Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

[Paelos]

That assumes that the problems are fixable. It might be better for the customers if the game never existed.

My concern in today's market of games is that delays indicate huge issues. Ten years ago? I wouldn't have cared. Now? I'm thinking this thing might actually be piled in shit, and they are scraping away. Does that mean the customers might get less shit? Yeah, but at this point we're ranking the size of the steaming pile.

Granted, things might be rosy and they may just need to finish up some things. But lately we've been used to companies releasing that stuff anyway and polishing it within the few weeks of release as the players live beta the thing.

[satael]

I've had a couple projects that I had to choose between 'delay by two months' and 'might be ok, might be a career-wrecking disaster' so it's not very hard for me to understand why they'd choose to delay. It's also better overall for their customers.

I'm sure you have a job in a sector where falling a few months behind the schedule and then when the new extended deadline starts to loom you can once again delay the release a few months but it doesn't usually inspire much confidence even if you explain those repeated delays as "improving quality". 

[Ingmar]

Honestly their mistake was in advertising an uncertain release date, not in any of the pushback stuff (IMO). These things happen constantly on software and/or IT projects internally, the only reason we know about this one is that they misjudged their release target and then *told* us what it was. There's such a thing as too much transparency.

[HaemishM]

They can delay as long as they need if it means their Cyberpunk game benefits from the fixes to their engine this hopefully entails. 

[rk47]

Saw a pre-order at $49.50
I can get $10 off.
Saw the release date - February '15
Wow. That's just way too long.

[satael]

Saw a pre-order at $49.50
I can get $10 off.
Saw the release date - February '15
Wow. That's just way too long.

The problem is that the release is now actually May '15 instead and the stores haven't just updated it yet.

[satael]

CD Projekt Red promises "no more delays" for The Witcher 3:

"This is not our first game; we are not newbies," he said. "It's not like 'hey we are delaying and we'll keep on delaying'. If we would think we need more time we would say 'hey we'll release it not in Feb but, I don't know, June'. We made the decision at the moment we were able to judge how much time we needed, and we planned it well and it works well for us. So, no more delays."

I dug up this old article to partly explain why I'm so peeved off by the delay and why it bothers me (though logically thinking the fact I did take the time to find it again doesn't speak well for me )

[rk47]

Saw a pre-order at $49.50
I can get $10 off.
Saw the release date - February '15
Wow. That's just way too long.

The problem is that the release is now actually May '15 instead and the stores haven't just updated it yet.

LOL damn pollacks.
I'm definitely not touching it.
Insane. Something must be really wrong for them to delay it that far.

[tmp]

Insane. Something must be really wrong for them to delay it that far.

They are their own publisher, with digital distribution platform generating money for them. They aren't hard pressed to RELEASE NOW or sink.

Reminds you of any other company with similar assets, which was supposed to release 3rd part of their game at some point in the past?

[Teleku]

LOL damn pollacks.
I'm definitely not touching it.
Insane. Something must be really wrong for them to delay it that far.

Hey man, it's winter.  It like, got cold over here and stuff.

[calapine]

Not sure I see the issue either. We are talking about a story focused CRPG here, not an MMO or some novel game concept were a "We can't find the fun!" moment can happen. It's also an issue of who says it. If CD Project Red (or Larian) says we need to delay to finish it properly I give them more credence than in case of some Kickstarter clowns who haven't yet proven they can produce a finished product.

[satael]

Not sure I see the issue either. We are talking about a story focused CRPG here, not an MMO or some novel game concept were a "We can't find the fun!" moment can happen. It's also an issue of who says it. If CD Project Red (or Larian) says we need to delay to finish it properly I give them more credence than in case of some Kickstarter clowns who haven't yet proven they can produce a finished product.

If you read that article I quoted from (CD Projekt Red promises "no more delays" for The Witcher 3) you'll see that they were practically swearing that there wouldn't be any more delays from the February date. The main point is that they seem to be having major problems with producing a finished product that wouldn't be a major disappointment to consumers (and since it's CDPR's biggest project so far it could be pretty catastrophic economic wise)

[calapine]

Not sure I see the issue either. We are talking about a story focused CRPG here, not an MMO or some novel game concept were a "We can't find the fun!" moment can happen. It's also an issue of who says it. If CD Project Red (or Larian) says we need to delay to finish it properly I give them more credence than in case of some Kickstarter clowns who haven't yet proven they can produce a finished product.

If you read that article I quoted from (CD Projekt Red promises "no more delays" for The Witcher 3) you'll see that they were practically swearing that there wouldn't be any more delays from the February date. The main point is that they seem to be having major problems with producing a finished product that wouldn't be a major disappointment to consumers (and since it's CDPR's biggest project so far it could be pretty catastrophic economic wise)

I guess it's wait and see. In May we will know what was really behind it. My personal guess is still that it's a case of CDPR having more freedom with these decisions due to being their own publisher and due the bad rep they got with the first Witcher being rather buggy. The Witcher 1 EE saw the entire German voice synchronization redone - with new voice-actors. I doubt they want to go through this again.

[Phildo]

Agreed, sounds like they're trying to avoid having to publish an enhanced edition (which they had to do for both of the previous games).

[disKret]

For me it's just look like damage control before damage happens. Lessons learned from Ubisoft drama.
They wanted to patch it after release - but customers will shit all over it today.

[tmp]

So, the system requirements are out and they're pretty brutal:

Minimum System Requirements
 Intel CPU Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz
 AMD CPU Phenom II X4 940
 Nvidia GPU GeForce GTX 660
 AMD GPU Radeon HD 7870
 RAM 6GB
 OS 64-bit Windows 7 or 64-bit Windows 8 (8.1)
 DirectX 11
 HDD Space 40 GB

Recommended System Requirements
 Intel CPU Core i7 3770 3,4 GHz
 AMD CPU AMD FX-8350 4 GHz
 Nvidia GPU GeForce GTX 770
 AMD GPU Radeon R9 290
 RAM 8GB
 OS 64-bit Windows 7 or 64-bit Windows 8 (8.1)
 DirectX 11
 HDD Space 40 GB

too brutal for me, in fact. Is there any possibility prices of NVidia cards like that 660 will be dropping some in the next few months, as they introduce more models with their new chips to replace the previous batch, or is that completely out of the question?

[Nija]

I'm going to play it on PS4.

[calapine]

So, the system requirements are out and they're pretty brutal:

too brutal for me, in fact. Is there any possibility prices of NVidia cards like that 660 will be dropping some in the next few months, as they introduce more models with their new chips to replace the previous batch, or is that completely out of the question?

I guess the graphic card is going to be the issue for most (is for me, HD 6950). And maybe CPU for people gaming on dual-core notebooks.


Regarding what's coming up:

nVidia
22th January:  GeForce GTX 960 (high end, GM206 chip)

February - July: More models of the GTX 900 series. GM204 and more affordable GM206 chips. Should also provide downward pressure for all current cards on the market.

AMD
March - August: Radeon R300 series. Tonga/Fiji/Bermuda chips. Both new high-end and rebranding of current models.

Edit: Mixed up GM204 and GM206. Corrected post.

[Malakili]

[schild]

"an HJ" :sneer:

But for real, the requirements are what the fuck. I barely meet the fucking recommended but I can crush everything else I've thrown at it. I7 870 / GTX 760 / 8GB RAM.

These fuckers think they're Crytek or something.

[UnSub]

This is going to sound ignorant, but... is 'HJ' meant to stand 'hand job' in that joke? Because that's all I can take away from it.

[schild]

Yes. it's terrible writing. I assumed they were replaced with very small shellscripts a few years back anyway.

[calapine]

This is going to sound ignorant, but... is 'HJ' meant to stand 'hand job' in that joke? Because that's all I can take away from it.

I read it as 'handkerchief', but now that I see it that's not how it's actually spelled. 

[calapine]

But for real, the requirements are what the fuck. I barely meet the fucking recommended but I can crush everything else I've thrown at it. I7 870 / GTX 760 / 8GB RAM.

These fuckers think they're Crytek or something.

Well, these requirements read like someone just wrote something down quick without bothering to think too much.

CPU:
Core i7: That kind of gives it away already. Why i7? I am pretty sure the game wont benefit significantly from the hyper-threading it provides. Willing to bet that a Haswell i5 >  i7 3770.

Secondly the minimum Phenom II X4 940 is quite the slow-poke nowadays. In fact in Crysis 3 it is slower than Core i3-3220, which is a only 2 core CPU (2C / 4 threads). So if it runs on that it will run on anything that isn't awfully ancient.


GPU:
Nvidia GPU GeForce GTX 660
AMD GPU Radeon HD 7870

As frame of reference, it is said the PS/4 has about the raw power of an HD 7850.

The 7870 is hardly faster than that, but the (significant) difference is it is a 2 GB VRAM card. Which is why it's demanded here.

The Nvidia requirements confirm that suspicion. In benchmarks a GTX 560 is about as fast as 7870, so why demand a faster card from Nivdia users? The answer is, I think, that the GTX 560 is again a 1 GB card, thus they write 660 as requirement.


So bottom-line:
4-core CPU, no matter how old. Modern Intel 2-cores with HT (read: i3) maaaaybe too.
GPU: Any graphic card with 2 GB VRAM. (If it has that much it will have the raw power too, so that wont be an issue).

Who can't run it:
People gaming on notebooks without dedicated graphics cards.
People with only 4 GB RAM (probably).

[tmp]

Regarding what's coming up:

nVidia
22th January:  GeForce GTX 960 (very high end, GM206 chip, probably not of interest for you)

February - July: More models of the GTX 900 series. GM206 and more affordable GM204 mainstream chips. Should also provide downward pressure for all current cards on the market.

AMD
March - August: Radeon R300 series. Tonga/Fiji/Bermuda chips. Both new high-end and rebranding of current models.

Ahh excellent, it looks then like holding off a few months may pay off one way or another. And who know, maybe they'll delay this Witcher again in the meantime or it turns out terrible 

[tmp]

So bottom-line:
4-core CPU, no matter how old. Modern Intel 2-cores with HT (read: i3) maaaaybe too.
GPU: Any graphic card with 2 GB VRAM. (If it has that much it will have the raw power too, so that wont be an issue).

Who can't run it:
People gaming on notebooks without dedicated graphics cards.
People with only 4 GB RAM (probably).

Your bottom line is anyone who doesn't have a card with 2gb vram is running a notebook with intel chipset? I think that's... imagining people upgrade their hardware much more often than they really do.

(75% of steam hardware survey doesn't clear that hurdle, btw)

[calapine]

Your bottom line is anyone who doesn't have a card with 2gb vram is running a notebook with intel chipset? I think that's... imagining people upgrade their hardware much more often than they really do.

(80% of steam hardware survey doesn't clear that hurdle, btw)

*laughs* Ok, that's an excellent point. Lurking on too many hardware enthusiast forums skews the perspective a bit.  

Blame X-Box / PS-4 though. Suddenly there are ~ 6GB shared VRAM/RAM to waste for a console game and any that's going to lead to more demanding PC ports too.

[brellium]

So bottom-line:
4-core CPU, no matter how old. Modern Intel 2-cores with HT (read: i3) maaaaybe too.
GPU: Any graphic card with 2 GB VRAM. (If it has that much it will have the raw power too, so that wont be an issue).

Who can't run it:
People gaming on notebooks without dedicated graphics cards.
People with only 4 GB RAM (probably).

Your bottom line is anyone who doesn't have a card with 2gb vram is running a notebook with intel chipset? I think that's... imagining people upgrade their hardware much more often than they really do.

(75% of steam hardware survey doesn't clear that hurdle, btw)

That's scary, my 5 year old box clears those hurdles.

[Paelos]

I would have asked if he needed some Mountain Dew and Doritos instead of an HJ.

[Teleku]

Well I'm certainly never coming to you for comfort during a tough time.

"an HJ" :sneer:

Guess I have to ask.  Why the sneer?

[schild]

"an HJ" :sneer:

Guess I have to ask.  Why the sneer?

Grammar. You can't get an handjob.

[Lucas]

"an HJ" :sneer:

Guess I have to ask.  Why the sneer?

Grammar. You can't get an handjob.

Depends if the aforementioned handjob is stressed enough or not (and yes, we're totally in-topic :P)

[rk47]

what's a handjob

[Jeff Kelly]

Grammar. You can't get an handjob.

Yes you can, if it's abbreviated. At least that's what all my english textbooks in school said.

"a handjob"
"an HJ" (because of the vowel in the pronounciation of 'H')

Granted the examples used in my EFL textbooks used LP's (fake edit: yes I'm old) and not handjobs (we're not THAT liberal) - as in a long play vs an LP - but the (grammatical) principle stays the same.

[edit: when talking about grammar at least get the spelling right]

[Ironwood]