The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Patch 4.02 Promises Greater Performance and Stability, Restores HBAO

[Tsing]

The Witcher 3 fans who have considered rolling their games back to the vanilla version (1.32) may want to give the next-gen version one more chance before they call it quits. CD PROJEKT RED has released Patch 4.02 for the PC, PlayStation, and Xbox versions of the open-world RPG, and according to the patch notes, players should find a range of improvements for the game, including better CPU core utilization (DX 12) and the return of horizon-based ambient occlusion, something that had been mysteriously absent from recent versions. The patch also introduces some visual improvements, such as better-looking water thanks to the addition of refraction to SSR and ray-traced reflections, as well as a motion blur slider that might prove useful for players who may get nauseous from the effect but don't want to turn it off entirely. That said, those who have updated to the new patch say that it's introduced a new set of problems, including increased crashing and further instances of FPS drops, alongside shadows still being bugged.

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[Peter_Brosdahl]

Did some testing with this on the weekend. Glad to say that I can now turn off frame generation with the 4090 (at stock settings) in 4K. With max settings, and the usual post junk turned off, my 5800X3D/4090 rig was getting 60-80 FPS on average with rate dips around 55 FPS. For me that is totally playable and the game really looks amazing on the C2. Just a heads up that I am using Rebar with it, via NV Profile inspector, which might be helping a little.

The bad news. I still couldn't use RT on either of my other rigs. I tried turning all the RT settings on/off and two modes for global lighting. The 4930K rig does not support Rebar and at 4K that 3090 Ti, OC'd to 2110 MHz, was averaging ~30-40 FPS with it on which was very clunky. Perhaps playable for some but too low for my tastes. Meanwhile the 3700X rig was able to do a little more at ~40-50 FPS with RT on but still a bit clunky at 5120x1440. I was also using my max OC settings on that 3090 Ti at 2140-2160 MHz. I have the same Rebar settings on that rig as the one mentioned above. Turning off RT provided an extra ~10 FPS, but kind of defeats the purpose with this version of the game.

 

[DrezKill]

I still need to test 4.02 to compare with 4.01. Pretty sure none of the glaring issues introduced by the whole "next gen update" have been addressed though. Like the massive performance drop just switching from DX11 to DX12 with every graphics settings exactly the same between the two. Up until the 4.01 patch the game was mainly using two CPU threads in DX12. I don't know if this was improved in the 4.02 patch. Same with the shader compilation stuttering, I don't know if the new patch reduced or eliminated that (I highly doubt it did). There was also a weird issue with just the camera movement itself being stuttery and un-smooth, don't know if that was fixed either. It's too bad the game needs DX12 to support RT and FSR and DLSS and other new stuff, cuz otherwise the game runs way the f*ck better in DX11. And W3 post-next-gen update just isn't on the same level as how well the old version of the game ran. Not all of that is due to the new graphical effects and higher Ultra+ settings.

 

[Peter_Brosdahl]

The DX12 version still needs work. I don't consider it a good thing that you basically need a 4090 paired with something along the lines of 5800X3D to get a mostly smooth play experience. I agree, the DX11 was awesome and I think about that everytime I test it on the other rigs. BTW I did notice while looking around a few weeks back that the DX11 exe is in the folder still so it's still possible to launch that way but doesn't really help if you want the RT. Things are improving. I did notice with 4.02 that this patch really went deep into game files and made substantial modifications. Patch was maybe 2 GB but it went through 60+ GB of file(s) to patch. Some patches are just quick./dirty exe swaps but this one made a lot of changes somewhere.

 

[Peter_Brosdahl]

I'm not sure if CDPR silently added some other updates to this without formally rolling out another but I've been playing this on the 3700X rig for the last 5-10 days, still using the 3090 Ti with OC'd settings (2130-2160 Mhz, VRAM at stock) but had to dial back my clock setting (+100 now) a bit due to crashing, and it's been a bit better. I'm able to keep RT on its lowest settings and still get 40-60+ in a lot of places with dips into the mid-30s when there are a bunch of NPCs on the screen. As soon as I go indoors FPS jump to around 60-80. I can turn RT off and get a bit more but it sure is nice at least getting this now. It's a blast on the CRG9 and one of the few games the HDR looks good with it. I've really been enjoying seeing the landscapes in 32:9. The C2 is still better for overall IQ but the CRG9 has its advantages too and once you do the hex mods this game is awesome in 32:9 5120x1440.