Dynamic Path Tracing for Cutscenes

I made this mod for myself and decided to share it with the community.

Running full Path Tracing in the open world limits my FPS to around 30 with noticeable ghosting (DLSS Balanced at 1080p). However, during story cutscenes and close-up dialogue shots, Path Tracing looks incredible on faces, clothing materials, and interior lighting.

This mod automatically turns on Path Tracing (or your preferred RT preset) whenever a cutscene or dialogue starts. Once the scene ends and you regain control of Geralt, it instantly reverts back to your regular gameplay graphics settings.

Features:

• []Automatic PT in Scenes: Configure your preferred mode directly in the Options menu: Full Path Tracing, Path Tracing GI only, or Cinematic Ray Tracing. You can also customize where it triggers: all scenes, cutscenes only, or dialogues only.[/]

  []Auto Upscaling Quality (DLSS / FSR / XeSS): Playing with native DLAA during regular gameplay looks crisp, but switching to Path Tracing in cutscenes can tank FPS down to ~12 on mid-range setups like an RTX 3070. When enabled, this option temporarily sets your upscaler to "Auto" during cutscenes to help maintain a smooth ~30 FPS, then restores your original setting right after.[/]

  []RT Standby (Crash Protection): If you normally play with RT completely disabled, enabling Path Tracing abruptly on the fly can occasionally hang the GPU driver (DXGI_ERROR_DEVICE_REMOVED). RT Standby keeps the pipeline warm in the background with minimal overhead so transitions are seamless (though this crash is rare, so you can leave it disabled if you prefer).[/]

  []Dialogue Skip Protection: Rapidly pressing the Spacebar to skip dialogue lines will not cause graphics settings to thrash back and forth. The mod holds the cutscene profile steady until the conversation has fully concluded.[/]

  []Native In-Game Menu Localization: Fully integrated into the in-game Options menu with translations for all 18 supported languages.[/]

  Manual Installation:

  • []Extract the bin and mods folders from the downloaded zip directly into your main Witcher 3 directory (e.g. C:\Games\The Witcher 3\).[/]

    []Navigate to:

    The Witcher 3\bin\config\r4game\user_config_matrix\pc\

    Open dx12filelist.txt with Notepad and add this line at the very end:

    modCutscenePT.xml;[/]

    []If you have other script mods installed (such as Better Movement, Friendly HUD, etc.), run Script Merger to resolve any conflicts (the mod touches r4Game.ws, scenePlayer.ws, and ingameMenu.ws).[/]

    • []Delete the modCutscenePT folder from The Witcher 3\mods\[/]

      []Delete modCutscenePT.xml from The Witcher 3\bin\config\r4game\user_config_matrix\pc\[/]

      []Remove the line from dx12filelist.txt

      modCutscenePT.xml;[/]

      []If you used Script Merger, refresh your merged scripts.[/]

      A Note on HairWorks:

      On RTX 20 and 30 series GPUs, hardware ray-traced hair (Linear Swept Spheres) is not supported by the hardware architecture (it is exclusive to RTX 40 series and newer). Because of this, HairWorks hair rendered under Path Tracing can appear overly glossy or shiny.

      HairWorks cannot be dynamically toggled off mid-scene without causing the hair physics mesh to detach and freeze in the air (I haven't found a solution for this yet). If the glossy hair bothers you in cutscenes, the cleanest workaround is simply to disable HairWorks in the game's main Graphics options.

      Credits:

      • []CD Projekt Red for The Witcher 3 Remastered edition.[/]

        []w3strings encoder community tools.[/]