Why Ray Tracing Is Still Not Worth It

Ali Rashid From Tech4Gamers writes "Ray Tracing has been out for over five years at this point; however, most of its issues still remain relevant even with modern GPUs."

[Goodguy01]

Too little gained for too much lost basically.

[Sciurus_vulgaris]

In titles that lack environments with prominent reflective metallic surfaces you often don’t notice the ray-tracing very much. Most players are going to stare down at puddles and wet surfaces. Ray tracing doesn’t impact immersion as much as some other graphical effects.

[fr0sty]

That is only true in cases where the ray tracing is only being used for reflections. When it is used for all of the lighting, indirect illumination, etc... it makes a world of difference. However, we're still a couple GPU generations away from being able to do all that at 4K. The vast majority of games that use ray tracing only use it on select parts of the scene, and they rasterize the rest.

[FinalFantasyFanatic]

Ray Tracing makes a big difference, it's just a question of having enough processing power to actually do it, so most developers are selectively choosing to use it on certain things. I would love to see Ray Tracing using a lot more, for more things, especially if it makes it easier for developers and shortens development times, unfortunately, it'll be a long time before we see that happen.

[swedishMeatwad]

@fr0sty I agree with you, on the console side especially, but Cyberpunk 2077 with full path tracing is very, very playable on a 40 series GPU. That was also a game that wasn't built with full path tracing in mind for gameplay and it doesn't take a lot of imagination to imagine what gameplay possibilities full raytracing (path tracing if you will), or even just raytraced reflections, will bring us. We just haven't seen an example of it yet because consoles set the standard and they aren't there just yet.

It's not for every game, but it can be very useful for a lot of games. Not only that, once we can stop worrying about cached lighting/shadows, it will often speed up that part of game development because it takes ages to do lighting the traditional way.

Whenever these articles go up, it irks me a bit because it's always from gamers who are not developers who don't actually realize what is made possible with these new techniques that write them. It's like fans yelling at players in an NBA match, telling them what they should be doing.

[isarai]

Seriously, it's been such a thief of processing power that could've been used to add something of actual substance to the game. We got this sizeable leap in power from last gen, and a lot of it is being wasted on Ray tracing imo

[Michiel1989]

it's honestly expected, it will cost less relatively the more time passes. The 4000 series from nvidia does especially well with raytracing compared to the previous 3000 series. For now it's a waste still, but give it some time and it will get exponentially less costly

[JEECE]

Yep. Ray tracing kills the framerate for slightly better lighting and reflections. I have seen some impressive tech demos where it seems to make a meaningful difference, but in real games it is never worth it.

[fr0sty]

I do CG rendering for a living.. Ray tracing isn't just "slightly better" when properly utilized. The problem is, they don't properly utilize it in most games. Many games only have ray traced reflections, but the rest is still rasterized. A few use it for lighting as well, but so far no game has ever been fully ray traced. Systems just aren't powerful enough for it yet. Once they are, you wouldn't want to play a game that was rasterized again.

[FPS_D3TH]

Not really “lost” per se but the cost and requirements don’t match up for the reward

[mkis007]

This is what purpose the ps5 pro serves. Just as ps4 pro was for higher resolutions. You need a purpose built machine for ray tracing.

Side note
Amd gpus are better value than nividia, except when you want raytracing. Which is why I went with a 4070ti super.

[CrimsonWing69]

I honestly rarely notice it in some games. Like RE Village used it and I couldn’t tell you if any example I noticed. I only know because the trailer mentioned using it.

[CantThinkOfAUsername]

Because it's 'AMD-sponsored.'

[fr0sty]

That's because they only use it for reflections in that game..

[CrimsonWing69]

I think it had to do with lighting mode, but like if you asked me what was improved by ray tracing in that or stood out, i really couldn’t say.

[gold_drake]

same haha i struggled to see the difference

[Aussiesummer]

They clearly badly implemented it, not all devs use it well.

[Dazelya]

Frankly, RT reflections do not interest me much, on the other hand, RT lighting makes a huge difference.

[VariantAEC]

And then there's GT7. It relies only on reflections... which creates all the other lighting phenomenon including bounce lighting or global illumination. Of course GT7 only deploys that system at 30FPS and people think that makes it not worth it. In reality there are many other games that deploy it without issues even at 60FPS like Fortnite which everyone ignores is a F2P 60FPS UE5 game with RT on consoles.

The smart deployment of RT makes it worthwhile. Even in a game like GT7 RT is used on every non-transparent surface. The asphalt the grass the guardrails... literally everything that isn't transpanrent glass sees RT in GT7 in replays and photomode and it's truely transformative, but 30FPS is too much of a compromise for most people honestly even PD thinks so because they limit RT to replays only not gameplay. Even so PD still also felt necessary to include RT and make it the default quality option.

So PD is right on the fence with RT while Insomniac is an even stronger believer in RT making the taxing reflections work at 60FPS at up to 1440p on PS5 in graphically accomplished games even those taking place in open world settings. Then we have 3rd parties like Rockstar and Machine Games which offer RT in some of their recent current gen games like GTAV and Doom: Eternal (before MS' acquisition).

RT is the future and while you can turn it off so your PC can run games at 60 or deal with limitations which consoles sometimes have or don't as in the examples I listed (all offering 60FPS gameplay except GT7 which still features 30FPS RT with 60FPS rasterization which I didn't touch on earlier).

RT will become more efficient as GPUs get more powerful. My phone handles RT reflections in an OK manner. I do play mobile games at 20FPS already so if we could get RT at 20FPS (already doable on my phone at 1080p at 23FPS) then 20FPS at 532p is just fine for me on phones - though I'd turn it off for additional battery longevity and better thermal performance.

[fr0sty]

I'm actually looking forward to seeing how PS5 Pro handles GT7, with its supposed 400% increase in ray tracing power.

[isarai]

Mainly the GI/ambient occlusion which weirdly enough is like the least expensive ray tracing, only takes like 3fps off your framreate most times.

[RaiderNation]

Devs want it though because its a less time and labor intensive way of creating reflections.

[Einhander1972]

It will be on the PS5 Pro when the RT is separated from the CU's and doesn't cause performance loss.

[Giga_Gaia]

I find it hilarious that people actually believe there is a PS5 Pro coming considering there is no leak coming from anyone reliable. How are you enjoying that Switch Pro? Pretty much everyone who claimed to be important said it was real and you people actually fell for it. Now you're gullible enough to fall for it again.

[ChasterMies]

You could go back in time and say that about a lot of graphics optiond. The hardware will improve and you’ll be glad ray-tracing is built into these games.

[repsahj]

Totally agree.

[SeTTriP]

Facts

[FinalFantasyFanatic]

I can only imagine the difference when hardware catches up in, say, 10 or 15 years when we have the hardware to run these life-like worlds.

[Giga_Gaia]

It's another reason games will take longer to develop and cost more money. No thanks, it's eating performance we could use elsewhere.

[DivineHand125]

The problem with ray tracing is that it has to be exaggerated for you to notice it. When that happens it then breaks the realism. If it wasn't so demanding, I wouldn't mind it being there but on consoles if I have to choose 30 FPS with ray tracing vs 60 fps without then I will always choose the 60 fps option.

[VincentVanBro]

Depends entirely on the game. In Cyberpunk 2077 it is totally worth it.

[sagapo]

Agreed but you need one beefy setup for all that glory tho.

[FinalFantasyFanatic]

Even in Minecraft, the lighting between RTX on/off is astonishing, and it doesn't even use a realistic art style.

[DustMan]

I don't think Ray Tracing can really be judged in pictures alone.

Cyberpunk running with and without is fairly noticeable. Same with Alan Wake II.

I mean the example from fortnight did have a completely different shadows. AMD and Nvidia need to figure out significant ways to reduce the impact of ray tracing. Upscaling, and Frame Generation are not going anywhere because brute force computing is now too expensive for the typical consumer to be able to take advantage of. As noted on the steam chart. Having enough VRAM just isn't enough anymore for the complex computations that need to be made as well with the newest of cards still not smoothly running 4k.

We are kind of at this weird in-between stage of tech with AI on the rise.

[Elda]

I would think it's a waste of time & money knowing most gamers do not pay attention to those little details. One of the very reasons why gaming is so expensive.

[SpacedDuck]

Still not worth it? It will never be worth it.

When you need to pause a game using a DF breakdown video to see the difference at the expense of easily 20+ FPS it isn't worth it.

[darkside2205]

I don't know. There are other things that have a severe performance impact that we could do away with. There are anti-aliasing algorithms that barely impact performance at all but we're still mostly using ones that kill performance, just as an example

[CantThinkOfAUsername]

The only real problem is that mid-range and entry-level cards, which represent the majority, can't run it well. But the visuals are there.

[PRIMORDUS]

I have a 4070 Super but rarely even use RT, and that's with DLSS and Framegen if the game supports it. I like my games with very high FPS at 1440p, I favor that more over using RT. I actually use reshade in all my games, because plain vanilla is just meh.

[chronoforce]

With raytracing what usually relies on baking or done only in screen space is simulated more correctly and still in real-time.

The sooner developers focus on ray and path tracing the faster these techniques will get as developers invest more in the tech. Epic have already invested a lot in lumen and it is a fantastic RT solution for GI and reflections that supports both software mode of compatibility and hardware mode for Quality.

If the PS5 has enough performance to deliver a game like Spiderman 2 with raytraced reflections then we should be able to start leaving behind certain aspects of rasterization.

This could also allow more game like Cyberpunk 2077 and Alan Wake 2 that have path tracing modes without being too much of divergence for the developers to support.

[Psychonaut85]

Ray traced reflections are meh, but I feel like global illumination is more worth the sacrifice. But seems like usually it’s just reflections and maybe shadows.

[1nsomniac]

It’s soo worth it!

…if you can run it that is. So many people dismiss it because they themselves can’t run it so therefor no one else should enjoy it either.

That’s why we can’t have nice things and why the industry is so stale. Same people complaining are the same people complaining there’s no progression in the industry. They want mediocrity and the common denominator then complain at their pixel counting console war.

[jjb1981]

The sacrifices in other areas just aren't worth it for most games, especially if they are fast-paced. Everything else is a blur when I'm focused on the center. I could see it being worth it for slower, more cinematic games.

[Profchaos]

My personal opinion is ray tracing will eventually find a place in all games but we won't be there for another 10 years.

It has to work on all systems because developers are not going to work on advanced ray tracing for a ps5 pro and PC implementation then spend time working on traditional implementations of baked lighting when we can do a lot with baked lighting that still looks great.

And it's not just about how much processing power a system has but how much ray tracing hardware a system packs seperate from the GPU

I'm not saying that developers should steer clear of it however we saw that Spider-Man 2 proved it can be done effectively without sacrificing performance (all modes had it to various degrees)

To a lesser degree metro exodus was also a convincing showpiece for early ray tracing in consoles

But those two examples are from development teams who both show an excellent understanding of the technology which is not anywhere close to being widely understood across the bored.

Many people are thinking around 2028 ray tracing might be more viable with a ps5 but I think we're honestly looking at 2015 and looking at games that we have today a game that's had a human hand baking the lighting can sometimes be superior than ray tracing.
For example in cyberpunk phantom liberty the devs out out a demo showing off rtx overdrive vs baked lighting on a ps5 at one part v went down a plastic slide the baked lighting had a ton of artificial lighting baked into the slide and the rtx overdrive on the PC was near black o preferred the baked lighting here but the lighting on the street was far superior in rtx overdrive

[isalas011981]

Article brought you by AMD :)

[gurp]

not worth it

[gold_drake]

if i get a better performance, i leave it off to be honest.

[spoonard]

But nVidia needs to sell people video cards! If they don't toss some bullcrap marketing in there, what difference is there from AMD cards?

[DustMan]

After being able to mod frame gen into certain games I'm convinced Nvidia was performing shady business. I know AMD is not using the card's specific hardware, but it works very well. Nvidia could have created software that did the same thing, while allowing owners of the 40's series to be able to integrate what's supposed to be a superior version using the cards hardware. Pretty sure whenever I upgrade my next box I'm going for an AMD build.

[__y2jb]

I’ve yet to have a single jaw dropping moment with ray tracing. Nothing even close to a Mario 64 moment.

[DynDasE]

60fps > 30fps cinematic bullcrap.

[saint_seya]

I do like RT, ofc depends on personal opinion, but i even use mods to add RT if possible.. I tried the path tracing mod in RE2 and i use RTGI in old games because it makes em look much better (GTA5, Assassin's creed games, Dark souls games and others i cant remember).

[purple101]

Series S enters conversation

Series S loweres head, turns around, quickly leaves building

[chicken_in_the_corn]

It can add a lot to a games visuals. Watch Dogs Legion and Hitman for example.

[ANIALATOR136]

People said the same thing about tesselation at the time. Give it a few years and the performance cost will be forgotten about and every game will use it.

[Aussiesummer]

I love raytracing, especially it’s more potent form pathtracing, the realistic lighting you can get in games using it is sublime, real pause in awe moments but it does come at a huge performance hit and you need expensive gear to run it though over the years it will become more and more common place and more cost effective to use. Rtx 5090 is going to allow games do some amazing things with it and I can’t wait….my bank balance on the other hand will be whincing in pain.