[UPDATE] 21:9(2.37:1) Needs a fix

[Winchester7314]

[UPDATE] Bumping this to make a notation. This issue is only present in DX12 exe, but I need DX12 for HDR and Raytracing as these options are not in DX11 exe.
[OG POST]
Hi, I'd like to start by saying that this issue has been known by many for a long time, but I don't think many people know exactly why its an issue.
So Basically, the game has issues with 2.37:1 variations of 21:9. In these varitations of 21:9 there are tiny black borders on all edges of the screen. While a there are many 21:9 monitors that run at 3440x1440, which is roughly 2.38 or 2.39, a large portion of common 21:9 resolutions are actually 2.37(2560x1080, 3416x1440, 3840x1620, 5120x2160)
The people experiencing this border issue are all using a 2.37:1 variant of 21:9.
The Hex Edit fixes do not resolve this issue, and the in game cutscene setting does not fix this, plus it extends to the menus and in game also, so it wouldn't help anyway.
Could we please see a fix for this issue. I would certainly love to hear back on this issue.
I'd like to end this by thanking you for the continued support in Witcher 3's Lifespan. Alot of positive updates and fixes have come, and I'd certainly like to see this one more fix be addressed.
Thank you

 

[SigilFey]

Very unlikely (that the issue will be addressed by CDPR).

What you're seeing is the game displaying at an aspect ratio slightly off of what your monitor's native resolution is. The only option you'll really have is to slightly stretch the image to fill in those borders by using the scaling option in your GPU's control panel. Choose the option to fit the final image to your screen. Here it is for nVidia:

My guess is that you have it set to either Aspect Ratio or No Scaling (or the equivalent for AMD's cards).

Just be aware that this will "stretch" the image, creating pixelization here and there, depending on your monitor and the game's resolution settings. The 2D assets of the HUD cannot be properly scaled to fit the screen, unfortunately -- that would require a complete recreation of all 2D assets for the exact resolution and aspect ratio that you're using. So, if using ultra-widescreen, some level of 2D wonkiness is to be expected.

 

[Winchester7314]

Very unlikely (that the issue will be addressed by CDPR).

What you're seeing is the game displaying at an aspect ratio slightly off of what your monitor's native resolution is. The only option you'll really have is to slightly stretch the image to fill in those borders by using the scaling option in your GPU's control panel. Choose the option to fit the final image to your screen. Here it is for nVidia:
View attachment 11377006
My guess is that you have it set to either Aspect Ratio or No Scaling (or the equivalent for AMD's cards).

Just be aware that this will "stretch" the image, creating pixelization here and there, depending on your monitor and the game's resolution settings. The 2D assets of the HUD cannot be properly scaled to fit the screen, unfortunately -- that would require a complete recreation of all 2D assets for the exact resolution and aspect ratio that you're using. So, if using ultra-widescreen, some level of 2D wonkiness is to be expected.

Thank you for the response.
Firstly, Id like to say, I have an nvidia card, and I do in fact know of this option, however, this is not the solution that I'm looking for, for a few reasons.
1. The issue of black bars is an in-engine issue, not a desktop resolution issue. Toggling these settings will not fix the issue, as the black bars are in engine, so they will always be there. The black bars are being rendered by the game, not a result of the absence of the game. The only way nvidia control panel could potentially help this issue, is to crop it out, however, nvidia is not exactly user friendly in that regard, especially to a pixel accurate manner.
2. It would also affect the resolution as a whole, so all games would be cropped in the same manner. Not the solution I'm looking for
The only way this issue could be resolved is for CDPR to edit the code to account for this specific ratio, and to not draw black bars.
But I would like to thank you for your attempted help and input.

 

[Winchester7314]

EDIT: Mistaken Comment thinking I had the solution

 

[SigilFey]

Thank you for the response.
Firstly, Id like to say, I have an nvidia card, and I do in fact know of this option, however, this is not the solution that I'm looking for, for a few reasons.
1. The issue of black bars is an in-engine issue, not a desktop resolution issue. Toggling these settings will not fix the issue, as the black bars are in engine, so they will always be there. The black bars are being rendered by the game, not a result of the absence of the game. The only way nvidia control panel could potentially help this issue, is to crop it out, however, nvidia is not exactly user friendly in that regard, especially to a pixel accurate manner.
2. It would also affect the resolution as a whole, so all games would be cropped in the same manner. Not the solution I'm looking for
The only way this issue could be resolved is for CDPR to edit the code to account for this specific ratio, and to not draw black bars.
But I would like to thank you for your attempted help and input.

You're welcome!

You're also identifying exactly what the situation is. Your options are to distort the image slightly with scaling or deal with the borders by using the closest no-scaling resolution (which it seems you're already doing.)

It's not the "code" that would need to change. It's worse. Much, much worse. Every asset would need to be rebuilt from the ground up to do what you'd like. Every HUD element. Every part of the mini-map and world map. Every cursor. Every icon. Every part of the Inventory screen. Every item thumbnail. Every single piece of text and every font that's used. Every part of the menus. Every line of captioning for the dialogue. Every. Single. Thing. All of it would need to be done again at exactly the aspect ratio of those particular resolutions.

This is why most games will allow for 720p - 1440p, 16:9, 16:10, and sometimes 4:3, and that's it. There are a few games that specifically support ultra-widescreen aspect ratios, but the vast majority do not. There are simply those games that will work with them without any glaring issues. (Most of those will have issues, but they may not be that noticeable.)

My best recommendation to you is to bring it up in Mod Discussions.

 

[Winchester7314]

[Bumping for updated findings]
[UPDATE] Bumping this to make a notation. This issue is only present in DX12 exe, but I need DX12 for HDR and Raytracing as these options are not in DX11 exe.

 

[Smoked_Cheddar]

So for me this Worked.

my fix for DX12 (direct x 12 ) witcher 3 utlrawide black bars is as follows.

open your dx12user.settings

change your resolution to Resolution="2544x1060"

now, here comes to the frustrating part....

so I changed mine to full screen, and it was some kind of blurred monstrosity.

I changed it to borderless window, it did work!

here's the really annoying part.

you have to change to full screen back to borderless window every time you do this.

this isn't acceptable...

this should get fixed... weird that it hasn't.

 

[Winchester7314]

So for me this Worked.

my fix for DX12 (direct x 12 ) witcher 3 utlrawide black bars is as follows.

open your dx12user.settings

change your resolution to Resolution="2544x1060"

now, here comes to the frustrating part....

so I changed mine to full screen, and it was some kind of blurred monstrosity.

I changed it to borderless window, it did work!

here's the really annoying part.

you have to change to full screen back to borderless window every time you do this.

this isn't acceptable...

this should get fixed... weird that it hasn't.

Strange that you say that, because I sortof did something similar(not exactly, but close) for God of War. In God of Ware, 2.38 works, but 2.37 has black borders on sides. So I set the game to Windowed, 3440x1440 and used Window Borderless App to center it, so it actually showed a full 2.37 and just cropped out the unnecessary 13 pixels off each side. I thought it might work for Witcher 3, however, it did not. I will definitely have to try out your method, of course, this week I'm in the middle of moving, so it will have to wait till next week some time.
In regards to a fix, I managed to find the Customer support email, and sent this issue in. It took them almost 2 months to respond, as they do explain in their autoresponse, as being a result of efforts on other launches. They responded simply asking if it had fixed itself, and when I said no and it would need a patch, they said, sorry, but active development is over for the game as their resources are being put elsewhere...then several days later an update to Witcher 3 was released like they didn't just say they weren't putting effort into it anymore....so yea
View attachment Polish_20240228_223541658_1.jpg

 

[Sethz]

You're welcome!

You're also identifying exactly what the situation is. Your options are to distort the image slightly with scaling or deal with the borders by using the closest no-scaling resolution (which it seems you're already doing.)

It's not the "code" that would need to change. It's worse. Much, much worse. Every asset would need to be rebuilt from the ground up to do what you'd like. Every HUD element. Every part of the mini-map and world map. Every cursor. Every icon. Every part of the Inventory screen. Every item thumbnail. Every single piece of text and every font that's used. Every part of the menus. Every line of captioning for the dialogue. Every. Single. Thing. All of it would need to be done again at exactly the aspect ratio of those particular resolutions.

This is why most games will allow for 720p - 1440p, 16:9, 16:10, and sometimes 4:3, and that's it. There are a few games that specifically support ultra-widescreen aspect ratios, but the vast majority do not. There are simply those games that will work with them without any glaring issues. (Most of those will have issues, but they may not be that noticeable.)

My best recommendation to you is to bring it up in Mod Discussions.

I think you are wrong here since it works in dx11 has to be a dx12 specific problem and its fucking annoying can't play this way.

The yellow part is black ingame on dx12.

 

[Winchester7314]

I think you are wrong here since it works in dx11 has to be a dx12 specific problem and its fucking annoying can't play this way.

The yellow part is black ingame on dx12.

TBF, his response came before I found out it was a DX12 issue only, so I can't blame him for thinking it may be something else.

 

[Sethz]

Did you manage to fix it because smoked_cheddars workaround didn't work for me. He even went so far to post his solution in every post around the internet about this issue.

 

[Winchester7314]

Did you manage to fix it because smoked_cheddars workaround didn't work for me. He even went so far to post his solution in every post around the internet about this issue.

Not yet, unfortunately Ive been very busy lately, so I haven't revisited this issue just yet.

Post automatically merged: Mar 22, 2024

Did you manage to fix it because smoked_cheddars workaround didn't work for me. He even went so far to post his solution in every post around the internet about this issue.

I've just tested, and found his solution does not work for one critical reason. He thinks he's fixing it, because YES, the black bars ARE gone...but its because he has created a resolution that is not 2.37, and is thefore, exempt from the bars. He is not realizing that all he has done is reduced the vertical aspect real-estate, and is just not noticing that he is utilizing less of his monitor to do so. and not fixed the core issue, which is this games issue with a particular, industry standard aspect ratio.

 

[Sethz]

I've just tested, and found his solution does not work for one critical reason. He thinks he's fixing it, because YES, the black bars ARE gone...but its because he has created a resolution that is not 2.37, and is thefore, exempt from the bars. He is not realizing that all he has done is reduced the vertical aspect real-estate, and is just not noticing that he is utilizing less of his monitor to do so. and not fixed the core issue, which is this games issue with a particular, industry standard aspect ratio.

Well even that doesn't work for me - the game won't go to 2544x1060 if I set it in dx12user.settings. Even setting my monitor resolution to 2544x1060 won't get rid of the black bars.

 

[Smoked_Cheddar]

I was hoping it had. I did have to change my resolution to a custom one.

I just got a new monitor too, same resolution, and that didn't work.

When did do that resolution, gwent looked weird.

Post automatically merged: Apr 3, 2024

Did you manage to fix it because smoked_cheddars workaround didn't work for me. He even went so far to post his solution in every post around the internet about this issue.

I was hoping it had. I did have to change my resolution to a custom one.

I just got a new monitor too, same resolution, and that didn't work.

When did do that resolution, gwent looked weird.

i was just excited and hoping it would help others.

 

[MERDEAN]

I have the same problem, and I've made some discoveries: I'm using an RTX3060 graphics card, which doesn't support frame generation, but I'm using the dlss3 to fsr3 module to get frame generation. The funny thing is that with frame generation turned on the black border and hud keeps flickering, you can notice that the game is actually rendering at full resolution, but cdpr added a 2.38:1 mask to constrain and position the hud, which is the border we see at 2.37:1 resolution. So the question is, how do I turn off this mask? I don't have any experience with red engine modding, but I'm convinced that there is a solution to this problem. I guess it's just a matter of removing the mask and resetting the relative position of the hud configuration.

 

[remoteman213]

Just to add to this, I have a 3440x1440 monitor that I use with DLDSR when I have spare performance.

In this game, I get the black bars and flickering border only when I use the 1.78x resolution of 4587x1920 (which is not exactly the same aspect ratio as 3440x1440 or 2.25x/5160x2160). So definitely seems that it only supports one specific aspect ratio for 21:9.

Seems unlikely that it will be fixed, so I've settled for forcing DLAA on at 3440x1440. Following this thread in case someone finds a workaround!