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).