The Witcher 3 Next-Gen screenshot

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.

As we’ve already reported, The Witcher 3 Next-Gen will bring Ray Tracing Global Illumination, Reflections, Ambient Occlusion and Shadows on PC. Thus, this comparison video will give you an idea of what you can expect from these RT effects.

Furthermore, the game will support both AMD FSR 2 and NVIDIA DLSS 3. DLSS 3 will help owners of weaker CPUs to maximize the aforementioned Ray Tracing effects.

The Witcher 3 Next-Gen will release on December 14th. Yesterday, CDPR also shared its complete changelog. You can also find here the mods that the team has included in this free update.

Stay tuned for more!

The Witcher 3 Next Gen Patch Ray Tracing On vs OFF - PC RTX 3080 Graphics Comparison

38 thoughts on “Behold the PC version of The Witcher 3 Next-Gen with all of its Ray Tracing effects”

        1. The water is RT. It’s enhanced SSR on consoles.

          PC is RT Reflections. If you’re gonna call people lazy you should at least do basic research.

          1. Jesus Christ you’re a moron.

            Even the source you linked to says
            “Additionally, PC players with compatible hardware have an additional option to turn on ray traced reflections and shadows.”

            How did you manage to write all that while having a stroke? Are you actually braindead?

        2. Ok in that case: I only see Phoenix mod adding this. Is there another mod I can try without losing the trees swaying in the wind. I’m usually a big fan of screen space reflections 😉

    1. The lighting is not overhauled, the “RTGI” is merely contributing to the original probe system by adding secondary/indirect lighting.
      That’s part of the reason why it barely looks different, this is not RTGI like Metro Enhanced, where they completely removed the traditional probe GI and replaced it entirely with RT.

  1. The biggest difference seems to be the significantly improved water reflections. 2nd biggest would be the foliage, RT makes the grass look much more grounded.
    Other than that, the differences are little to none, and in certain scenes without foliage and water, RT off actually looks aesthetically better IMO.

  2. “DLSS 3 will help owners of weaker CPUs to maximize the aforementioned Ray Tracing effects.”

    You mean people can afford a $1600 graphics card but can’t afford a decent CPU to go along with it? That doesn’t sound like very good planning

  3. The anti-aliasing is 10 times better than the original game, models/meshes have been upgraded so round things actually look round and not 8 sided. The tree and grass meshes have been drastically altered. Anyone who says they can’t see the difference between the old game and new is blind as a bat

    1. That’s HalkHogan’s HD Reworked mod, been available since 2015.

      Also bats are not blind; that’s a myth.

  4. I don’t see any real differences. On the footage where there are minor differences, the version without raytracing looks better.

      1. Completely wrong. It’s still vanilla lighting with probe based RTGI. The lighting is not overhauled, the ray tracing is merely contributing to the original probe system by adding secondary/indirect lighting.
        That’s part of the reason why it barely looks different, this is not RTGI like Metro Enhanced, where they completely removed the traditional probe GI and replaced it entirely with RT.

  5. I’ll be honest. Majority of the advertised improvements are all hard work of halk hogan. And instead of implementing raytracing (which doesn’t suit red engine at all look at CP2077) I wish they would have brought back original e3 lighting system that has baked global illumination, lighting fog volumes, and sort of subsurface scattering. Would have been less taxing and better quality.

    1. Now that 2014 build I would gladly play as it did and still looks more appealing to the eye than the retail version. Even this RTX version doesn’t even come close.

  6. Modded W3 have been enjoying this for years already. Except RTX which does very little in this version. Next-Gen visuals my a$$

  7. Seems like Skellige and Kaer Morgen show off much more dramatic differences than Novigrad and Velen. RTGI seems too weak in the latter locations.

    Anyhow, it’s a very subtle but nice touch in most locations. The RT Reflections make a massive difference.

  8. Should have made it for RTX GPUs only. Make it run on 3070 and above only. We need mid range gamers to stick with non Ray Tracing otherwise complaints like “can’t see the difference” will emerge. I mean, if you don’t own high end hardware, don’t complain.

    1. It seems like many people just dont know what RT really does and cant appreciate what it brings to the table.

      There’s interesting YT channel “ray tracing revolution” that really shows the true scope of RT implementation in the witcher 3. The difference between RT on and off in this game is huge, yet all these people here on DSOG complain “I cant see the difference”.

  9. Witcher 3 we added bloom edition and now you need 2k dollars for 4090 to be able to handle that bloom. Gaming for life…

  10. Just tested the game now. All the RT settings are extremely demanding (regardless of GI, shadows, reflections, AO). You need a 4080/4090 card in order to run with RT on at 60FPS+.

    Edit: After some tinkering, I am able to get a decent frame rate on my laptop 3080. At 1440p, with all RT options turned on, DLSS set to auto and all settings on Ultra+ (except for Background Characters set to Low) and Hairworks completely off, I get frame rates around 55 to 60FPS in dense forest areas and cities/villages. I’ll test some more later. Do note though that FSR2 seems to have issues as it is very blurry.

  11. Is it me? because apart from the watre and some extra shadows I am not seeing much of a difference. That and even with youtubevideo qaulity, there is def a fps drop and stutter in the RT on shots.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *