List of supported game technologies in the Witcher 3

[amfibiya89]

This is same place with 35 min demo.I cant see SSR there.

1. It can be disabled for this screenshot.

2. Or may be they removed it in some places. For better FPS. But this is not logical for me. Because its "screen space". This must be there or must not be entirely

In January footage we can clearly see SSR on the sea when Geralt dive into. And in soldier camp to. But in beginning when Geralt took papers from the board there was no SSR too in little water where child played.

 

[octavian123]

Awesome list. I hope the game delivers and I hope my 970 wil keep up.

 

[Psykosonikninja]

I did not. I heard that from an interview. As prince_of_nothing pointed out I misremembered and the volumetric fog was only considered.

Really? I hope that isn't true, as the volumetric fog/clouds looked amazing in the trailers. It really added a lot to the visuals/atmosphere and I hope they didn't take it out. Did the developers actually say that? Do you have a link to the interview?

 

[LasurArkinshade]

For what it's worth, the facial animations middleware in the game appears from the footage to be FaceFX. It's the big facial animation middleware in gaming right now. Previously, for the other Witcher games, CD Projekt used a much lesser-known (and much less robust) middleware called Annosoft, which led to the not-so-amazing facial animations in the previous games. FaceFX is the tech used for most modern games. You can see a few of them on their website, in case you're curious: http://facefx.com/game-titles

This is speculative, however, given that CD Projekt haven't, to my knowledge, discussed this. It's just my inference based upon the way the results look in the footage we've seen.

 

[SageFox.326]

I think here we have to make a distinction between technology and methods/implementations. Most of those don't fall in the same categories as the OP.

For example - "Forward Lit Soft Particles" is not a technology and has nothing to do with fire specifically, the Forward Lighting part is the technology, the property of the particles is that they're soft looking.

that is like saying wi fi is not a technology because its the same as wired electricity but on air, as a "different implementation".

Don't agree.

---------- Updated at 04:35 AM ----------

This is same place with 35 min demo.I cant see SSR there.

1. It can be disabled for this screenshot.

2. Or may be they removed it in some places. For better FPS. But this is not logical for me. Because its "screen space". This must be there or must not be entirely

In January footage we can clearly see SSR on the sea when Geralt dive into. And in soldier camp to. But in beginning when Geralt took papers from the board there was no SSR too in little water where child played.

Some gameplay videos aren't running on the highest settings. But the final game will deliver ultra settings for PC and i think will be better than console versions.

 

[Scholdarr.452]

I'm actually quite curious if the Red Engine 3 now supports some form of Global Illumination. If yes, what's the solution and how does it work? Does anybody have current information on that maybe?

The last time I heard about it the Reds said that they had a quite hard time to implement a solution for that in the engine. That was back in September 2013 in this interview: http://www.dsogaming.com/interviews/cd-projekt-red-talks-the-witcher-3-tech-tessellation-physx-dx11-2-windows-8-global-illumination/




By the way, if some of you guys are really interested in in-depth tech stuff used in Witcher 3 there are three interesting sessions (partly) freely available online from GDC 2014:

Solving Visibility and Streamingin The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt with Umbra 3
hold by Jasin Bushnaief (Umbra), Przemyslaw Czatrowski (CDPR)

• video recording of the session
• slices of the session
• Overview:
  This talk will detail how the Umbra 3 Visibility System is being used and accomodated in the REDengine 3 that powers The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Umbra's automated occlusion culling system makes sure only the objects seen by the camera are rendered. Middleware has been an important design consideration in building the state of the art REDengine 3. Engineers from Umbra Software and CD Projekt RED offer views from both sides as to how an engine and middleware should work together and their experiences in developing systems in collaboration. We will discuss and show the REDengine's various visibility-related features. Umbra's visibility system automatically generates occluders and removes the need for manual markup. The size of the world in The Witcher 3 makes using manually placed occluders impossible. Umbra was required to develop new streaming and an LOD system for its visibility software to meet the game's needs which we will discuss in our talk. The talk will contain information and examples of how Umbra was integrated into the engine's world editor and runtime, how it fits into the workflow and the performance budget, the challenges presented in creating a huge streaming open world game and an honest look in what went right and could be done better in the future.

Landscape creation and rendering in REDengine 3
hold by Marcin Gollent (CDPR)

• live recording of the session sadly only available to premium members
• slices of the session
• Overview:
  Game worlds expand in size and complexity, thus requiring developers to fill hundreds of square kilometers with content - some of the most tedious and time consuming tasks being terrain and vegetation editing. This talk will describe CD Projekt Red's approach to highly automatize the process. By moving away from the conventional terrain material layers and linear material blends, visual quality can be improved while greatly reducing the amount of work. Vegetation coverage can be procedurally generated both offline and in real-time to produce realistic results, while not requiring artists to place it manually. The talk will cover many solutions developed during production and usage of REDengine's landscape-related features, including terrain shadow casting and LOD management.

Speed Up Your Game Using Simplygon
hold by David Larsson (Simplygon), Balazs Torok (CDPR)

• live recording of the session sadly only available to premium members
• slices of the session
• Overview:
  Managing draw calls and polygon counts are challenges for games regardless if targeting the latest generation of consoles or hand held devices. This session contains a case study of how CD Project Red have integrated Simplygon in its art pipeline for The Witcher 3 and how it automatically optimizes their content, and thereby saving you thousands of artist hours by automatically generating lod chains. We will also cover all key Simplygon features from an API point of view to allow you to integrate them directly into your pipeline and tools.

 

[prince_of_nothing]

OK I added entries for SpeedTree and Umbra 3, so the OP has been updated. The next ones I will do are Apex and Scaleform..

---------- Updated at 10:02 AM ----------

SSR is a huge performance hog, who told you it isn't It's done on CPU hence why it's slow, Killing Floor 2 is the only game where I've heard for the first time that reflections will be done on the GPU using some new tech. Let's see how that goes when the game comes out.

Are you certain SSR is done on the CPU? I thought that GPGPU like DirectCompute would easily allow such things to be done completely on the GPU. BF Hardline uses SSR extensively in fact, and Frostbite 3 engine definitely makes use of DirectCompute.

In the end though, the CPU still has to give the GPU the command to render it everything..

---------- Updated at 10:06 AM ----------

This is same place with 35 min demo.I cant see SSR there. .

Yeah I see what you mean. Maybe it was just disabled like you said. The 35 minute video used a Titan, and probably had many advanced effects turned on despite the performance.

 

[amfibiya89]

Yeah I see what you mean. Maybe it was just disabled like you said. The 35 minute video used a Titan, and probably had many advanced effects turned on despite the performance.

I think so too

 

[prince_of_nothing]

Apparently I reached the limit for embedded videos in my OP, so I'll have to continue adding to that list in this post

15) NVidia Apex :: Another technology that often confuses many people. NVidia Apex is a set of authoring tools designed to allow artists to implement visual effects in games quickly and easily. There are currently five Apex modules; Destruction, Particles, Clothing, Turbulence and Vegetation; though the last has been suspended. Apex requires an underlying solver for these fancy effects, and typically the solver that is used is PhysX. However, this is not always the case, as any physics solver can theoretically be used.

At any rate, the Witcher 3 will use the Apex Destruction and Clothing modules for what will undoubtedly be some awesome looking destruction and cloth simulation! Here are some videos showcasing NVidia Apex Cloth and Destruction in effect:

16) Simplygon :: Simplygon is an automated tool that allows for easy LOD (level of detail) management in games.. LOD is extremely important for the performance of games, especially graphically advanced games like the Witcher 3 as it reduces the graphics workload by lowering the amount of polygons for each mesh according to various factors such as distance from camera, importance, speed, amount of hardware resources available etcetera..

As the Witcher 3 uses unified assets for all three platforms (to save on time), LoD management is even more critical I'd wager as asset quality must be dynamically adjusted based on the resources available.. An automated toolset like Simplygon would allow CDPR to start with high quality assets, and then downscale them easily for the consoles as the consoles typically have significantly less hardware resources than gaming PCs.. Here's a video about Simplygon's ability to optimize LOD easily and effortlessly:

Another big advantage of Simplygon is that it can drastically reduce the amount of draw calls by generating a replacement mesh, thus reducing the burden on the CPU. You can see that in action here:

[video=youtube;Uj_-GfOPYCU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uj_-GfOPYCU[/video]

 

[cyberpunkforever]

and real time sparks! remember the igni sign in the gameplay demo, the wind moves the sparks, cute sparks

 

[Awesker.575]

Dynamic super resolution

Is DSR being used on some of the scene shots we are seeing? Does TW3 support 4k or is DSR how near 4k images are being achieved? Thanks

 

[silentcid]

Is DSR being used on some of the scene shots we are seeing? Does TW3 support 4k or is DSR how near 4k images are being achieved? Thanks

Yes, The Witcher 3 supports 4K

https://twitter.com/Marcin360/status/578222687555829762

 

[earthonline]

whats DSR?

 

[silentcid]

whats DSR?

This is what DSR is http://www.geforce.com/hardware/technology/dsr/technology

 

[earthonline]

This is what DSR is http://www.geforce.com/hardware/technology/dsr/technology

ah ok tnx

does it work for amd too?

 

[tahirahmed]

ah ok tnx

does it work for amd too?

AMD has VSR (Virtual Super Resolution). It does the same thing. It's not required to be supported specially, Nvidia just mention it as supported feature on their website. DSR and VSR usually works properly with new games though both are quite demanding obviously.

I think VSR is supported on R7 260 and up graphic cards though I am not sure. It was working fine on my R9 290 for sure.

Nvidia's DSR works on GTX 400 series and up.

 

[wonderboyxd]

Man if the game looks like those videos (even tough recest screens don't come close for some reason) it will be the visually best looking game atm.

About soft particles, if i remember correctly it smoothens out the particle when colliding with an object, like smoke on a wall looks great on flames.

 

[prince_of_nothing]

OK apparently I just found out the reason for the flat looking grass and vegetation (and possibly the lighting) in all the media released so far for the Witcher 3. Basically CDPR was using SSAO, the lowest grade of ambient occlusion there is..

The thing about SSAO is that it's rendered at half resolution compared to more expensive forms like HBAO and HBAO+ which are rendered at full resolution. Also, the occlusion samples per AO pixel for SSAO is 16, compared to 36 with HBAO+ This can have a HUGE impact on overall scene quality, but especially foliage.

Here's a great example of the tremendous impact HBAO+ can make using Far Cry 4:

Far Cry 4 with SSAO

Far Cry 4 with HBAO+

As you can see, the grass looks absolutely flat and featureless with SSAO making it seem as though no ambient occlusion is enabled whatsoever. But with HBAO+, suddenly the grass looks like it has depth and much better detail.

Another thing, ambient occlusion can also apparently have a big effect on the quality of lighting in a scene by correctly (or incorrectly in the case of SSAO) accounting for the occlusion of light sources. Here's a really good example of that using Far Cry 4 again:

Far Cry 4 SSAO

Far Cry 4 HBAO+

Both pics have the exact same lighting, but the one with HBAO+ looks much more authentic because HBAO+ is properly accounting for the occlusion of light unlike SSAO which completely fails. Special emphasis on the ceiling and the bottles near the ground for those that are having difficulty spotting the differences.

So my point in posting this was to show people how much of an improvement in IQ they can expect by just turning on HBAO+, and that just by virtue of this one technology which I enumerated in my OP, the PC version is a big step up over the consoles which will both use SSAO..

 

[Krabapple]

So correct me if I'm wrong here, but the HBAO+ is not the only thing that PC will have over the console version, but also PhysX? And Hairworks? Is there anything else I've missed?

Apparently there is an ubersampling feature that the devs are withholding from us because PC's are not powerful enough or something along those lines. So there is that as well.

 

[prince_of_nothing]

So correct me if I'm wrong here, but the HBAO+ is not the only thing that PC will have over the console version, but also PhysX? And Hairworks? Is there anything else I've missed?

You're sort of correct here. HBAO+ and Hairworks are both exclusive to the PC.. PhysX will be on the consoles as well, but it will be lower quality. Same for tessellation, textures etcetera...

Apparently there is an ubersampling feature that the devs are withholding from us because PC's are not powerful enough or something along those lines. So there is that as well.

Ubersampling is a ridiculously expensive option that in my opinion is absolutely worthless.. I personally would not care one iota if they cut it permanently..