What is HBAO+ What next-gen means :

[HUX]

The witcher 3 (2015) HBAO+
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2904247808

The witcher 3 (2015) SSAO
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2904247743

The witcher 3 (2022) next gen SSAO
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2904247918

Now you know

[schachmatt123]

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

SSAO and HBAO are fake soft shadows and you will see then all time with all scenes no matter how the light falls.

RT Ambient with path traced light and shadows is like real in life falls. You see soft shadows only when you will see this shadows in real life.

There is no marketing here, its just hardware technology.

The one "useful idiots" its I think author, but this must be becasue o lack knowekdke he has ;-)

Thanks for proving my point.

Now go back to my original post, you will find out that I never doubted that RT looks more "realistic" than rasterizing options.

The downgrade of non RT SSAO and HBAO+ is a fact, btw.

Oh, and in real life, shadows won't disappear or pop in at a 50 meters distance like the RT ones in witcher 3 does. RT right now is not realistic, we simply don't have the processing power now. Right now, RT is used to simulate reality in a better way than previous methods. In time, this will change.

[Maverick81PL]

Publicado originalmente por NuttyNut:

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

DX12 is path traced ambient onclusion so its not a fake like SSO or BHAO ambient onclusion.

Looks better with RTX ON, and more realistic.

Other are just fake effects bit in some games looks nice, but still I prefer this with RT

This game uses raytracing and not pathtracing. If it did the fps would be in the single digits even for 4090 users.

lol really? and shadoows in game from sun lioght are from where? they not fake ;-) so game use path traced light and shadows ;-)

[HUX]

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

Publicado originalmente por schachmatt123:

Typical marketing trick: Make the non RT version look worse, so the RT version looks better in comparison. The RT SSAO doesn't look much better than the HBAO+ btw, if at all.

Still incredible how many people fall for this. The indutrie calls them "useful idiots".

SSAO and HBAO are fake soft shadows and you will see then all time with all scenes no matter how the light falls.

RT Ambient with path traced light and shadows is like real in life falls. You see soft shadows only when you will see this shadows in real life.

There is no marketing here, its just hardware technology.

The one "useful idiots" its I think author, but this must be becasue o lack knowekdke he has ;-)

I know what RTX is and how it works, thanks
The global illumination, the ambient occlusion "rtx version". I know how it works since early 2000 maybe you were not born yet ^^
What you don't understand is that I compare the non-rtx SSAO.(it's written in green in those screenshots if you look closely)
You don't have to give me a lesson of how rtx works, I know it is wonderful and much better than non-rtx. (obvious, isn't it?)

For non-rtx users, there is a downgrade compared to the 2015 version. That's it.

[Maverick81PL]

Publicado originalmente por schachmatt123:

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

SSAO and HBAO are fake soft shadows and you will see then all time with all scenes no matter how the light falls.

RT Ambient with path traced light and shadows is like real in life falls. You see soft shadows only when you will see this shadows in real life.

There is no marketing here, its just hardware technology.

The one "useful idiots" its I think author, but this must be becasue o lack knowekdke he has ;-)

Thanks for proving my point.

Now go back to my original post, you will find out that I never doubted that RT looks more "realistic" than rasterizing options.

The downgrade of non RT SSAO and HBAO+ is a fact, btw.

Oh, and in real life, shadows won't disappear or pop in at a 50 meters distance like the RT ones in witcher 3 does. RT right now is not realistic, we simply don't have the processing power now. Right now, RT is used to simulate reality in a better way than previous methods. In time, this will change.

you make screens only with SSAO and HBAO so...
also I play with RT and nothing is disspear in my game, shadows are visible in far distance, on Ultra+ you will have NO more popup in game. Scenes are loading far far away and players must very focus on screen and look for that ;-)

[BigCunggus]

this is why i rollback to 1.32, the game looks ugly without Raytraced cards

[Raein]

Yeah people calling todays RT more "realistic" is like when people used to call Physix more realistic. The way it's implemented right now and with user-side avg computing power it's not that far from "fake" artistic lightning we had before and it will not become more realistic in the near future. Also, realistic !=best.
oh and it's not a real graphic improvement when you have to take screenshots and compare them on one screen to be able to tell the difference. Just ask Fortnite.

[schachmatt123]

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

[..] shadows are visible in far distance, on Ultra+ you will have NO more popup in game. Scenes are loading faf faf away and players must very focus on screen and look for that ;-)

The ultra+ setting doesn't raise shadow view range in any noticeble way compared to ultra. Some shadows still pop up a few inches right in front of you due to it's cascade nature (this can be countered by manually increasing the ini settings). But that's not what I meant, as the ultra+ shadow setting (or other shadow settings) only affects non RT shadows.

Regarding RT, there are more than enough videos and screen comparisons, the shadows fade out/pop in with RT as they are set within a fixed range. I also played with RT on/off and different quality settings. Anyway, I'll end this Off Topic side discussion now.

On Topic: It's obvious that the non RT SSAO has been watered down. I support the return of the original SSAO settings for the "next gen" version. They look much better than the current solution.

I noticed that before and was surprised that it wasn't mentioned before, at least this topic is the first one I noticed someone mentioning it. There's also another topic I just found that asks for the return of HBAO.

[HUX]

Publicado originalmente por schachmatt123:

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

[..] shadows are visible in far distance, on Ultra+ you will have NO more popup in game. Scenes are loading faf faf away and players must very focus on screen and look for that ;-)

The ultra+ setting doesn't raise shadow view range in any noticeble way compared to ultra. Some shadows still pop up a few inches right in front of you due to it's cascade nature (this can be countered by manually increasing the ini settings). But that's not what I meant, as the ultra+ shadow setting (or other shadow settings) only affects non RT shadows.

Regarding RT, there are more than enough videos and screen comparisons, the shadows fade out/pop in with RT as they are set within a fixed range. I also played with RT on/off and different quality settings. Anyway, I'll end this Off Topic side discussion now.

On Topic: It's obvious that the non RT SSAO has been watered down. I support the return of the original SSAO settings for the "next gen" version. They look much better than the current solution.

I noticed that before and was surprised that it wasn't mentioned before, at least this topic is the first one I noticed someone mentioning it. There's also another topic I just found that asks for the return of HBAO.

I'm not the only one who ask the return of HBAO, many comments talk about it, not only in this steam forum, but in CDP official forum as well.
Not many put screenshots to compare though, i thought it was necessary!

Sometimes i wonder if they didn't remove the hbao to create some kind of visual gap and promote rtx tech.
A dark story of a dark briefcase full of dark money.

[NuttyNut]

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

Publicado originalmente por NuttyNut:

This game uses raytracing and not pathtracing. If it did the fps would be in the single digits even for 4090 users.

lol really? and shadoows in game from sun lioght are from where? they not fake ;-) so game use path traced light and shadows ;-)

Here, learn something new: https://www.techspot.com/article/2485-path-tracing-vs-ray-tracing/

Also the shadows from the sun for small vegetation such as grass and pebbles of rock are actually based on screen space, meaning the shadows will disappear when the object that casts it is obstructed from view. If they were path traced this wouldn't happen, dummy.

[Darwe]

Publicado originalmente por NuttyNut:

Publicado originalmente por Maverick81PL:

lol really? and shadoows in game from sun lioght are from where? they not fake ;-) so game use path traced light and shadows ;-)

Here, learn something new: https://www.techspot.com/article/2485-path-tracing-vs-ray-tracing/

Also the shadows from the sun for small vegetation such as grass and pebbles of rock are actually based on screen space, meaning the shadows will disappear when the object that casts it is obstructed from view. If they were path traced this wouldn't happen, dummy.

Also ... Raytraced reflection have are hybrid, the small details are screen space dependent

[Knight]

I kinda hope they bring back the old HBAO+ and SMAA anti-aliasing for dx11 users at least. I play on 1080p, my game used to look crisp and now it's all grainy because of the new TAAU and the new SSAO causes some shadow flickering in Novigrad.

[Milkdust]

It is unfortunate that HBAO+ was inexplicably removed, particularly from the DX11 version.

[Knight]

They kinda went too far with the "improvements" with PC settings, they should've just improved upon the existing settings at the very least. It's all tolerable if I'm honest here, as I said it used to be near perfect for me as it was, kinda nitpicking here but still.

[HUX]

I saw a very interesting thread yesterday where the author of MXAO was working on a new version of MXAO, mixed with GTAO.
Also the good news is it will release very soon, maybe at the very end of this month.
I'll keep you informed as soon as it gets updated.

[Lheon]

Idk if you notice, but the game will not render Light Shafts if you´re not using TAAU anti-aliasing, man TAAU looks sooo blurry, it completely wash out the texture details, even with sharpening at max