Hi all,

Just wondering if anyone else is having problems with eye strain on this game? I've been playing the game pretty much since release and it seriously strains my eyes, obviously the first thing I did was visit the opticians (even though I haven't been experienceing this in other games), the optician has told me my eyes are fine so now it must be something in the game. I have pretty much ruled out FPS causing this as it happens at both 30FPS and 60FPS, I'm also pretty sure it isn't caused by brightness/gamma as I have played around with these to no avail, additional to this I've heard sharpness, chromatic aberration and blur settings can cause eye strain, but turning these off also doesn't get rid of it so any help with this would be great, also keep in mind other games don't cause this so it has to be something unique to this game (so I'm hoping someone could identify this for me).

Lastly when I talk about eye strain I don't mean the kind you get from prolonged play, I'm talking eye strain that is coming on after about ten minutes of play.

Thanks you in advance.

I experience some to a degree. Its a beautiful game and the color and contrast really pops and for me I think that is part of it. I don't know why, but because of how profound the contrast is along with the constant wind I can get a little woozy at times.

One thing that helped me was taking the vignette off. Its kind of cool but it was restrictive to my peripheral vision and it made me feel claustrophobic which I don't need when there's already some eye stress.

I don't know what to say as it'll probably be different for different people. Maybe try one of those mods that alters the game's colors and see if anything, if it makes a difference.

I wouldn't call it eye strain, but since I started playing this game for two or three hours each night, I'm definitely in need of lubricating eye drops before I hit the hay. (Another, more enjoyable, side-effect is having Witcher-dreams all night!)

Hello.
The eye-strain may be caused by the sharpening filter in graphic options (same menu as motion blur). It makes the image crisper, but can cause that king of problem. Motion blur may be a problem too.

Just disable everything not linked to graphical quality and see if you are okay. Then enable them one by one, and see if you still have the problem. ;)

No eye strain here, as in pain, but I can't play when the sun in going down and the landscape is lit red (it's eye-searing) or when there is this weird overcast effect, where it's sunny, but everything is so dark you can't see things clearly.

Always need to meditate to get over quickly, as it feels unnatural to me.

It could be the FOV, which is kind of narrow. Not as bad as a Bethesda game, but it's pretty narrow. Because the timing for dodges and counters is pretty tight, it could be you've lowered your blink rate while playing the game to adjust to the combat and now you're getting eye strain because of it. It could also be the witcher senses fish-eye effect, a lot of people have been having problems with that.

I know the cat potion effect gives me a headache, it's too bright, but you can't see anything in the caves without it.

Each time I play it I get dizzy the first hour but I think my eyes get used to it after.

Could be the Witcher senses which does the fisheye lens type effect. Some people have some kind of sensitivity to that and feel eye strain or even vertigo/nausea from it. Also could be motion blur or bloom, light shafts, chromatic abberation or possibly other effects/post-processing. Try disabling some of these effects to see if that has any change for you.

I do not read what's on the packages anymore, but I can remember dev's advising not to play

- in otherwise dark rooms
- hours and hours without taking a break
- on large monitors (had been a good time back when 17" was considered "large").

I'm playing in a dark room (no lights on most of the time) on a Dell U3011 30" display placed about 18" in front of my face, and I've been playing 8+ hours a day or so on average almost every day since it came out. What are the consequences/symptoms I should be aware of for doing so? :)

it'll prolly be the witcher sense, i have all blur effects disabled like i do always, however the witcher sense is still very blurry, i don't mind it though, it is very well done.

Thank you for the replies all, I have tried a few things which seemed to have helped like changing my monitors setting to 'warm', also as someone mentioned I think I wasn't blinking enough, so I've tried to make a concious effort to blink more.

The above as helped but from playing I'm pretty sure it's the motion blur that is having the biggest impact, even with the blur options turned off when I turn the camera my eyes really do seem to pick up the blur more than they do on other games, probably need to invest in a monitor with a motion blur reduction feature.

Thanks again all and any more suggestions are welcome.

It's about immersion for me. I love having a huge monitor and having it positioned in the same place you'd place any monitor because that gives me two things in gaming. One is the option for higher resolution and smaller pixel dot pitch which translates into more real estate and finer detail, the second is it gives me a wider field of view, with the viewing pyramid of the monitor consuming a wider angle of my vision, and that greatly increases immersion in many game titles, in particular in FPP and TPP games. The ultimate field of view would be to have the eyes see nothing but in-game graphics no matter which way the eye is looking but that will only arrive when VR helmets hit the markets and mature for a few years I suspect.

I play in a lowly lit room most of the time, which is not too dark really, about the light level most people have in their livingroom with a single lamp going. I basically have a single livingroom lamp up about 6 feet high running with a CFL in it with the equivalent light of a 60W bulb. On certain types of games I go dark though for extra immersion. In particular spooky games, games like DOOM3 or other horror styled games, but also occasionally other types of games as well. It just ups the immersion factor for me.

I play for long long hours often which I know is unhealthy for many many reasons for sure, no question. I never really experience what I'd call eye strain though, at least not to a point where I physically feel anything and make note of it. I think it's more of an individual body response more than anything. I do get other symptoms sometimes that tell me "time for a break" or "time for sleep dude", which I'd attach "strain" to. :)