Both are not mutually exclusive.

While RT could be used as an gameplay element just as physics can I see less of an use for it that couldn't be done with "cheating" meaning no need to have actual real time RT. 

From a game play perspective I see more to gain from real time CFD than real time RT to be honest. 

But I might just lack imagination. 

He's not wrong.

It -is- an industry buzzword to hype new hardware (not just consoles).

Ray Tracing has been around for decades, Generation 6 consoles had games that used Ray Tracing.

It's not new. It's not novel.

While RT is nice to have, there are many other techniques that can get pretty close results for half the sacrifice in performance. And remember that the most impressive scene we've seen so far in games (UE5 demo) was not using RT.

Since when did consoles rendered scenes with Raytracing in realtime?

Returnal is used exactly in that manner, to accelerate global illumination queries, essentially speeding up a software-based system  and is also used to take the 3D audio to the next level: audio environment queries are accelerated with hardware ray tracing support. 

And please, don’t be dishonest and disingenuous about how and when Ray-Tracing actually became something viable for real-time game visuals and sounds. 

Reminds me of Motorhead (an old arcade racer made by Digital Illusions about 20 years ago) that was so stunning with the reflections in the cars. 

Well it was all cheating since it was the same track specific dynamic texture just being repeated over and over again. But when you actually played that game (I loved it BTW) you really didn't noticed that detail you just noted that there where reflections and it looked cool. 

And that is my main problem when, in my opinion, to much resources are wasted on graphical "lul" in games, t h e y  d o  n o t  m a t t e r if the game is good and immersing because of gameplay. 

EDIT:// here is a video of Motorhead gameplay https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlXnI2R4gAE you might laugh but at the time of its release it was visually really stunning. 

Double-post

Mobile editor acting up on me this morning. -__-

I'll be honest, one of the best implementations I've seen is actually Wolfenstein: Youngblood.  I mean, even the reflective bits on crates were fully ray-traced and I saw a distorted "me" in realtime.  I showed that in my actual review of that game, too.  That's one of the best examples of ray tracing, and that's why I used the weapon scope as an example because even the weapon scope is real time ray traced for things behind you, and I could literally SEE enemies behind me in the scope!  You should check it out!

I can't tell if y'all watched the vid and are just regurgitating the points for people in this thread who didn't, orrrrr if you just so happen to be saying things I said as well, hahaha!

I'm about 99% sure he's being sarcastic, lol... And thanks!  Hope you become a sub one day!

The video does a good job explaining what ray tracing is. 

However, it is misleading to say that it is neither technology or marketing.  Sure, ray tracing is a physics concept, but you could also say that "3D" is just a math concept.  However, back in Gen 5 the vast majority of games used new technology to render 3D graphics.  When gamers were saying "3D", they weren't really talking about the math concept so much as the different graphics in the games.  Ray tracing is the same thing.  There is new technology that makes the graphics look different in the games using this physics concept.

Likewise, ray tracing is marketing, because that is the purpose of showing off graphics.  Gameplay is often hard to advertise.  Graphics are fairly easy to advertise.  Just show a screenshot or video and you can show off the graphics.  These big budget games put the largest chunk of their budget into graphics, because that is what markets the game.  Graphics = marketing.  That is why all of this talk about ray tracing is really marketing.