Let me understand something about graphics in W3

[Lyvean]

Let me understand something about graphics in W3

Hello all. I am as excited as the next witcher fellow fan for the release and now that we are have seen almost final code, I have some inquries about the graphics.

Not so long ago CD promised that the horrible pop up/in was going to get under control. This graphical imperfection is the main culprit for breaking visual immersion and I personaly really loathe it. I have no problem having less graphical prowess for the elimination of pop up than the other way around. Anyway, checking the last gamespot videos it is clear that pop up/pop in is still in the game in a big way. Now, I don't mind if there are imperfections in the engine of a game so huge, but in the videos it is really evident. The famous W2 glitch of grass popping in as you walk in front of you is still there in many incidents. Shadow drawing in the small town where Geralt is walking in, shadow popping in the trees in the forests, etc... It might take a while to see it in the low quality compressions that we usually get, but they are all there. Granted the problems is not as bad as it was in the 35 min gameplay video but it is still far from dealth with.

And if gamespot was testing the PC version in an uber machine (which I just invested in for this game), what will be the results to the console versions?

Please calm me down

 

[thislsmadness]

The Gamespot footage was filmed in early March. Who knows how old the actual build they played was.

Aside from that, its probably something that is impossible to eliminate entirely in a huge, dynamic, and detailed world with little to no loading. So its probably a case where we live with some pop in or they remove/dumb down elements of the living world.

 

[moonknightgog]

Hello all. I am as excited as the next witcher fellow fan for the release and now that we are have seen almost final code, I have some inquries about the graphics.

Not so long ago CD promised that the horrible pop up/in was going to get under control. This graphical imperfection is the main culprit for breaking visual immersion and I personaly really loathe it. I have no problem having less graphical prowess for the elimination of pop up than the other way around. Anyway, checking the last gamespot videos it is clear that pop up/pop in is still in the game in a big way. Now, I don't mind if there are imperfections in the engine of a game so huge, but in the videos it is really evident. The famous W2 glitch of grass popping in as you walk in front of you is still there in many incidents. Shadow drawing in the small town where Geralt is walking in, shadow popping in the trees in the forests, etc... It might take a while to see it in the low quality compressions that we usually get, but they are all there. Granted the problems is not as bad as it was in the 35 min gameplay video but it is still far from dealth with.

And if gamespot was testing the PC version in an uber machine (which I just invested in for this game), what will be the results to the console versions?

Please calm me down

It's all about LOD and draw distance.
There is nothing can be done to solve this very common problem in open world games (A draw distance setting which possibly can solve this LOD problem is something very expensive in terms of performances)

What they have promised to do was about the pop up of elements of the scenario at few meters from the player. But for LOD, it's another problem entirely.

 

[prince_of_nothing]

It's important to understand that pop in can never truly be eradicated as long as a game engine uses data streaming, and Red Engine 3 does. Actually, ALL modern engines utilize data streaming as a way to generate larger and more complex game worlds without crushing a system's performance or requiring a ton of memory.

There are ways to minimize pop in, but it's always going to be there in the background even if it's not immediately visible. From the looks of it though, pop in is VERY minimal in the Witcher 3, courtesy of the Umbra 3 tech which offers some amazing draw distances and LoD.. Pop in is really a by product of LoD management and draw distance, and as such, can be very system intensive as mitigating it successfully requires a lot of resources from the CPU, GPU and memory.

Which brings me to the console versions. It's already been confirmed more or less that the console versions will have lower LoD and shorter draw distances compared to the PC version, which was already expected seeing as the console versions have limited hardware.

 

[hamilcarBarca.196]

yes,as long as the game doesn't load fully on ram,there will always be pop in...

 

[Lyvean]

I don't want or (falsely hope) for these issues to be eradicated completely. But grass popping in front us as we walk? Shadows being drawn just a couple of meters as we walk? I would argue that, from the looks of it, pop in is not at all minimal. I assume that we all have watched the footage. There is actuall shadow pop in on the trees and foliage as Geralt runs with the horse in an already loaded perimeter. Draw distance is something that the player doesn't need at this point (there is nothing to see far away since he is surrounded by trees). The LoD problem is another thing that seems to hang in balance as most of the assets seem to suffer from very low levels of LoD and only pop in when the player is near. This creates a really disturbing immersion breaking scenario (not in all cases - in the village, for example, when Geralt is simply galloping the surroundings looks solid).

Again, I am not talking for completely eradicating the problem, but the results look far worse than I expected since that 35 min gameplay video.

 

[Geralt_of_bsas]

Maybe in max settings it will be less noticeable, but there's always going to be some degree of it. In consoles I'd start to accept this is more or less what one can get.

 

[Lyvean]

"Some degree" doesn't mean grass drawing up in front of Geralt (watch the fight in the bandit camp while he is on horse). Can't we at least have our immediate surroundings solid? That IS achievable.

 

[hamilcarBarca.196]

There is actuall shadow pop in on the trees and foliage as Geralt runs with the horse in an already loaded perimeter

maybe it's because of umbra and occlusion culling...
when you have occluded objects,these doesn't cast shadows,because they are actually not rendered...I guess it's that,unless umbra does compute occluded object's shadows

 

[soldiergeralt]

if you go looking for pop ins you're always going to find it. ideally, they would have extremely small lod consisting of a sprite, but people will then take notice of the "cartoon" background.

unless it poses a serious issue to visual consistency, it's pretty easily ignored when once stop obsessing over it and acknowledge the practical reality for it. similar to clipping.

 

[Asmodean778]

You guys are assuming that all renderer data is being called together. They'd normally be in different buffers for calls. Which is exponetially more efficient, when it comes to increasing the distance of such things, rather than just increasing the overall 'draw distance'.

You could have different sliders for different buffers (eg: shadows, lod system, 3d models, vegetation(2d/3d), etc.). Which would be far more efficient than a single slider for something like "draw distance". Which would include everything.

Even though, as far as I'm aware - RED Engine's asset system has this information prebuilt into the individual assets. So I don't know if we're even going to have access to this information to be able to adjust anything related, until REDKit 3 gets released. Obviously this last part is just speculation, but I dunno how they've actually got this down.

Edit: I'd imagine, at a guess that there's going to be some preset system for stuff like grass distance, mesh/model, lod etc, that's baked into the assets. Again this is just speculation.

 

[YourAverageNord]

Draw distance definitely does look like a problem for The WItcher 3. I remember seeing some massive draw distances back in the debut trailer.and being amazed by how detailed the world looked. I'm curious as to why CD Projekt decided to lower the draw distance, was it because of Umbra? Hopefully we get some type of explanation.

Here's a gif that shows the draw distance back in 2013:
http://i.minus.com/iybtRFAszF35C.gif it's going to be pretty interesting seeing how the retail game stacks up to this.

 

[Cathulhu81]

Here's a gif that shows the draw distance back in 2013:
http://i.minus.com/iybtRFAszF35C.gif it's going to be pretty interesting seeing how the retail game stacks up to this.

There are only 2 types of trees here and no grass and plants, wildlife a single bird, no NPC exept for those few 5 mounted. Only animated thing besides them is a smoke from a one chimney - if that is a price to be paid for far LOD than i'm not willing to pay it.

 

[erxv]

There are only 2 types of trees here and no grass and plants, wildlife a single bird, no NPC exept for those few 5 mounted. Only animated thing besides them is a smoke from a one chimney - if that is a price to be paid for far LOD than i'm not willing to pay it.

also everything apart from the close-up trees look, sorry to say this, but fake as hell, i much more prefer how the game actually looks right now, rather than this

 

[prince_of_nothing]

Again, I am not talking for completely eradicating the problem, but the results look far worse than I expected since that 35 min gameplay video.

Show me this footage you're talking about. I've watched most, if not all of the videos and I haven't seen any indications of overt pop in.

If you're that concerned about pop in, the only thing you can do is make sure you have a beast of a rig (GPU should have at least 4GB of VRAM) where you can dial all the settings to the max. Ultra quality should have a greater LoD and longer draw distances so make sure your rig can play the game at ultra settings..

An SSD and at least 8GB (though I'd go for 16GB myself) will also be a significant factors as well, as they increase the rate of streaming data..

 

[YourAverageNord]

There are only 2 types of trees here and no grass and plants, wildlife a single bird, no NPC exept for those few 5 mounted. Only animated thing besides them is a smoke from a one chimney - if that is a price to be paid for far LOD than i'm not willing to pay it.

Regardless, the draw distance in that gif is a lot higher than what we've seen recently, and you don't see the low quality (2d?) trees in the distance that you see now. The gif is from the debut trailer, and in other parts of the trailer, you can see there is a lot of vegetation on the ground.

Here's another gif from the VGX trailer: http://static.gamespot.com/uploads/original/1503/15036700/2504542-3840569450-25044.gif

The LOD seem to be higher in this gif than what you see in newer gameplay videos, and while you can't see the draw distance too well in the gif, you can see the amount of detail in the scene.

 

[Scholdarr.452]

I worry much more about the absence of a DD/LOD sliders in the setting of the PC version. That's a real letdown for people with monster PCs...

 

[moonknightgog]

Regardless, the draw distance in that gif is a lot higher than what we've seen recently, and you don't see the low quality (2d?) trees in the distance that you see now. The gif is from the debut trailer, and in other parts of the trailer, you can see there is a lot of vegetation on the ground.

Here's another gif from the VGX trailer: http://static.gamespot.com/uploads/original/1503/15036700/2504542-3840569450-25044.gif

The LOD seem to be higher in this gif than what you see in newer gameplay videos, and while you can't see the draw distance too well in the gif, you can see the amount of detail in the scene.

In that gif there is a lot of sharpening, and more important, there is DOF, which cover the 2D elements on the scenario.

 

[YourAverageNord]

In that gif there is a lot of sharpening, and more important, there is DOF, which cover the 2D elements on the scenario.

The VGX trailer really didn't show draw distance too much, but the debut trailer did. If you look at the debut trailer you don't really see any low quality trees. There is slight pop-in, but a lot less than what we've seen recently.

 

[Lyvean]

Show me this footage you're talking about. I've watched most, if not all of the videos and I haven't seen any indications of overt pop in.

If you're that concerned about pop in, the only thing you can do is make sure you have a beast of a rig (GPU should have at least 4GB of VRAM) where you can dial all the settings to the max. Ultra quality should have a greater LoD and longer draw distances so make sure your rig can play the game at ultra settings..

An SSD and at least 8GB (though I'd go for 16GB myself) will also be a significant factors as well, as they increase the rate of streaming data..

If you are talking about the 35m video you can easily find it on youtube. I have 16 GB of RAM but the game will not be able to use all of it. Maybe it will be able to use 6 or 8 (in extreme circumstances) but very few -very few- games generally use more than 6. But that is not the point I am making, anyway. I can accept things popping at some points in an open world game, but right in front of Geralt as he gallops? Great graphics lose a lot of their prowess due to these things. It is impossible not to notice these problems when you are going to be spending so much time in the game.

Again, I am not trying to ditch the game or anything - I am waiting to play it with a baited breath. All I am saying is that pop in or shadow drawing so close to the player really doesn't feel very advanced graphics wise and it breaks immersion in a big way. I really hoped we would have something better than this to tell you the truth.