Ray Tracing and Why You Love to See It!

[ZyroXZ2]

freebs2 said:

ZyroXZ2 said:

It is true, and I even said "but just barely" in the video.  But even so, NVIDIA is pumping out graphics cards that can handle it at 60fps, so I think we're not climbing uphill with realtime ray tracing anymore, as the penalty can be nearly negated based on what kind of game and how it's used.  Example: Spider-Man Miles Morales is absolutely and perfectly playable at 30fps in which the ray tracing adds quite a layer of additional polish to the game's visuals. And that's on a last-gen built engine, so if Spider-Man 2 comes out built for the PS5 and has a 30fps option for ray tracing, I might just pick that over 60fps!

I'm not talking about the implementation of real time ray tracing in games, but more specifically the use of ray tracing for global illumination. For that matter next-gen consoles (PS5/XBSX) don't have the proper capabilities yet. I can see some games implementing it optionally on PC for RTX cards (or for  next-gen AMD cards) - Metro Exodus Enhanced Edition is the first proper example for this matter - but as long as baseline platforms are not up to the task it won't become a standard.

You might not have known this, but both Returnal and REVillage use ray tracing in their lighting engines, and inherently both use global illumination.  Returnal uses it more for assisting global illumination calculations in a constantly reconfiguring/reorienting environment (where pre-baked lighting would be too hard to pull off) while REVillage uses it more directly to apply and bounce light to a broader number of nearby surfaces which is why with ray tracing on, many "dark" areas are brighter if there's lighting nearby.

Remember, ray tracing isn't new, it's just being done in real time, now.  A lot of the things people think are not possible have been possible for decades, it's just a matter of how to do it in real time without completely tanking the game's performance.  But either way, both Returnal and REVillage stand as examples of what you're asking for as opposed to the more "common" eye candy of using ray tracing to properly create accurate reflections.