[Forbes] AMD Is Wrong About 'The Witcher 3' And Nvidia's HairWorks

[xthetenth]

Why would they do that?

Because it hurts the other guy worse, and it makes their new stuff look better to people with the old stuff.

 

[AnandThenMan]

Absolutely. What a loss for AMD to have left things to the whim of devs and the uncertainty of using or not using their code, whether open source or not. Its a big gaming title! They should have been banging on CDPRs doors to make this happen. But no, the code/libraries are out there... to be used.. or not. Jeezus, AMD shareholders should be screaming for blood at this moment.

This post is amazing to me. Do you honestly think that we are in a good place where a game dev needs black box code supplied by Nvidia or AMD to make games run "properly" or introduce some types of visuals? What is more troubling about this is essentially the company with the most bribe oh sorry sponsorship money gets the best performance.

It is beyond me how any free thinking gamer could support this scenario.

 

[Silverforce11]

But isn't a 290x usually faster than a 970?

Maybe it's resolution dependant.

Latest TPU GPU review

Latest Sweclockers index:
http://www.sweclockers.com/recension/20391-evga-geforce-gtx-970-ssc-acx-2-0/6#content

It depends on the review site for Witcher 3, but a few of them have the R290X as faster without GameWorks features. So it's actually performance as normal. There's no foul-play from Prj Red.

http://www.sweclockers.com/recension/20511-snabbtest-grafikprestanda-i-the-witcher-3/3#content

Oh, notice how strong the 780Ti still is in neutral games.

 

[Kenmitch]

Because it hurts the other guy worse, and it makes their new stuff look better to people with the old stuff.

Sad but true.

Don't really see the hype over hair and fur myself. Would rather have the fps than pretty hair and fur. Not like it adds anything to gameplay. Looks good on screenshots sometimes I guess.

 

[Flapdrol1337]

Looks like they're on par at 2560x1440, at higher res de 290x is faster, at lower res the 970

https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Performance_Analysis/The_Witcher_3/3.html

It depends on the review site for Witcher 3, but a few of them have the R290X as faster without GameWorks features. So it's actually performance as normal. There's no foul-play from Prj Red.

Yeah, looks like business as usual then. Pcgameshardware tested at 1920x1080, missed that at first.

 

[Keysplayr]

I will say this one more time, pay very close attention:

I'll try to keep up. Please excuse my slow mind.

1. TressFX is a FREE and DOCUMENTED library with SAMPLES.

Free doesn't get it into a game. AMD should promote, present, and work with devs to get it into as many games as possible. FREE has absolutely nothing to do with anything.

2. The game studios have people called PROGRAMMERS who know how to WORK with CODE.

They absolutely do. I also know that programmers love having assistance in implementing features in games by the creators of said features. You can't just say, "here's TressFX". Point to the code and say "You're on your own. Do with it what you will"

3. AMD is a business, if it is NOT MAKING MONEY (DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY) off of TressFX IT DOES NOT NEED TO SPEND RESOURCES ON A THIRD PARTY GAME STUDIO WHO HAVE ALREADY DOCUMENTED CODE FOR A FREE LIBRARY.

Yes, it does need to spend resources on a third party game studio to implement their features. It 100% absolutely and undoubtedly does.

4. If CDPR's programmers need assistance implementing documented code then they should be sacked for their incompetence and laziness.

Funny you should mention laziness. S'all I'm sayin.

Summary:
You are asking AMD to spoonfeed people who have graduated with degrees who can read and write code. CDPR's programmers have TressFX code since it is FREE and DOCUMENTED. DO YOU UNDERSTAND NOW?

No. I am not asking anything. I do feel that a technology innovator should feel obligated in some part to get there tech out there and implemented in dev's wares. It's called marketing your product.

P.S. I think there is something wrong with your caps lock key.

 

[MrK6]

This post is amazing to me. Do you honestly think that we are in a good place where a game dev needs black box code supplied by Nvidia or AMD to make games run "properly" or introduce some types of visuals? What is more troubling about this is essentially the company with the most bribe oh sorry sponsorship money gets the best performance.

It is beyond me how any free thinking gamer could support this scenario.

Exactly, one of the few sensible posts to come out of this thread. Why are many of you demanding that GPU companies do the developer's work for them? This ridiculous partisanship is what has gotten us to where we are in the first place. Every little gimmick that one company throws together to sway the dullest of fanboys wastes resources that should be spent developing faster and more efficient hardware. We're stuck on 2+ year product cycles now because every time a company releases a new hair magic trick or some other nonsense you collectively lose your heads. If that's all it takes to get sales, why would they try harder? You have yourselves to blame for the lack of progress and overall state of the graphics cards market; this thread is great documentation for it.

 

[amenx]

Exactly, one of the few sensible posts to come out of this thread. Why are many of you demanding that GPU companies do the developer's work for them? This ridiculous partisanship is what has gotten us to where we are in the first place. Every little gimmick that one company throws together to sway the dullest of fanboys wastes resources that should be spent developing faster and more efficient hardware.

No, they shouldnt be doing the developers work for them. They should be selling their hardware. Now if they have trouble selling their hardware due to games not making the most out of the features their hardware is capable of, then so be it... wither and die... because the ideal of 'free thinking gamers' is of course more important to them than the survivability of their business.

 

[MrK6]

No, they shouldnt be doing the developers work for them. They should be selling their hardware. Now if they have trouble selling their hardware due to games not making the most out of the features their hardware is capable of, then so be it... wither and die... because the ideal of 'free thinking gamers' is of course more important to them than the survivability of their business.

What features do you think those would be?

 

[Atreidin]

Exactly, one of the few sensible posts to come out of this thread. Why are many of you demanding that GPU companies do the developer's work for them? This ridiculous partisanship is what has gotten us to where we are in the first place. Every little gimmick that one company throws together to sway the dullest of fanboys wastes resources that should be spent developing faster and more efficient hardware. We're stuck on 2+ year product cycles now because every time a company releases a new hair magic trick or some other nonsense you collectively lose your heads. If that's all it takes to get sales, why would they try harder? You have yourselves to blame for the lack of progress and overall state of the graphics cards market; this thread is great documentation for it.

Whether they admit it or not, many people treat these companies like a lot of people treat sports teams. They are emotionally invested in their successes and failures. Whether or not the actions of these companies benefit the one who buys the products is strangely not at the top of the list of their concerns. The question people should be asking is "What can these companies do that will get me the best hardware and the best games, now and in the future?" If someone really thinks things through and thinks the answer is "closed and/or extremely difficult to optimize standards which will hamper the adoption of cool features," then that is a thought process I have a difficult time following.

 

[maddie]

The hard core capitalists argue that
Nvidia should seek their own interests
AMD should seek their own interests

Ideally however, us consumers should seek our own interests and not be captured emotionally by any company. To do otherwise is to tie the noose yourself and jump.

This is not a sports event where you pick a side and support them.

 

[amenx]

What features do you think those would be?

Well features mainly involving the software/coding that enhances their cards performance or visual appeal, ie, hairworks, TressFX, Physx... thats all I can think of, lol. But yes, point made. Ideally everything should run and visualize about equally regardless of manufacturer. And yes, it is a bit of a sad state when it comes down to which manufacturer is quicker or cleverer in gaining the upper edge over the other in how they utilize coding (and/or financing/collaboration with devs) to make their hardware appear more capable. I kind of feel sad for AMD, although they would probably do the same as Nvidia in similar position, if given same influence, clout or money. But to sit back and do nothing while their ship takes on water is not exactly an appealing strategy either.

 

[PPB]

You all miss somethibg very important regarding the tressfx vs hairworks issue.

Lets first assume cdpr ussed tressfx instead of hairworks. All good, use open source code to apply a particular effect of hair and fur and grass on your game, who wouldnt want that?

Well, after applying it, they have to check the performance of the game with that code being used on the biggest range of hardware withib reason. For AMD, they just have to go to their tech papers regarding the uarch, its functions, and use the debuggers, sdk or other complementary troubleshooting software. This is no problem, since AMD, altough sometimes late, its totally open of exposing their uarch to ghe devs and have all those things I named available for using. Ok, now Intel and Nvidia. Well, here is where they are boned, as neither will supply neither tech papers, debuggers or sdk to the devs regarding their uarchs. If they leave the code untouched, it is highly propable their game will run like crap on Intel and Nvidia hardware when tressfx is activated. And here is when it comes the interesting part: those 2 vendors amass the gross share of igps ans dgpus, respeclty. So the dev knows here that if they plan on using tressfx, because of the closeness of those 2 aibs regarding their uarchs, the performance will bomb as the most used pc gaming hardware will probaly tank when enabling this particular effect. There is no conspiracy from AMD in this (no convenient abuse of compute in tressfx to tank kepler as some uninformed users try to imply).

So what is left for the dev? Risk the game success because of a mayor performance issue regarding the 2 most prominent hardware makers in the pc gaming space, or try another middleware with higher optimizations to the higher parties I named? This is where gameworks comes into play. Gameworks code is as closed as a grocery store on 3AM of a sunday morning, but it is designed to work well with the latest uarch of the most prominent dgpu vendor, this is maxwellv2 from Nvidia. We cant know if wheter there are explicit crippling functions ala ICC or they conveniently abuse certain effects such as tessellation(well, after the tweak it was posted in popular forums to limit tess on AMD card and regain almost all the perf lost from hairworks, this is fairly a strong assumption). Either way, performance sucks balls on kepler, GCN <1.2 and probably all your intel igps (but the latter mostly because of the inherent lack of power as they are all igps), but at least more people are allowed to run the game better as nv is the aib with the higher marketshare. Also this is good for cdpr as they get compensations fornusing gameworks (either gpus or manpower from nv) and can shift their lazy asses to move on solving the rest of the game code till retail.

I think the above is what happened here and what usually happens in the pc gaming space since NV, most notably, decided to strat being secretive about their uarchs. As someone already said in another post, it wont be surprising if AMD is more helping than NV when reaching the devs go optimize for Kepler. Which sounds absurd, as absurd as devs settling for using closed middlewares of companies that are not open about their hardware optimizations. Sad times indeed for pc gaming ahead.

 

[maddie]

Why would they do that?

Ever heard of planned obsolescence?

 

[geoxile]

AMD should just make their own GameWorks, exclusive features (ex PhysX), and vendor locked features (Batman AA MSAA fiasco). The people have already voted with their wallets. They approve. AMD better make some changes before they completely lose the market.

 

[amenx]

Whether they admit it or not, many people treat these companies like a lot of people treat sports teams. They are emotionally invested in their successes and failures. Whether or not the actions of these companies benefit the one who buys the products is strangely not at the top of the list of their concerns. The question people should be asking is "What can these companies do that will get me the best hardware and the best games, now and in the future?" If someone really thinks things through and thinks the answer is "closed and/or extremely difficult to optimize standards which will hamper the adoption of cool features," then that is a thought process I have a difficult time following.

Well stated. I cant think of any other companies that are in as blistering, froth foaming competition as these 2 GPU makers.. and fuelled by their supporters. I wish there was some overseeing body of sorts that could regulate PC gaming . .. that could ensure no side gains an undeserved edge over an other through software/coding, but only strictly through the merits of their hardware.

 

[Dribble]

Trying to deny the author has a point flies in the face of the reality that AMD is loosing market share to nvidia all the time. Bottom line is 99% of gamers clearly don't care who's name is on their gpu, or who's nicer to puppies they just buy whatever they think will work best. That is nvidia most of the time.

However much you froth at the mouth about the unfairness of it all it won't change the fact AMD is going to go bust unless they sort this out. Why did the dev's use gameworks not tressfx:
1) nvidia helped them implement it, AMD weren't willing to put the same effort in.
2) gamesworks is a lot more then hair, there's a whole set of useful addons.
3) I suspect hairworks is just better then tressfx - tressfx has been used in 1 game to give a 1 woman nice hair, hairworks is on all sorts of creatures. It has nvidia's much larger dev effort behind it, it is very likely tressfx hasn't been touched since tombraider where as hairworks gets constant updates.
4) nvidia sells more gpu's, you make the game work for the biggest part of your user base first.
5) nvidia has better marketing, they will help sell your game better.

Like the author and others have said AMD has to step up to the plate and compete - they are a business in a competitive market. Complaining isn't working. If you don't want AMD to go bust then I suggest you stop making excuses for them, and rage at them for not doing a good enough job. That's all the author of the article (who was/is an AMD fan) has worked out.

 

[Vesku]

Witcher 3 is an Nvidia Gameworks title, yes? So isn't it a bit odd to blame AMD in such a way as to say "you should have anticipated Nvidia would implement their version of TressFX in such a way as to hurt your cards even though it also ended up hurting their own Kepler series and heavily impacts FPS even on their Maxwell architecture". Flip it around, why didn't CD Projekt RED give AMD builds with Hairworks sooner than 2 months from release date? If they spent so much time on Hairworks why isn't there an in game menu way to adjust how extreme the tessellation is to better support a broad range of both Nvidia and AMD cards?

 

[Attic]

Bottom Line:

I'd rather have TressFX in The Witcher 3 than nVidia's Hairworks

TressFX:
Runs Faster than nVidia Hairworks
Looks better than nVidia Hairworks


That's basically it. nVidia sabotaging competitors performance is nothing new. What is surprising is how badly nVidia Hairworks "works" on nVidia cards. This is a small blight on an overall great game.

 

[boozzer]

is this the same reporter as before? he smells like "bought"

Warning issued for thread crapping.
-- stahlhart

 

[Goatsecks]

Ever heard of planned obsolescence?

Of course. So please correct me if I am wrong: you guys are suggesting they are intentionally giving their products a life span of one year and that they are doing this, presumably, to increase sales?

 

[Keysplayr]

Witcher 3 is an Nvidia Gameworks title, yes? So isn't it a bit odd to blame AMD in such a way as to say "you should have anticipated Nvidia would implement their version of TressFX in such a way as to hurt your cards even though it also ended up hurting their own Kepler series and heavily impacts FPS even on their Maxwell architecture". Flip it around, why didn't CD Projekt RED give AMD builds with Hairworks sooner than 2 months from release date? If they spent so much time on Hairworks why isn't there an in game menu way to adjust how extreme the tessellation is to better support a broad range of both Nvidia and AMD cards?

If AMD worked much more closely with devs, like CD Projekt RED, than I'm fairly certain AMD would have had far more than two months of access to the game.
If they had, then maybe there WOULD be a slider for tessellation intensity in Witcher 3. But, they didn't, so.... you know the rest.

This is the classic "do everything for us" attitude that you see so many here complaining about.

 

[Vesku]

If AMD worked much more closely with devs, like CD Projekt RED, than I'm fairly certain AMD would have had far more than two months of access to the game.
If they had, then maybe there WOULD be a slider for tessellation intensity in Witcher 3. But, they didn't, so.... you know the rest.

This is the classic "do everything for us" attitude that you see so many here complaining about.

Given it's a sponsored title that doesn't seem likely, it would be very surprising if Nvidia didn't have at least some say on when CD Projekt Red could distribute pre-release builds with Hairworks enabled. It's not that they were only given access two months before release it's that they weren't given any builds with Hairworks until 2 months before release. AMD is supposed to be psychic or maybe supposed to communicate in a belligerent manner "I know you probably have some tech in your game to ruin AMD performance, cought it up."?

 

[Keysplayr]

Given it's a sponsored title that doesn't seem likely, it would be very surprising if Nvidia didn't have at least some say on when CD Projekt Red could distribute pre-release builds with Hairworks enabled. It's not that they were only given access two months before release it's that they weren't given any builds with Hairworks until 2 months before release. AMD is supposed to be psychic or maybe supposed to communicate in a belligerent manner "I know you probably have some tech in your game to ruin AMD performance, cought it up."?

You sure used the word "given" quite a lot here. Such entitlement. AMD could have even approached Nvidia and worked with them to ensure Gameworks in Witcher 3 or any title works properly or at least better on their hardware. You know this hasn't happened before. Because there isn't any chance that Nvidia would deny AMD the ability to make gameworks games run better on AMD hardware. It would be all over the internet otherwise.
So, not everything is just "given". Some things need to be gone after to make work right or better.

 

[chimaxi83]

It's hilarious to see how quickly you diehard Nvidia supporters flip flop. If AMD ever gets their grubby hands into closed source game code which screws Nvidia users (I hope they never do), you people will flood the internet with tears. Then you'll all forget about it. It's kind of how FCAT, frame times, and multi-GPU smoothness no longer matter to you all, when they were at one point some of your strongest weapons in the forum crusades. None of you bring that stuff up anymore, which is so, so strange. Oh well.