Poll: Ray Tracing - Do we care?

[StarShock]

Hello, with the impending release of these new fangled "RTX" cards, do any of us actually care about ray tracing?
For me I don't think it will add very much, like its a cool new way of doing stuff, and at a professional level will likely save Disney a bunch of time and money on their next block buster, but from a gaming point of view, even if there were games that use it, it seems like it wouldn't add very much to the end result.

I mean I'm sure developers will be happy to be able to just flip a switch in the game engine instead of having to go through the game and manually add texture and lighting maps to a scene, but by the sounds of it there will be a big old performance hit, and I'm not sold that it will actually improve the end result.

Add to that, if only a hand full of top end cards will even be able to pull it off, just means that if a game dev wants to actually sell a lot of games, they will need to do it the old way as well for at least a few more generations.

I feel like this is just going to be another PhysX or hair works, NVidia will pay a few devs to add it to their games, but no one will actually use it or care.

What do you guys think? Next big thing or not?

 

[DONOHUE07]

I didn’t know what Ray Tracing was, I had to google it, and now I have I’m not interested in it in the slightest, don’t get me wrong, I’m interested in the the GPU’s as I’m itching to upgrade from my r9-290 but as far as Ray Tracing is concerned, I couldn’t care less.

 

[humbug]

Yes, its very important, its makes a huge difference to lighting, shading and makes real time reflections possible.

I made this 2 or 3 years ago with old Cryengine.

 

[Armageus]

Based on demos like this:

Then it's a no from me - shinies for shiny sakes, and honestly makes no difference compared to some of the good quality "baked in" lighting developers have used up until now

 

[humbug]

Based on demos like this:

Then it's a no from me - shinies for shiny sakes, and honestly makes no difference compared to some of the good quality "baked in" lighting developers have used up until now

Backed in lighting does not move, its static, its only used for distance shading or games where the time of day does not change.
You can also use Environment Probes to overlay over reflective surfaces, like water, but again its static. if you have a line of tress next to a body of water the fake reflections only line up from a very specific angle, you move away and the scenery moves but the reflection doesn't.

 

[SE-Lain]

I think the big advantage is for the game artists and devs. Not having to create art with baked lighting and fake reflections, and workarounds for effects etc will save a lot of time that can be dedicated elsewhere, thus improving the graphics in other areas as well as giving us more accurate reflections and lighting. It'll be ages though before real time ray tracing becomes common and perform well enough so I don't think it's particularly exciting right now tbh.

 

[jigger]

I have no idea what sort of performance jump the RTX cards will bring, but it will need to be massive and I think we are a very long way off having graphics cards powerful enough.

Nvidia are just hamming up a feature I think. The need for ray tracing as standard in games is questionable too.

 

[Armageus]

Backed in lighting does not move, its static, its only used for distance shading or games where the time of day does not change.
You can also use Environment Probes to overlay over reflective surfaces, like water, but again its static. if you have a line of tress next to a body of water the fake reflections only line up from a very specific angle, you move away and the scenery moves but the reflection doesn't.

Which I appreciate. However trying to sell that to "Joe Public" as a groundbreaking reason to upgrade isn't going to happen. Instead there will be months of games with "forced" scenes with loads of chromed surfaces and lights just to make the effect as in your face as developers can, in order to push it as "essential"

 

[hedgey]

Nope.

 

[humbug]

Yes, its very important, its makes a huge difference to lighting, shading and makes real time reflections possible.

I made this 2 or 3 years ago with old Cryengine.

Backed in lighting does not move, its static, its only used for distance shading or games where the time of day does not change.
You can also use Environment Probes to overlay over reflective surfaces, like water, but again its static. if you have a line of tress next to a body of water the fake reflections only line up from a very specific angle, you move away and the scenery moves but the reflection doesn't.

Its been a while since i made this.

In the video from start to 25 seconds i used Environment Probes, as i explained above, the reflection does not line up, you can see that very clearly, from 25 seconds the video blurrs in to a Ray Traced based reflection, as you can see everything lines up even when moving around, even under the bridge which an Environment Probe would not capture.

Watch it closely.

Which I appreciate. However trying to sell that to "Joe Public" as a groundbreaking reason to upgrade isn't going to happen. Instead there will be months of games with "forced" scenes with loads of chromed surfaces and lights just to make the effect as in your face as developers can, in order to push it as "essential"

You're right its not ground breaking, i was messing with it 3 years ago as you can see, but it is important to make mainstream.

 

[beany_bot]

I think it probably is important long term. But Nvidia sure will be making a mountain out of a molehill to sell mor cards. That is for sure.

 

[Gregster]

I remember way way back when Ray tracing was something to only dream of happening and now seeing it as a reality really does whet my appetite. I really do hope that it becomes the next 'thing' and we see it in many games.

 

[opethdisciple]

If devs start using it in games and games start looking epic because of it, then yes, yes we will care vary much about it.

It comes down to adoption and what it delivers.

 

[jigger]

Do we even have ray tracing support at an API level yet?

 

[humbug]

Download this, extract, run the .exe

www.rigidgems.sakura.ne.jp/files/RigidGems2_2.zip

Mouse Input

• R Drag - Rotate Camera
• Left Down(Click Object) - Focus to the object
• Left Drag - Drag the object
• R + L Drag - Change camera distance from center

Key Input

• ESC - Exit
• PAGE_DOWN, PAGE_UP - Increase/Decrease Fov
• HOME, END - Increase/Decrease focal
• INSERT, DELETE - Increase/Decrease F Value
• SPACE - Reload the scene
• ENTER - Next Scene

Original site http://www.rigidgems.sakura.ne.jp/index_en.html

 

[bru]

A very similar conversation happen a good while back about Polygon's vs sprites, give us the cards that can do it and developers will use it, but I totally agree it will take a few generations before it is actually useful.

 

[beany_bot]

I remember way way back when Ray tracing was something to only dream of happening and now seeing it as a reality really does whet my appetite. I really do hope that it becomes the next 'thing' and we see it in many games.

I just hope it doesn't set us back too far. Starting to get excited that truly capable 4k / Ultra cards are close by. Don't want to have to go back to 1080p medium to handle Ray tracing.

 

[Skynet5]

All its going to mean is that we can turn the option on (if we have an rtx enabled card) and see the fps tank.

Then all get excited for the next card that has more power to make it better.

And so it starts all over again.

I do think we need it. It looks smart.

 

[V F]

I remember way way back when Ray tracing was something to only dream of happening and now seeing it as a reality really does whet my appetite. I really do hope that it becomes the next 'thing' and we see it in many games.

We used to get excited over 2 white squares and a moving line.

 

[bru]

We used to get excited over 2 white squares and a moving line.

Wasn't it two white lines and a square?

Spoiler: Pong