Cyberpunk 2077 troubleshooting (Patreon)

I'm so excited about this new mod, my head is spinning from all the positive feedback and anticipation I'm getting from you guys!

Cyberpunk 2077 is a complex game, and it can be punishing on some PCs. Also, it's not completely free of bugs yet, even before adding the VR layer. So I'm expecting lots of support requests, ranging from "the game doesn't even start on my machine" to "how can I improve my fps on this GPU?"

That's why I'm jumping the gun and creating this troubleshooting post even before I finish packaging the mod :-) [The mod went live on Feb 26 at 8am EST]

I'll add new questions and solutions as they come up; let me get started with issue Q1, which occurred during testing and almost prevented Cas from being able to record her upcoming video (oops, did I just announce that?):

Q1: The game flatlines every time I launch it. It's not the mod, because I haven't even installed it yet. Update Feb 28: The issue should be solved with today's official patch (no version bump, CD Projekt RED calls it "1.5 Hotfix"). Please note that you need to upgrade to release 3.0.4 of my mod, attached to the announcement post, after you install the Hotfix.

Status: It's a game bug related to audio. From the analyses I made of the crash dumps, I suspect it might stem from CP2077 using an outdated version of Wwise.

A1: [Old text for informational purposes] The developers know about the issue and are working on it: https://forums.cdprojektred.com/index.php?threads/currently-investigated-issues-last-updated-19-02-2022-patch-1-5.11098819/ Luckily there's a workaround, described at the same link (basically you need to disable or remove from your Device Manager some conflicting drivers that the Wwise version shipped with the game doesn't support correctly).

Q2: Will the game run with good fps on my PC?

A2: It mostly depends on your video card, since at VR resolutions the game is almost completely GPU-bound. There is an easy way to find out more or less what resolution you can expect to sustain with good frame rate: go to https://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html and find your video card. If it's not listed there, then don't even bother ;-) Otherwise, take the square root of the benchmark number for your GPU and multiply it by 16.65: that will give you the approximate resolution that your card can render in CP2077, with the default options that RealConfig provides and with fluid frame rate. Example: if you have a 2080 Ti, the benchmark result is 21,759. Taking the square root we get 147.5, and multiplying by 16.65 we get 2456. So the closest resolution you'll want to choose from the VIDEO page for a 2080 Ti is 2430x2430.

Q3: The game flatlines for me and I have the Steam version. It worked without the mod, so it's not Q1.

Status: Being investigated. If you have the GOG version, see Q6 instead.

A3: First make sure that the game actually still works without the mod by renaming dxgi.dll to dxgi.bak and launching the game. If it doesn't flatline, please do the following: in Windows, open the folder "%LocalAppData%\REDEngine\ReportQueue". It will contain several subfolders. Sort them by date, zip the most recent one, upload the archive anywhere (Google Drive or any hosting service that you prefer, as long as it doesn't need an account for me to download) and give me the link. I can't promise I'll be able to fix your issue, but at least that will give me some information to go on!

Q4: The overlay controls cannot be reached with the mouse.

A4: That happens when the in-game resolution you selected exceeds the Windows desktop size that your monitor can show, because Windows will prevent the mouse pointer from going offscreen. There is a workaround: the overlay can also be navigated with the keyboard (using the cursor keys for movement, the spacebar to select and enter fields, and Ctrl+Tab to cycle tabs) and/or the gamepad. I will try to do something about this issue in future releases.

Q5: How can I uninstall the mod?

A5: There is actually no need to uninstall if you only want to play flat for a short time: just press the "Stop VR" button and select the 1920x1080 resolution from the game menu. If you need other resolutions, with the game not running, rename dxgi.dll to dxgi.bak in the executable folder and the mod won't attach anymore (for RDR2 the file to rename is RealVR64.json to RealVR64.bak).

Q6: The game flatlines and I have the GOG version.

A6: Please disable the GOG overlay. After that the game should start correctly!

Q7: I don't get good frame rates on Medium, High, Ultra, Psycho with ray tracing... How do I fix that?

A7: There are two reasons why RealConfig selects mostly Low settings. The first is that the RED game engine just cannot reach decent frame rates at VR resolutions on current hardware, no matter how costly your card is. The second is that (at least in my own, very subjective opinion) the game looks best in VR at the settings I configured. The higher you go with lighting, ray tracing, post-processing effects and so on, the murkier and hazier everything becomes, and besides frame rate REALLY takes a dive. So, please stick to the settings I supplied, and only change the resolution! Also see Q2 above for what you can reasonably expect from your GPU at the default settings selected when you run RealConfig.

Q8: In the inventory, the tooltips showing item descriptions, comparisons, etc., appear way too high in the interface. You can't even see the description of the perks you are supposed to pick. Update Feb 28: The issue should be fully solved now: please upgrade to release 3.0.4 of my mod, attached to the announcement post!

A8: [Old text for informational purposes] Unfortunately this was just confirmed to be a bug in the flat version. Apparently they failed to account for the aspect ratio in some portions of the user interface. I will try my best to fix the issue in future releases, but I can give no guarantees because I have no source code access to the game. For the moment, the only workaround is to temporarily put the resolution to 1920x1080 when playing through the problematic portion of the mission, and then returning to your chosen 1:1 square resolution when done.

Q9: I'm using 1920x1080 resolution in VR and...

A9: Whoa, stop right there! NEVER use 16:9 resolutions with this mod in VR, because if you do 44% of the pixels your GPU renders will go to waste and never be visible in the headset. You only want to select from the 1:1 resolutions. 1920x1080 is there just in case you should need to play some mission flat.

Q10: The mod doesn't work with my HP Reverb G2: I switched the VR renderer to OpenXR and when I click the Start VR button I get the WMR animation, but then it goes straight back to the WMR home.

A10: Check if you have OpenXR Toolkit installed. Patron David Gauvreau discovered that it's not compatible with my mod.

Q11: The square cursor that appears when I "use" the in-game terminals is stuck at the right of the screen and cannot be moved, so the terminals are not usable.

A11: Should be fixed and working correctly in release 3.0.4 (and later) attached to the announcement post.

Q12: The HUD stops being headlocked in some situations, like when scanning enemies, so the crosshair won't follow my gaze and I'm unable to aim.

A12: Should be fixed and working correctly in release 3.0.4 (and later) attached to the announcement post.

Q13: When shooting from a vehicle, the gun doesn't follow my gaze (although the crosshair does, and the bullets go where they are supposed to).

Status: Open.

A13: I will start working on fixing this as soon as the other, more pressing issues are dealt with. There is an easy workaround in the meantime: just use the mouse or right thumbstick to rotate the gun where you want it. It will be done automatically by the mod, like when you're on foot, in a future release!

Q14: The HUD doesn't follow my gaze when I turn my head, unless I'm in combat or scanning.

Status: That is by design.

A14: Since current headsets don't have good clarity except in the center, it would be impossible to focus your gaze and read information from the periphery of the HUD if it was constantly headlocked. That said, I will try to come up with a way to do something in the middle, like have the HUD follow you only if you turn your head by more than a selectable angle, similarly to what I did with RDR2.

Q15: My keyboard doesn't have the Pause/Break key, and I don't own a gamepad (or it doesn't work). Am I screwed? Must I use complicated third-party key remappers?

A15: No, it's much easier than that! While the game's not running, you can just edit the RealVR.ini file with Notepad and find the [INPUT] section: in the line
KeyOverlay=19,0,0,0
change 19 to the virtual key code for the key you want to use. Virtual key codes can be found here: https://cherrytree.at/misc/vk.htm

Q16: There is a slight shimmer around nearby objects/NPCs: if I close one eye I can see it's on one side only, and it switches sides if I close the other eye. It gets worse if I lower the resolution or activate DLSS, and it disappears if I select Mono rendering.

A16:The problem is that Cyberpunk 2077 has compulsory TAA, and it doesn't understand stereo rendering, so the prediction for the occluded pixels is wrong. I might be able to fix it in future releases (although it's a LOT of work so we might want to weigh that against alternative uses of time). However, patron Billy Brackeen Jr.  discovered that having Film Grain turned on in the game graphics options makes the shimmering much worse, so be sure to leave Film Grain off as automatically set by RealConfig!!! Also, patron Solomon Ginsberg found out that the shimmering is reduced if you replace the game-supplied nvngx_dlss.dll, which mysteriously has not been updated and dates back to November 2021, with the latest version available from https://www.techpowerup.com/download/nvidia-dlss-dll/ which should also offer better visual quality in general.

Q17: Every time I open and close the inventory, the game HUD starts flickering and it doesn't stop until I reload the level.

A17: Patron Rich Helstrip reported that the issue was solved for him by updating to the latest NVIDIA drivers.

Q18: When I run the mod from Virtual Desktop something doesn't feel right. Tracking is jerky, or the eye images appear to be out of sync.

A18: Check that you're actually running the latest version of Virtual Desktop. It should be at least 1.20.30, both for the streamer and the mobile app. It usually updates automatically, but if you're on an older version please go to vrdesktop.net to download the latest version!