Memory leak - worsening FPS over time

[Mike_GS]

Hi fellow witchers,

Been playing a lot of Witcher 3 lately, now with the Next Gen version. Again I am reminded of why this is the best game I've ever played. My hat's off to you, CDPR, for this wonderful masterpiece.

However, playing on PC (Windows 11, Steam, 32gb RAM, 4090). Everything up to date with patches and updates, except for running the 2022 December Geforce driver (the newest one has issues with Witcher 3 afaik).

I've played a decent amount now, and have been to Oxenfurt and a great deal of Velen. I'm noticing that my FPS is gradually declining in certain areas (especially towns, but not exclusively), now dipping down into the 70s and 80s, where I before got over 100fps. Maybe these is some kind of memory leak issue with the game?

I'm running all the visual settings at max, except for ray traced shadows off, with DLSS3 on (incl. frame generation).

Anyone else experienced this?

Thanks!

 

[tponte]

Yes. In fact it has been well documented across the forum in several other posts.
For example:

1. Witcher 3 NG Ray Tracing - GPU PCI-E Bus / VRAM Overload cause of FPS drop/stuttering issue. | Forums - CD PROJEKT RED
2. AMD and Nvidia Ray Tracing Needs Fixing on The Witcher 3 Version 4.0 | Forums - CD PROJEKT RED
3. VRAM Usage in DX12 and DX11 | Forums - CD PROJEKT RED

So far, to me, there seem to be two big issues with performance:

• Dx12 is extremely single threaded causing CPU bottlenecks, which worsen with RT on.
• Enabling RT causes your VRAM consumption to increase over time, eventually resulting in huge frame-time spikes, stuttering and low FPS. If you exit and restart the game, performance goes back to normal.

There are, obviously, other issues, but these are the ones that I've seen be reported more frequently and with more serious consequences.
A lot of folks are recommending running with RT off, or the Dx11 version - which is, of course, NOT a solution.

 

[Mike_GS]

Thanks for the reply, good to have this confirmed. Hopefully CDPR is aware of this, and working on this for a future update.

Definitely gonna stick with dx12 though, the updated graphics are amazing. The most beautiful game I've ever played IMO. The art style is so good, now finally combined with high-res textures and ray tracing. RT shadows need improvement though, the draw radius is too small, causing heavy shadow flickering (combined with the odd flicking and texture bug here and there - looking forward to the patch).

 

[hicham1234]

this is it 5 crashes today i have enıught never again i will buy any product by cdpr ever

 

[tponte]

Thanks for the reply, good to have this confirmed. Hopefully CDPR is aware of this, and working on this for a future update.

Definitely gonna stick with dx12 though, the updated graphics are amazing. The most beautiful game I've ever played IMO. The art style is so good, now finally combined with high-res textures and ray tracing. RT shadows need improvement though, the draw radius is too small, causing heavy shadow flickering (combined with the odd flicking and texture bug here and there - looking forward to the patch).

For the RT shadows issue, you can try this.
RT Fidelity at The Witcher 3 Nexus - Mods and community (nexusmods.com)

Unfortunately I have a 3070TI, without frame generation it's impossible to play the game with RT on. So I opted to uninstall and wait.

this is it 5 crashes today i have enıught never again i will buy any product by cdpr ever

I can't possibly say that. But one thing is for certain, no pre-orders and no "day 1" buys for sure.

 

[Mike_GS]

The crashes *can* come from using a previous version of Reshade and with DLSS3 Frame Generation enabled, but the latest version of Reshade has fixed most of the crashing. There are also some occasional crashes from the game itself, which is annoying, but hopefully the upcoming patch will help.

 

[Oropher3]

For the RT shadows issue, you can try this.
RT Fidelity at The Witcher 3 Nexus - Mods and community (nexusmods.com)

Unfortunately I have a 3070TI, without frame generation it's impossible to play the game with RT on. So I opted to uninstall and wait.

Meh, you can play at 30 fps if you set background characters to low, you might even get 45 fps in the countryside.

 

[hicham1234]

welcome to the next gen stutter all over the place

 

[R4zen_Hose_Tony]

Meh, you can play at 30 fps if you set background characters to low, you might even get 45 fps in the countryside.

Can gen even more fps but what is point if few minutes later f. e. In novigrad u will get Vram overload with memory leak that tank ur fps to 10s. Rtx 3070ti has only 8GB Vram and this game uslualy using two times more then that ( funniest thing but rare that in game u can find locations overloading 24gb vram even on rtx 4090 and cousing same stutter fps to 10s and Dlss 3 won't help with that)

Sorry but nobody normal want play having to restart game every time when vram is overloaded.

 

[tponte]

Can gen even more fps but what is point if few minutes later f. e. In novigrad u will get Vram overload with memory leak that tank ur fps to 10s. Rtx 3070ti has only 8GB Vram and this game uslualy using two times more then that ( funniest thing but rare that in game u can find locations overloading 24gb vram even on rtx 4090 and cousing same stutter fps to 10s and Dlss 3 won't help with that)

Sorry but nobody normal want play having to restart game every time when vram is overloaded.

Correct!

The only way so far that I've been able to run the game for a while with RT, is to keep textures at LOW.
MEDIUM does not cut it, it has to be LOW. Everything else can be ULTRA+.

It can, 100% be a case of just having more time before the game just reaches that unplayable fps state. But I don't have enough time to run through every scenario.

 

[R4zen_Hose_Tony]

Solution to Memory leak issue :
In GPU Control Panel in 3d settings choose Witcher3.exe (from <game installation directory>/bin/x64_d12 folder) and set Anisotropic filtering to x2 or x4/8/16 (for best quality go x8 or 16):

( from 04:39 i'm showing where to change it)

Now i have playable gameplay with almost highest game setting on my mobile GPU with only 6GB VRAM RTX 3060:

For better image quality (less blur use Sharpen to High): https://imgsli.com/MTUyOTEz/6/3
Even with AF on x16 is still fix memory leak for me and with Sharpen is even AF x2 is very smillar to no AF overall, or even better, especially with x8/16.