Gaming
Witcher 3 Patches Roll Out, Graphics Complaints Arise
One week after the release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, a series of patches have been rolled out for the game’s various platforms. PC got an update last week and another two days ago, bringing it to version 1.0.4. PS4 has just received the 1.0.3 patch in EU, adding a bunch of fixes intended to improve the game’s stability and performance. The Xbox One version of that patch is on its way, and is set to fix the uneven framerate performance by locking it at 30fps. It’s currently waiting for Microsoft to finish putting it through its certification process, but it should be out shortly.
After addressing concerns about The Witcher 3 going through a big graphical downgrade since its E3 trailer two years ago, CD Projekt RED is now facing complaints that the recent patches are causing graphics problems. The most notable complaint is that, since patch 1.0.3, characters and objects “pop” into the screen at seemingly random times. The problem is demonstrated in the video below, and appears to be an issue with some bizarre character draw distances. This is an issue that I have run into a couple of times while playing the game myself.
Other issues involve floating objects, missing textures, and framerate drops. Another complaint is that CD Projekt RED promised to include an update that would allow users to tweak their graphics settings manually through .ini files, but it has still not arrived yet.
Here’s the full list of what patch 1.0.4 was supposed to fix:
- Rebinding of all keys is now available after switching on the ‘Unlock Bindings’ option in the Options\Key Bindings submenu.
- Corrects an issue in the dialogue system that might have caused dialogue looping in certain scenes.
- Fixes an issue with incorrect behavior of Wild Hunt warriors after they were affected by the Axii Sign.
- Corrects a bug that caused spontaneous combustion of gas clouds.
- 1280 x 720 resolution is now properly displayed as a valid resolution option.
- Fixes boat stuttering in cutscenes.
- Texture rendering quality for the high and ultra presets has been improved.
- Further improvements made in NVIDIA Hairworks performance.
- A few additional gwent cards are now available in the Prologue area.
- Fixes an issue where users with usernames incorporating non-Latin characters were unable to import saves from The Witcher 2.
- Includes a series of overall stability and performance improvements.
- Fixes issues related to alt + tabbing and minimizing the game window.
- Updates the game icon.
- Enlarges the loot pop-up window in the UI.
- Fixes an issue where, in certain circumstances, the comparison window could extend beyond the game borders in the UI.
- Upgrading items included in gear sets no longer destroys rune sockets on said items.
- Introduces small tweaks in the UI for gwent.
- Corrects some missing translations in localized versions.
Gaming
Ubisoft says that future Assassin’s Creed games will need more time to be made
As Assassin’s Creed Shadows is about to sneak up on people in November, Ubisoft says that the time between developing games needs to be longer to find the “right balance.” Shadows has been in development for four years, longer than any other game in the series up to this point. That includes the huge open-world epics Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla.
Shadows lead producer Karl Onnée (thanks, GamesIndustry.biz) says that the latest AC game took 25% longer to make than Valhalla. He says this is necessary to keep the quality of the series that it is known for: “It’s always a balance between time and costs, but the more time you have, the more you can iterate.” You can speed up a project by adding more people to it, but that doesn’t give you more time to make changes.
Onnée says this has as much to do with immersion and aesthetics as it does with fixing bugs and smoothing out pixels. This is because the development team needs time to learn about each new historical setting: “We are trying to make a game that is as real as possible.” We’re proud of it, and the process took a long time. In feudal Japan, building a house is very different from building a house in France or England in the Middle Ages. As an artist, you need to learn where to put things in a feudal Japanese home. For example, food might not belong there. Get all the information you need and learn it. That process takes a long time.”
You’ll have to wait a little longer for Ubisoft to work on each game. Are you okay with that? In what part of Shadows are you now? Is it interesting to you? Leave a comment below and let us know.
Gaming
You can now pre-order Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP on PS5
You can now pre-order Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP, a remaster that Dragami Games and Capcom both created. You can now pre-order the PS5 game on the PS Store for $44.99 or £39.99. If you have PS Plus, you can get an extra 10% off the price.
The company put out a new trailer with about three minutes of gameplay to mark the start of the pre-order period. Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP is a remaster of Grasshopper Manufacture’s crazy action game from 2012. You play as Juliet, a high school student who fights off waves of zombies.
The remaster adds RePOP mode, an alternative mode that swaps out the blood and gore for fun visual effects. It also adds a bunch of other features and improvements that make the game better overall. You can expect the graphics and sound to be better as well.
The game will now come out on September 12, 2024, instead of September 12, 2024. Are you excited to get back to this? Please cheer us on in the section below.
Gaming
This Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 zombies trailer is way too expensive
Is there really anyone who is following the story of Call of Duty’s zombie mode? We’ve known about the story in a vague way for a while, but we couldn’t tell you anything about it. It looks like the “Dark Aether” story will continue in Black Ops 6, but we don’t really know what that means.
For those of you who care, here is the official blurb with some background: “Requiem, led by the CIA, finally closed the last-dimensional portal, sending its inhabitants back to the nightmare world known as the Dark Aether, after two years of fighting zombie outbreaks around the world during the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War timeline.”
Wait, there’s more! “Agent Samantha Maxis gave her life to seal this weird dimension from the inside out.” Even worse things were to come: senior staff members of Requiem were arrested without a reason by the Project Director, who turned out to be Edward Richtofen.
Black Ops 6 will take place about five years later, and it looks like it will show more about Richtofen’s goals and motivations. The most important thing is that you will probably be shooting an unimaginable number of zombies in the head. This week, on August 8, there will be a full reveal of the gameplay, so keep an eye out for that.
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