Witcher Engine Fix 0.8.0

Witcher Engine Fix 0.8.0 fixes two problems in fights and makes a charged attack that fails for lack of Endurance visible.

• Fix 15, attacks stop working in fights: in crowded fights Geralt could get stuck so that every click failed (sometimes with a crossed-out sword) and a held charge did nothing, until you took a step. A charge attack released while the enemy was out of reach, or an attack cut short another way, left him in his attack sequence without a combat round. That sequence is now ended the way a step ends it: right at that release, and otherwise at the first refused attack, so the next one works. Each time is logged (fix 15: ...). [fixes] fix15=0 turns it off.
• Fix 14, physics crash in fights: the physics library (Karma) sometimes freed an object twice, after which one block of memory belonged to two objects and the game crashed later in the fight (at 0x9FFFE0). A second free is now skipped and logged, and freed blocks wait in a short queue before they are reused. [fixes] fix14=0 turns it off.
• QoL 8, Endurance warning (on): a charged attack costs 25 Endurance (of 40 at the start of the game). With less, the game dropped the attack without a sign, so a full charge seemed to do nothing. The Endurance bar now blinks red, the game's own effect. [qol] endurance_blink=0 turns it off. Optional: [qol] endurance_message=1 also shows "Not enough Endurance (19/25)" (what you have / what it needs) in the message line, in all ten languages.
• Diagnostics: [debug] combat_log (off) logs the engine's own combat messages and who refuses, cancels or ends the player's attacks.

Upgrading from 0.7.2: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.8.0.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it. After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.8.0 loaded and fix 14, fix 15 and qol 8 as applied.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.7.2

Witcher Engine Fix 0.7.2 keeps mod hotkeys working after Alt+Tab in exclusive full screen.

• Fix 13: without DXVK, Alt+Tab back into exclusive full screen made the game reset its graphics device and rebuild its input handling with only its own keys. Every hotkey a mod had bound with bindkey (Witcher Speed Toggle's V/B, quick loot on a key other than Space) stopped working until a restart, and nothing a script can react to runs at that moment. The DLL now binds every line of System\keybinding.ini again right after that reset, as the game does at startup. Each time is logged (fix 13: device reset, 3 of 3 keybinding.ini lines bound again). [fixes] fix13=0 turns it off.
• With 0.7.1's shared loader (which covers "Full screen" or the resolution changed in the options), hotkeys bound with bindkey now survive every video reset the game does.
• The 1-2 s black screen when coming back is the game's own device reset and is unchanged; DXVK or the borderless window (Options > Graphics) avoids the reset altogether.
• Nothing else changed.

Upgrading from 0.7.1: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.7.2.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it. After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.7.2 loaded and fix 13 (...): applied.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, with and without DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.7.1

Witcher Engine Fix 0.7.1 keeps hotkeys working after you change "Full screen" or the resolution in the options.

• Shared loader version 3 (System\Scripts\testtools.lua, identical in Witcher Speed Toggle 1.2.2 and Witcher Quick Loot 1.0.3): the game rebuilds its input handling on every video mode change and forgot every key bound with bindkey. That hit the quick loot hotkey when it is set to a key other than Space, and Speed Toggle's V/B. The loader now binds them again right after.
• Alt+Tab in exclusive full screen without DXVK rebuilds the input handling too, without anything a script can react to. That case is not fixed yet; borderless/windowed mode or DXVK avoids it.
• Nothing else changed.

Upgrading from 0.7.0: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.7.1.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it. After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.7.1 loaded.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.7.0

Witcher Engine Fix 0.7.0 adds a Continue button to the main menu, lets the Snipping Tool work over the game, and fixes a cursor that could vanish in the main menu.

• Continue (new, on): with at least one save, the main menu gets a "Continue" button at the top that loads your newest save (by its time; quicksaves and autosaves count). The other buttons move one slot down. Without saves the menu is unchanged. In all ten languages the game ships. [qol] continue_button=0 turns it off.
• Windows key and Print Screen in game (new, on): the game blocked the Windows key, so Win+Shift+S, Print Screen to the Snipping Tool and other Windows key combinations did nothing while it was in front. They work now, in full screen and borderless. A Windows key pressed on its own still does not open the Start menu. [qol] windows_key=0 blocks the key again.
• Cursor vanishing in the main menu (fix 12): with the over-the-shoulder camera, pressing Shift in the main menu, or coming back to the game after the Snipping Tool, hid the cursor; it only came back while Shift was held. The main menu now keeps its cursor. Shift in game works as before.

Upgrading from 0.6.x: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.7.0.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it. After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.7.0 loaded.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.3

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.3 adds an extreme level to the longer draw distances, for fast PCs.

• Extreme ([graphics] detail=3 in System\witcher_enginefix.ini, or Ctrl+F12 in game, which now cycles off, high, ultra and extreme):
  • shadows out to 180 m (the game: 30 m, ultra: 90 m);
  • distant lights stay on 10x farther;
  • scenery keeps full detail 10x farther: ground, buildings, fences, and the trees and bushes placed in the Outskirts and similar areas. It uses the same protection against holes as high and ultra.
  • creatures and trees 4x farther;
  • grass 3x the slider's range;
  • decals 200 m and weapon effects 120 m.
• Compared with the Higher LOD mod: extreme comes close to its ranges, without its debug mode, map reveal or holes, and on top of what your options menu sets. Grass density is left alone, because the engine never reads that setting. Do not use the two together: Engine Fix would multiply Higher LOD's values again.
• Cost: on my PC (4K, everything at maximum, capped at 72 FPS) extreme held 72 FPS in the Outskirts. The engine does nearly everything on one CPU thread, so older PCs may lose more. High and ultra are unchanged.

Upgrading from 0.6.x: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.6.3.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it. After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.6.3 loaded.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.2

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.2 brings the longer draw distances for scenery back, now without holes.

• Scenery keeps its detail far away again. With [graphics] detail=1 (high) or 2 (ultra), the ground, buildings, fences, and the trees and bushes placed in an area keep their full detail out to 2 to 3 times the game's distance, without the missing patches of hillside that 0.6.0 had. Only the areas that switch scenery between a detailed and a coarse version use this: the Outskirts and a few others. Distant buildings there no longer turn into flat stand-ins, and the ground no longer switches to its blurry far version a few steps away.
• Why 0.6.0 had holes: the game splits each area into sections and only draws what is in the sections it expects you to see. Detailed ground farther away than the game ever showed it was left out, so the sky showed through. At high and ultra that check is now skipped for those detail-switching models only; everything else keeps it.
• Cost: on my PC (4K, everything at maximum, capped at 72 FPS) the frame rate stayed at 72 at both levels, at most about 1 ms more work per frame in the Outskirts.

Thanks to forfunandmore for reporting the holes.

Upgrading from 0.6.x: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.6.2.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it. After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.6.2 loaded and 11 of 11 settings on the graphics detail line.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.1

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.1 fixes missing scenery with the longer draw distances and adds an option to skip the intro.

• No more holes in distant hills. With [graphics] detail=1 or 2, parts of distant hills could go missing, with the sky showing through. One example is the Outskirts near the Eternal Fire shrine. The areas are built from terrain tiles that the game shows as a coarse mesh from afar. Longer distances switched some of them to their detailed ground in places where the game never draws it. High and ultra now leave the level of detail for scenery at the game's own distances. Creatures and trees still get the longer distances, and grass, shadows, lights, decals and water reflections are unchanged. Thanks to forfunandmore for the report and screenshots.
• Skip the intro (off by default): [qol] skip_intro=1 in System\witcher_enginefix.ini goes straight to the main menu at startup, without the logos and the intro cinematic. It does the same as the usual manual edit of Data\Scripts\Movies.lua, without touching that file. If you already made that edit, both work together. Suggested by forfunandmore.
• French: the pause menu's "Exit to main menu" now reads "RETOUR AU MENU PRINCIPAL" instead of the game's "QUITTER", so it no longer looks like the "QUITTER LE JEU" button under it. The "Borderless window" tooltip also reads more naturally. Both from Illuzio.

Upgrading from 0.6.0: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.6.1.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it (skip_intro is new in [qol]). After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.6.1 loaded.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.0

Witcher Engine Fix 0.6.0 adds quick loot and puts the mod's own texts in every language the game ships.

• Quick loot. Press Space in the loot window to take everything, instead of clicking "Take all". In shops and storage Space does nothing, so it can never buy a shop's stock, and everywhere else it still pauses and unpauses as before. This is the Witcher Quick Loot mod, now built in. On by default; [qol] quick_loot=0 in System\witcher_enginefix.ini turns it off, and quick_loot_key picks another key (that key then only takes all, because a bound key loses its normal action).
• Works alongside Witcher Quick Loot. You do not need Quick Loot any more, but keeping it installed is fine, in any install order: while it is installed, its own hotkey and settings are used and this mod's quick loot stays out of the way. The log says which one is active (qol 4). If you remove Quick Loot, the Space binding it left behind (Space without pause) is cleaned up on the next start.
• All game languages. The "Exit game" button in the pause menu, "Borderless window" and its tooltip in Options > Graphics, and the Ctrl+F12 message now follow the game's text language: English, Polish, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Czech, Hungarian and Traditional Chinese. In French, German and Polish the "Exit game" button used to read the same as "Exit to main menu", because the game uses one text for both. Thanks to Illuzio for the French texts. Corrections from native speakers are welcome (how).

Upgrading from 0.5.x: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.6.0.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too; reapply any changes you made to it (the quick loot lines are new in [qol]). After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.6.0 loaded and a qol 4 line.

Uninstalling now also means removing the line SPACE runscript ef_lootall from System\keybinding.ini (or setting quick_loot=0 and starting the game once); otherwise Space stays without its pause. See the README.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).

Witcher Engine Fix 0.5.1

Witcher Engine Fix 0.5.1 is a small follow-up to 0.5.0.

• Ctrl+F12 message without DXVK. The on-screen message that shows the graphics detail level (Ctrl+F12) did not appear when the game runs on Windows' own Direct3D 9 instead of DXVK: that Direct3D rewrites its Present function after the first frames, which unhooked the message. It is now hooked again when that happens. With DXVK nothing changes.
• The "Borderless window" tooltip is shorter.

Upgrading from 0.5.0: extract the System and Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.5.1.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting (only System\dinput8.dll and System\Scripts\enginefix_hook.lua changed; the ini is overwritten too, so reapply any changes you made to it). After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.5.1 loaded. See the 0.5.0 release for the borderless window, longer draw distances and the other changes.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11), with and without DXVK.

Witcher Engine Fix 0.5.0

Witcher Engine Fix 0.5.0 adds a borderless window option, optional longer draw distances and a faster journal.

• Borderless window. Options > Graphics has a new "Borderless window" option. With "Full screen" off and your desktop resolution, the game fills the screen without a border or title bar, and alt-tab is instant: there is no exclusive full screen to leave and re-enter. The cursor stays on the game screen, the camera turns at the screen edge and the game pauses while it is in the background, as in full screen. It takes effect at once without a restart, and it is greyed out while "Full screen" is ticked. Off by default. The label is in English only, as the game has no translated text for it.
• Longer draw distances (optional). [graphics] detail=1 (high) or 2 (ultra) in System\witcher_enginefix.ini keeps full-detail scenery, creatures and trees, grass, shadows and lights out to 1.5-3x the game's distances, and raises the water reflection texture from 512 to 1024/2048 px. Or press Ctrl+F12 in game to cycle off, high and ultra: the level is shown on screen for a moment and lasts until you quit, so you can compare. It works on top of your options menu (the grass slider still counts) and needs no debug mode or console commands. At 4K with all options at maximum, ultra held 72 FPS and cost under 0.5 ms per frame on a modern PC; the engine does nearly everything on one CPU thread, so older PCs may lose more. Off by default.
• Faster journal. The journal's tabs were filled like the old load/save list: the whole list was redrawn after every entry, so tabs got slower the more entries they had. Each list is now drawn once.
• Diagnostics (development only, off by default): frame rate and main-thread time per detail level, and the time from the game window getting the focus to the next frame.

Each change can be turned off: "Borderless window" in the options menu, [graphics] detail=0 and hotkey=0 in System\witcher_enginefix.ini, local ENABLED = false in System\Scripts\enginefix_hook.lua (load/save list and journal).

Upgrading from 0.4.0: extract both the System and the Data folders from WitcherEngineFix-0.5.0.zip into your game folder and allow overwriting. Your witcher_enginefix.ini is overwritten too; reapply any changes you made to it (the new [graphics] section is in it). The borderless option is stored with the game's own settings, not in the ini. After starting the game, System\witcher_enginefix.log should show enginefix 0.5.0 loaded.

Requirements: The Witcher: Enhanced Edition, patch 1.5. Tested on Steam 1.5.0.1304 (Windows 11, DXVK).