Recommended Posts

Yep, downgrade for the lowest common denominator confirmed.

...did you even read the article? Your "PC master race" BS is unnecessary, and your over-simplification is flat-out wrong.

  • Like 3

Did you?

 

"If the consoles are not involved there is no Witcher 3 as it is," answers Marcin Iwinski, definitively. "We can lay it out that simply. We just cannot afford it, because consoles allow us to go higher in terms of the possible or achievable sales; have a higher budget for the game, and invest it all into developing this huge, gigantic world.

"Developing only for the PC: yes, probably we could get more [in terms of graphics] as there would be nothing else - they would be so focused, like if we would develop only on Xbox One or PlayStation 4. But then we cannot afford such a game."

 

"It was captured PC footage, not pre-rendered, Badowski confirms, but a lot had to change."

 

This is not PC Master Race BS, this is plain fact. They'll claim complex technical reasons behind it and that it runs optimized on consoles (LOLNO), but it is what it is.

Did you?

 

"If the consoles are not involved there is no Witcher 3 as it is," answers Marcin Iwinski, definitively. "We can lay it out that simply. We just cannot afford it, because consoles allow us to go higher in terms of the possible or achievable sales; have a higher budget for the game, and invest it all into developing this huge, gigantic world.

"Developing only for the PC: yes, probably we could get more [in terms of graphics] as there would be nothing else - they would be so focused, like if we would develop only on Xbox One or PlayStation 4. But then we cannot afford such a game."

 

"It was captured PC footage, not pre-rendered, Badowski confirms, but a lot had to change."

 

This is not PC Master Race BS, this is plain fact. They'll claim complex technical reasons behind it and that it runs optimized on consoles (LOLNO), but it is what it is.

The whole point of the article was that if it weren't for consoles, Wild Hunt wouldn't exist as it is today. I mean, the part you quoted literally says that. No one but CDPR knows the exact implications of applying their 2013 vertical slice to the entire game world they wanted to make. They even gave you examples of why they made the changes they did. Everything they said is completely plausible, especially if you work in software development. So you have no reason to doubt them, other than your "PC master race" crap.

 

If you want to go to extremes, yeah sure you could create a fully realized open-world game using their vertical slice as a 100% representation of gameplay, along with the "5000 doors" they talk about, and the additional NPCs, and mechanics they've added since it was revealed, AND have it perform well. But now you're talking about an extremely demanding game that could only be played using bleeding-edge PCs. (maybe) Does that sound like a good business plan for a company with finite money and time? (i.e. any company in the real world) There are way, way more factors at play when decided to make compromises than just "consoles are the lowest common denominator".

It isn't PC Master Race "crap", the visual difference is there and they admitted to it. There was no CG rendering in the VGX footage, it was running on PC systems.

Their choosing between 2 rendering systems and it ending up looking like this basically proves it all.

I bet you that it would have been funded within 24-48 hours by the PC community if that had been the case on a Kickstarter.

There are so many more PC gamers out there than on consoles, it's hypocrisy at its finest and they grew BECAUSE the PC community backed them in the first place.

 

And how sincere are they now? They've had ample opportunity to be honest with the community and those who had pre-ordered the game but chose not to do so.
First it was YouTube compression, then there wasn't any downgrading and now the cat's out of the bag they're suddently telling the truth?

People calling this The Witcher 3: Wild Dogs have every right to.

  • Like 1

After looking at this controversy it's clear they downgraded the game to fit the consoles. I kind of disagree with them about if was consoles there would be no witcher 3.  Especially since witcher series started out on a PC.  But model they chose to fund the game led to out-come that happened. Its not bad game but it could have been better.  If you look at other games such as star citizen it started out as one thing and it is turning into something else.  It shows there ways to create a high fidelity experience for PC users.  

  • Like 1

It's vastly overrated.  You get the same games with absolutely horseshit optimization so unless you've got a $1200+ new PC your mileage will vary.

 

DX12 will change everything though.

 

It maybe vastly overrated but I want to act like I'm better than the rest of the world. That's all.

 

I have a laptop with an i7 vPro in it - will that do?

It maybe vastly overrated but I want to act like I'm better than the rest of the world. That's all.

 

I have a laptop with an i7 vPro in it - will that do?

Depends on the GPU in it :D

 

Carry on then.  Personally I have too much invested in PC to stay away from it, but I'm waiting for DX12 gaming to really get back into it.

I wish I had a PC so I could act like I was better than everybody else. FML

 

FYL!

 

but seriously, it is not about "better then everyone else"  and this is damn annoying that many people here are throwing "pc master race" comments.

 

it is about communication and trust. a traditionally "for pc" deleloper clearly created a console game port to pc, after showing the pc gamers what it could have being...

then denied that they did until release date, when it became plainly obvious. 

 

they went with this strategy, because there is more money that way.    but they lost a lot of goodwill with pc users.    they are promising lots of patches to improve it, and get back some of goodwill.

  • Like 1

It maybe vastly overrated but I want to act like I'm better than the rest of the world. That's all.

 

you mean acting like a bit of an arse? i don't think you need a gaming PC to do it :p you are managing just fine.

Oddly enough, in the history of my gaming (back to Pong), I have yet to see a single game look like the concept. I guess that is why I never am left disappointed. Every game is downgrade from its reveal. Not only that, know that hundreds of millions of consoles are being sold now along side computers, I have accepted the fact long ago that multiplatform games will always be impacted by the lowest common denominator. I also know that the goal of a business is to be as profitable as possible.

I'm not bothered by the drop in visual quality. I had a feeling about what they showed back in 2013. It looked too good to be true. And I had a feeling they'd be faced with a choice. Good graphics at the cost of content or lots of content (e.g. open world) at the cost of slightly worse graphics. I'd take the latter over the former any day and I love good graphics.

  • Like 2

I'm not bothered by the drop in visual quality. I had a feeling about what they showed back in 2013. It looked too good to be true. And I had a feeling they'd be faced with a choice. Good graphics at the cost of content or lots of content (e.g. open world) at the cost of slightly worse graphics. I'd take the latter over the former any day and I love good graphics.

 

Me too. I honestly don't get the complaints. It's especially odd since some of the people making the complaints can't even run the game at max settings as it is now.

it is about communication and trust. a traditionally "for pc" deleloper clearly created a console game port to pc, after showing the pc gamers what it could have being...

considering Witcher 2 was dx9 and had a pretty horrible PC launch (especially for Steam users) I'm not sure that's entirely accurate.  They've had a pretty spotty history with PC overall IMO, aside from the first one not being on consoles afaik.

FYL!

 

but seriously, it is not about "better then everyone else"  and this is damn annoying that many people here are throwing "pc master race" comments.

 

it is about communication and trust. a traditionally "for pc" deleloper clearly created a console game port to pc, after showing the pc gamers what it could have being...

then denied that they did until release date, when it became plainly obvious. 

 

they went with this strategy, because there is more money that way.    but they lost a lot of goodwill with pc users.    they are promising lots of patches to improve it, and get back some of goodwill.

 

Did you play The Witcher 2 when it first came out vs what it is now? Not only does it run better but they added so much content to the game for free.

After looking at this controversy it's clear they downgraded the game to fit the consoles. I kind of disagree with them about if was consoles there would be no witcher 3.  Especially since witcher series started out on a PC.  But model they chose to fund the game led to out-come that happened. Its not bad game but it could have been better.  If you look at other games such as star citizen it started out as one thing and it is turning into something else.  It shows there ways to create a high fidelity experience for PC users.  

 

Star citizen is the exception to the rule so far and its not even released, lets put a pin in that one and come back when they ship a full product instead of taking peoples money for sporadic ships and in game features.

Did you play The Witcher 2 when it first came out vs what it is now? Not only does it run better but they added so much content to the game for free.

yeah, so, this is what i am expecting for them to do for witcher 3, and they better deliver.

 

what's your point?

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Posts

    • Win11Debloat 2026.06.14 by Razvan Serea Win11Debloat is a lightweight, easy to use PowerShell script that allows you to quickly declutter and customize your Windows experience. It can remove pre-installed bloatware apps, disable telemetry, remove intrusive interface elements and much more. The script also includes many features that system administrators and power users will enjoy. Such as a powerful command-line interface, support for Windows Audit mode and the option to make changes to other Windows users. All changes made by Win11Debloat can be easily reversed, and most removed apps can be restored via the Microsoft Store. A full guide on how to undo the changes is available here. Win11Debloat features: Below is an overview of the key features and functionality offered by Win11Debloat. Please refer to the wiki for more information about the default settings preset. Remove a wide variety of preinstalled apps. Click here for more info. Disable telemetry, diagnostic data, activity history, app-launch tracking & targeted ads. Disable tips, tricks, suggestions & ads across Windows. Disable Windows location services & app location access. Disable Find My Device location tracking. Disable 'Windows Spotlight' and tips & tricks on the lock screen. Disable 'Windows Spotlight' desktop background option. Disable ads, suggestions and the MSN news feed in Microsoft Edge. Hide Microsoft 365 ads on the Settings 'Home' page, or hide the 'Home' page entirely. Disable & remove Microsoft Copilot. Disable Windows Recall. Disable Click to Do, AI text & image analysis tool. Prevent AI service (WSAIFabricSvc) from starting automatically. Disable AI Features in Edge. Disable AI Features in Paint. Disable AI Features in Notepad. Disable the Drag Tray for sharing & moving files. Restore the old Windows 10 style context menu. Turn off Enhance Pointer Precision, also known as mouse acceleration. Disable the Sticky Keys keyboard shortcut. Disable Storage Sense automatic disk cleanup. Disable fast start-up to ensure a full shutdown. ...and more. Once you’ve downloaded the Win11Debloat file (Get.ps1), just follow these quick steps: Locate the Get.ps1 script file. Right-click the file and select Run with PowerShell from the context menu. If prompted by User Account Control (UAC), select Yes to grant the script the necessary administrative permissions. Win11Debloat 2026.06.14 changes: This is a minor release that hopefully addresses the false positives in Windows Defender and Bitdefender that prevented users from downloading and/or running Win11Debloat. Refactor Get-RegFileOperations.ps1 to address false positives by @Raphire in #626 Add logging around WinGet app retrieval and increase timeout to 20s by @Raphire Download: Win11Debloat 2026.06.14 | Open Source View: Win11Debloat Home Page | Screenshots 1| 2 Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware
    • Still using Microsoft Money 2005 in 2026 here!
    • I have a couple to mention, and they still run great on Windows 11 Adobe Lightroom Version 2 Alcohol 120% CLZ Book, Comic, Game, Movie, & Music Collector (PC - No longer sold / Grandfathered in - now mobile apps/online only) DVDDecrypter ISO Buster Pro version 1.9.1 (Still supports HD-DVD too) Nero Burning Rom 8 (Only the burning software, no backup, media converter, etc)   OpenAL (Runtime) - GuildWars 1 Reforged still uses it for 3d headphone audio PowerDVD 12 Ultra SPTD (SCSI Pass through Direct Driver) UltraISO Windows Media Encoder 9 WinImage You can tell I still sport an optical drive    
    • Linux 7.1 arrives with an NTFS overhaul and major hardware performance boosts by Paul Hill The founder of the Linux kernel has just announced the availability of Linux 7.1. This is a stable version of the kernel that will now be tested by various Linux distributions before it is shipped to users through update managers. Some users, like those on Debian, for example, might not get it for a long time, if at all, while Fedora users can expect it in the near future. With Linux 7.1 out on time, the merge window for Linux 7.2 is now open, giving contributors the opportunity to send in major new features that have been waiting for the last two months. Torvalds warned that he is currently travelling and will be in another timezone, so timing for the merge window may be irregular due to timezone differences and limited internet access. Torvalds said that he has already fetched early pull requests to allow him to do some offline work, but the travel could still cause disruption. Right now, he is not planning to extend the release, but did consider it. He said he might later regret not extending, though. In terms of this last week of development for Linux 7.1, Torvalds said there were no major or alarming changes. This week consisted mostly of smaller driver updates to GPU, networking, and sound, networking fixes, trace tooling fixes, and misc minor fixes. The shortlog this week lists fixes for driver bugs, memory leaks, I/O and USB fixes, networking and RDMA fixes, DRM/graphics fixes, and tooling and verification improvements. Specific fixes include USB series heap-overflow and buffer overflow fixes, and multiple use-after-free, memory-leak, and refcount corrections across subsystems such as i2c, zram, gpio, and net. There are fixes for graphics drivers, including amdgpu, i915, and virtio, as well as hypervisor and virtualization tweaks affecting mshv, vmbus, and hyperv. According to Phoronix, anyone running Linux 7.1 should look out for the new NTFS driver, Intel FRED for improved performance on Panther Lake and future CPUs, faster graphics with Intel Arc Battlemage, and improvements for older AMD Radeon GPUs. If you are running Linux on your computer and everything is fine, then you don’t need to worry about updating to Linux 7.1 as a priority; just wait for it to be pushed to you. If you have tried Linux on hardware but it didn’t work properly, trying again with a distro that uses Linux 7.1 could cause Linux to work on your machine, thanks to the new hardware support.
    • you can also do this with this tool: PowerSettingsExplorer made by mbk1969 at 3dguru forum.. I found it by accident researching on modern standby and annoying quirks of it in 2022
  • Recent Achievements

    • Week One Done
      rolfus earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      Leroy Jethro Gibbs earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Conversation Starter
      flexorcist earned a badge
      Conversation Starter
    • One Month Later
      AndreaB earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • One Month Later
      agatameier earned a badge
      One Month Later
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      507
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      196
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      139
    4. 4
      ATLien_0
      90
    5. 5
      Steven P.
      81
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!