Behold the PC version of The Witcher 3 Next-Gen with all of its Ray Tracing effects

YouTube’s ‘Cycu1’ has shared a comparison video between ray-traced and the non-RT versions of The Witcher 3 Next-Gen PC. This video showcases all of the game’s Ray Tracing effects that PC gamers will be able to enable.

[deleted]

If you already have the hardware to run this, then yea it's nice to have. It's really nice, especially on water no doubt. However, it isn't worth running out to buy or upgrade a PC just for this, as the appearance isn't overwhelmingly drastic. Better? Yes. A lot of it you're not going to notice though unless you stop and analyze a scene.

I'll be interested to see how much of it I can turn on with an RTX 3060 ti, probably at 1440p

[Vits]

That is RT as a whole. It's a nice feature to have, but honestly, I'm still looking for a game where it makes me go "oh that looks amazing and it's totally worth the frame rate sacrifice".

Though that might change with the RTX remasters. Portal looks pretty nice, but still quite not there yet.

[isarai]

Honestly the only case i can recall of the raytracing being worth the hit was Control. It's quite the noticeable difference. Also Metro Exodus is a huge improvement with raytracing, but it wasnt an option on consoles and yet still ran at 60fps with a pretty crisp image. That game is a damn good example of best of both worlds honestly

[Vits]

@isarai

Honestly, I only agree somewhat with Control, and mainly because that game doesn't take advantage of higher frame rates. But is still a far cry from what I would call a game changer.

[MrCrimson]

BFV did it well too; but the hit was too substantial.

[DarXyde]

I might be less interested in what it does and more interested in where they go with it.

For me, it's a feature I can only see myself caring about for dark horror titles.

[anubusgold]

Ray tracing in cyberpunk is crazy but even with a 3080ti at 1440P and dlss on it drops my fps to 50fps

[masterfox]

so I played the next gen version of the Witcher iII several years ago with my old 1060 gtx card , nice!... oh wait! this has RT, it looks sooooooOOOooo much different now.....well at least they are not asking for money this time, RT should be renamed to LPU (Lake puddle upgrader) :D

[IanTH]

RT is more than just reflections, but it is obviously the most visible change.

So I guess RT is bad because it's currently just a slightly nicer option? If we had that view about every incremental visual improvement, games would still look like Pong. RT will do more & look better, we're still in the early stages.

It isn't required, so I'm a little confused as to the outward disdain some people have for it.

[lonewolf10]

RT is just about only reflections/puddle upgrader on console, think that was masterfox's point.

[IanTH]

@lonewolf I feel like, thinking on RT implementations on consoles, many of them actually opt for things like RTGI or RT Shadows. In fact, TW3 doesn't support RT reflections on consoles, they just have an improved SSR implementation.

This video is also specifically showing off the differences on PC here, not consoles. So I don't think console was his aim at all.

[ChubbyBlade]

I’m slowly starting to think you’re one of the least intelligent people on this site.

[DaMist]

can't wait to jump back into this, will be cranking everything up with my 4090 and im hoping for a decent upgrade for sure, ive been avoiding all the previews.

[IanTH]

It's available for download right now - in the slim chance you're unaware - so perhaps you're playing it as we speak! I'll be curious to hear your thoughts after you've checked it out.

That said, also keep expectations in check. It looks nice, but I think you are potentially setting yourself up for disappointment. Especially if you loved it enough the first time 'round to futz around with mods.

[DaMist]

Thanks, just putting it to download. Yeah im excited but honestly after Cyberpunk im not getting ahead of myself. Will update once i try it later today!

[iNcRiMiNaTi]

I tried it out last night and on the ultra RT setting I was getting around 70-80 fps with DLSS off, 80-90 fps with DLSS quality and about ~130-150fps with DLSS Quality and frame generation. But this is just the starting area so I don't know how performance is with the larger city areas. I'm running it on a 5900x + 4090 @ 3440x1440

https://i.imgur.com/2mFknJz...

[MadLad]

Gives me an excuse to play through this again. It's been a little bit. Should put the 3080 through its paces.

Interested in seeing the improvements via the series S as well.

[gazgriff2k12]

the game is fantastic and has replay value without shiny puddles lol

[MadLad]

I downloaded both on PC and Series S, and there's far more going on than just shiny puddles. Especially on console, which Series S doesn't even push for RTX.
As someone who has been playing since day one on PC, even modding it, this is a pretty solid overhaul of the original game.

[ANIALATOR136]

I pretty much looks like the final release trailer now

[Terry_B]

Not seeing a big deal there.

[Binarycode]

You need a beast of a RIG to run that anywhere near 4k with decent FPS, You'll need DLSS on bigtime.lol.

[gazgriff2k12]

Am i the only one that really doesn't care about raytraced lighting. sound yes light can wait a couple of gens for me

[Flewid638]

If only I liked this game. I need them to add a 3rd person patch to Cyberpunk already. Much prefer sci-fi over medieval fantasy.

[frostypants]

I mean, it's obviously more accurate, but does it look significantly "better"? Eh...I'd say slightly. If I had a GPU that could pull this off at 60fps with everything else maxed out, then sure, why not. Otherwise it's a big tradeoff for a slight benefit. I can't imagine any detail or resolution setting I'd want to sacrifice for this to achieve 60fps.