Gothic 3 optimization suggestions

[hackbod]

THIS MATERIAL IS NOW IN AN UPDATED AND IMPROVED FORM AS A GUIDE:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=155304006

Please follow the direction there!

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I originally posted this in the combined Gothic forum, but it is really hard to find that with the new steam community so thought it would be useful to have it in the new dedicated Gothic 3 forum.

If you are going to play Gothic 3, I'd strongly recommend installing a few improvements to its performance -- it's a really great game, but seriously marred by issues, most of which can be fixed.

The first thing to do is to install the latest community match, which seems to be 1.75.14: http://www.patches-scrolls.de/gothic3.php#175

I've installed this over the Steam version, and it works great.

Unfortunately for some reason the patch doesn't seem to directly fix one of the most significant problems I have with Gothic 3 -- the terrible view distance. It does seem to make it *possible* to fix it, however you need to edit the game's ini file to do this. Someone on the old forum posted a link to an improved ini file, however it doesn't directly work with 1.75.14, and has some problems.

Here is a link to the improved ini file I have created so far: https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B_w4zHK-Jy6rbENCRVR1WmJiMWM

You should be able to directly replace your current ge3.ini (located in your Steam apps dir at common/gothic3/Ini/ge3.ini), though you will want to make a copy of your original file just in case.

To see how this helps, I have some screenshots comparing the default ge3.ini (at Very High settings) to this new ge3.ini (at High settings). There are a bunch of them, but if you want the difference in just two pictures try these:

Mountains north of Silden
Mountains north of Silden

Screenshots with the original ge3.ini:

On high at Faring
On the Ardea tower
Cape Dun
Looking out from Silden
Mountains north of Silden
Looking south towards Silden
Entrance to Trelis
Looking on Trelis
Stream by Trelis
At the dig near Trelis looking towards Varant
Entrance to the dig near Trelis
Looking over Bakaresh
Looking down on Bakaresh
In Bakaresh
Looking across part of Varant
Settled Oasis in Varant
Oasis in Varant

Screenshots with the improved ge3.ini:

On high at Faring
On the Ardea tower
Cape Dun
Looking out from Silden
Mountains north of Silden
Looking south towards Silden
Entrance to Trelis
Looking on Trelis
Stream by Trelis
At the dig near Trelis looking towards Varant
Entrance to the dig near Trelis
Looking over Bakaresh
Looking down on Bakaresh
In Bakaresh
Looking across part of Varant
Settled Oasis in Varant
Oasis in Varant

The main changes I made from the original "far distance" ini file was to rework the High graphics settings to give you all of the advantages I really wanted (using highest quality textures, nice far view distances) without going overboard. This setting runs great on my GTX560Ti, using "High" settings. I don't recommend "Very High" -- it doesn't seem to make a notable visual difference. I also fixed a few issues such as reducing the ROI so that you don't have the issue with audio cutting in and out.

One other thing I would recommend is to go into the game's controller settings and completely turn off mouse smoothing.

I have been playing with the Questpaket and Content Mod enhancements, and can give some instructions for how to get and install them. I think the game is fine without them, but if you want to push it further these seem pretty good. Most of my interest in them is for the improved textures; unfortunately I can't figure out a way to get them installed with only the textures -- you'll need to settle for some modifications impacting the game, from new dialog that doesn't have spoken parts, to the additions of the Content Mod without those quests but a warning that some parts may not work well because it depends on the quests.

To give you an idea of how these impact the game's visuals, here are the same set of pictures as above but running with Content Mod 2.5 installed.

On high at Faring
On the Ardea tower
Cape Dun
Looking out from Silden
Mountains north of Silden
Looking south towards Silden
Entrance to Trelis
Looking on Trelis
Stream by Trelis
At the dig near Trelis looking towards Varant
Entrance to the dig near Trelis
Looking over Bakaresh
Looking down on Bakaresh
In Bakaresh
Looking across part of Varant
Settled Oasis in Varant
Oasis in Varant

Here's what you need to install them. First, download all of the pieces:

1. Questpaket 2 update 4 AND its update for patch 1.75: http://www.worldofgothic.de/dl/download_433.htm
2. Content Mod 2.4: http://www.worldofgothic.de/dl/download_479.htm

(There is also a newer Content Mod 2.5 at http://www.worldofgothic.de/dl/download_482.htm; I have tried it a little and the instructions for installing seem basically the same as the 2.4 one.)

You want to install them in this order: Questpaket 2 update 4, then update for patch 1.75, then Content Mod 2.4. This must be on top of a game already patched to Community Patch 1.75.14.

The installation for the Questpaket is all in German, so it can be a little confusing. Here are the options:

- "Grundinstallation" -- I think you always want this.
- "Interface - modifizierter Kompass" -- gives you a new interface with a compass. If you don't select it, you will get a new interface without a compass. If you want the old interface, don't worry, the Content Mod has an option to bring it back.
- "Sprachausgabe - Deutsch" -- spoken lines of new quests in German. Don't bother with this unless you are playing your game in German.
- "Vertontes Intro - Deutsch" -- replaces the game intro with a version with German dialog on top. Also don't bother unless you are playing in German.
- "Neue Myrtana-Texturen" -- some new textures.
- "Erhogte Sichtweite" -- something about increase eye height, I haven't been able to tell what it does.

Now you install the update for patch 1.75, which has no options.

Next install Content Mod 2.4. There are a couple significant options here to be aware of:

- You can select either "CM2.4(mit_QP)" or "CM2.4(Ohne_QP_Quests)". The former is the default, the latter is an option you can use to get rid of the extra quests that were installed by Questpaket. This can be nice, because if you are playing in English, those new quests don't have any English spoken dialog, so they can be pretty jarring when playing the game. I think you need to select one or the other of these, not both. It works for me to select only the second option. I don't know what happens if you select both or neither of them.
- "G3_Bars" lets you restore the original Gothic 3 interface.

(Note the Content Mod seems to claim you can install it without the Questpaket, to only get the textures, but I have never gotten that to work. None of the changes it makes seem to show up in the game.)

Finally, you need to re-replace your ge3.ini file with the one from above, since the process of installing these patches changes it to a worse version.

[Elazul]

I have never played Gothic 3 before and I purchased it during the last Summer Sale. Just getting around to playing it soon(downloading it now). How does the community patch affect the game? It doesn't change the content does it? I wanted to play as close to the original game as possible and don't really want much altered. However, I don't like bugs so things that squash bugs are ok. Anyone know the answer to this question?

EDIT: Also, I am not really a fan of the new Steam Community. Is there a way to go back to the original forums? ugghhh...

[hackbod]

The community patch doesn't change the game in any way I think is significant in that regard -- it doesn't add new content or change quests. You definitely don't want to play it without the community patch. :) It has some options for alternative balancing that changes the stats on various things and such, but that is an option you can turn on or off in the main game menu.

[Ashes]

Some bugs aren't fixed yet in this new patch. Personally, sometimes the game is runninng so slow i have to exit it and relaunch, near Trelis i can pass over the map (silver wolves quest).

[TheWatamelonThief]

I was thinking about getting this game but not sure if i will like it. Is it any good and if so should i get gothic 3 or gothic 3 forsaken gods?

[dasn00t]

Get G3, forsaken gods shouldn't be touched with a ten foot pole.

[Set-115689]

Another hint that may help people is that to reduce loading times (3-9 minutes is apparently normal) turn off vsync in your video card control panel. My saved game loading time was reduced to about 35 seconds from about 3 min 45 seconds.

[Bleez]

Thanks for that man, thats awesome

[Bookhorse]

Playing G3 without a CP is... don't do it)

[Nuku]

Great post, especially for those new to G3, should be stickied!

[The Savage Chicken]

The community patches seem to take forever to dowload. I am getting mine from Gamefront and google is saying it gonna take up to two hour to download 1.5gb.

[Ronin]

Gracias. Thanks

[Latent Gecko ⁧🦎]

The http://www.patches-scrolls.de/gothic3.php#175
link just sends me to a search page.

[Nuku]

Tigers_Ghost původně napsal:

The http://www.patches-scrolls.de/gothic3.php#175
link just sends me to a search page.

Oh the site got a new look, so i guess the site's structure changed too, anyway here's the new link: http://www.patches-scrolls.de/patch/1876/25468/44334/download

[Big Bee]

is it sloves the terrible mouse-looking? just because not everybody likes, if move the mouse right, you look left, vice versa, and if move it up, look down, vice versa... any solutions? the patch sloves it?

[Wafflesaurus Supreme]

Nice post. Thank you.