves and in both instances, the errors were still there. My only guess is that a game patch may have broken the game. I'm at a complete loss on what to do.

Windows 10
MSI Radeon r9 290x
MSI Z97 Gaming 7 Motherboard
i7 4790k
16GB ram

 

[dragonbird]

It's unlikely to be related to a patch, or there would be more people reporting it.
Can you feedback on what graphics drivers you're using? I've no idea if they would be the cause of something like this or not, but it'll help narrow it down.

The first thing that came to mind though is that this looks remarkably similar to a problem I had a few weeks ago when I had a hardware-related fault that meant my PC wasn't reading from an SSD correctly. I don't think it would be the same in your case, as it would have shown up when you ran the Steam validation, but is there any possibility of background processes on your PC interfering with disk reads?

 

[Sucaru]

I am on beta 15.8 drivers, was previously on some beta drivers from May or so. The update changed nothing.

I'm running the game on my single HDD, and there shouldn't be any read/write interfering with the game that I know of. My HDD seems to be doing fine in terms of read/write and the game is the only thing that seems to be accessing it, so I don't think anything is interfering. I will try to run the game from a different file location.


When I was talking about the patch being a possible issue, I meant in relation to my hardware, but I still see what you mean.

---------- Updated at 05:25 PM ----------

I moved the game to a different location and ran it, still no change. I also cleaned up my hard drive a bit, freeing up a good 100gb. Neither made any difference.

 

[SigilFey]

I would go for a complete re-install here. It looks like the mesh/collision data for the 3D "ground" is somehow corrupt. As this is a gigantic file(s) that affects literally every aspect of the game, I would just start fresh.

Let me guess...you're using GOG?

 

[Sucaru]

As I mentioned in the first post, I have reinstalled twice.

Edit: I'm using steam, as well. Also mentioned in the first post.

 

[SigilFey]

Whoops! Sorry bro/bra, I didn't even see your text after the pictures.

Okay, then. If it isn't driver or installation corruption, my next guess would be that the game is accessing data from a bad HDD/SSD/RAM sector. I recommend performing these steps from Safe Mode, unless you're already running under an Adminstrator Account with UAC off. You may also be prompted to restart your computer at various stages. Just follow the instructions. (Don't get freaked out by the screen flickering or changing to a BIOS-level blue-screen. That's all normal.)

Create an elevated command prompt and type the following:

chkdsk /f C:

This checks your drives for bad sectors and attempts to fix any errors and recover data. Do this for all of your individual HDD/SSD drives in turn (C:, D:, E:, whatever), not just the drive/partition the game is installed on. When that comes back clean, restart the computer, start the elevated command prompt again, and type:

sfc /scannow

This will scan your file system and fix any errors.

Lastly, back to that elevated command prompt and type:

mdsched.exe

This will scan your RAM (and I believe your VRAM) for any issues. I don't think your problem is being caused by any sort of RAM, though. It's worth covering it while you're at it, is all.

PS! -- These processes can take a while, depending on the speed of your system and the size of your drives / amount of RAM. Give yourself at least 2 hours or so to get through all the steps.

 

[Sucaru]

All right. I'll get to checking these. If I thought about the HDD being the possible culprit beforehand, I would have checked the disk last night lol. Will report back afterwards. I don't believe it's the RAM/ VRAM either as I'd expect to see this in other games. I've had past issues with bad VRAM in the past, and have seem a few different examples of it. Nevertheless, I'll check that as well.

---------- Updated at 07:00 PM ----------

I currently need to use my PC to work on some projects, so I can't currently scan the ram or check the disk without a restart and to otherwise leave the PC indisposed, so I'll check that later tonight. I did scan my system, and found no issues.

 

[SigilFey]

My suggestions are free of charge and do not come with a due date. ^_^

Using the basic Windows Tools provided in Control Panel or through right-click menus are generally useless, I've found. Even disk defrag doesn't work well. Take your time and use the commands above whenever you have the time. They're much more thorough and accurate. (And use AusLogics for defragging -- free and awesome!)

 

[Sucaru]

I went through and checked my RAM/VRAM and my HDD for any bad sectors, and it all came up clean. I previously checked the system itself and it came up clean as well. Back to square one, it seems! I still have a hunch v1.08 just isn't playing nice with my hardware somehow, but I have no way of actually testing that.

---------- Updated at 12:57 PM ----------

Nevermind. Definitely has nothing to do with the patches.

 

[SigilFey]

I would definitely send this in to CDPR with images from as many different regions of the world as you can find. Meaning show it occurring in White Orchard, Skellige, Velen, Novigraad, Oxenfurt, the swampy regions, shorlines, etc.

What seems to be happening is mesh and collision corruption. And it only seems to be affecting the "ground" mesh. Basically, the world's surface is one continuous plane of interconnected 3D triangles that can be morphed and shaped like a sheet of aluminum foil. It seems that certain points where the tips of triangles meet are "missing", and the game is reallocating those connection points to the next nearest point. In other instances, it seems the structure is fine but collision data is missing. This has to be down to either data corruption or an error in the way your system is processing the data (like a corrupt API).

Which mods did you use? Did they require you to download/add/replace any .DLL files?

 

[Sucaru]

I have already put in a ticket with CDPR, linking to this post.

The mods I used were "Friendly HUD", "No Auto-Sheathe", and "Better Combat Enhanced" and none of them made any changed to .DLLs, to my memory.

I should mention that in all found locations of the issue, the collision is actually fine, and it's always the ground mesh that is broken.

 

[SigilFey]

I doubt it's a mod issue, then. None of those sound like they deal with the mesh. It must be something with the game. Do you have anything like this in other titles?

 

[Sucaru]

There's been nothing like this happening in any other game, no.

 

[SigilFey]

Then I am just going to blame Microsoft until the actual reason is known.

 

[Sucaru]

Always a safe bet!

 

[mchronowski]

Did anyone find solution to this? I am getting the same problem, text from my other post:

"I came across the following bug. In Novigrad I see walls of textures as well as missing pictures on the ground. I attach some screenshots:

http://imgur.com/a/IyPCT

My GPU is Radeon 7870 and my CPU is i5 3570 - I just upgraded to Windows 10. Maybe someone has already found a solution to this problem? Thanks!"

I guess it might be the problem with API in Windows 10, does anyone know how to reset it? thanks

 

[dragonbird]

Did anyone find solution to this? I am getting the same problem, text from my other post:

"I came across the following bug. In Novigrad I see walls of textures as well as missing pictures on the ground. I attach some screenshots:

http://imgur.com/a/IyPCT

My GPU is Radeon 7870 and my CPU is i5 3570 - I just upgraded to Windows 10. Maybe someone has already found a solution to this problem? Thanks!"

I guess it might be the problem with API in Windows 10, does anyone know how to reset it? thanks

Go through the same checks as were advised for the OP first - validate the game files, either in Steam or Gog, and remove any mods that MIGHT affect this.

 

[Sucaru]

OP here. I was in contact with CDPR's support team, and the individual I was working with was honestly stumped.

I'm willing to try anything short of an OS reinstall at this point. To the fellow also having this problem, our common ground seems to be both our AMD cards (albeit different generations) and Windows 10.

 

[SigilFey]

I seriously feel for all of you that are on Windows 10. I dread the day. Still on Windows 7 here, and loving life. I refuse to upgrade until I see something DirectX 12 related that makes me drool in anticipation.**

(**Note: I said "drool", not "salivate". It has to be so amazing that the spit actually makes it past my lips.)

 

[Sucaru]

I still have my Win7 disc lying around somewhere. I really need to rip it and just have it on a usb drive. I'm still on the fence about Win10 (as it is FAR better than Win8 and there are some noticeable performance improvements over 7) but DirectX 12 is still too early to comment on being a gamechanger yet.

As for switching to Win7, it's not really something I want to do just for the possibility of fixing a (albeit game-breaking) bug in one game.