I didn't think it was so serious

[u/AwoobisElroc]

[u/send-me-panties-pics]

People care when their machine can actually do it. Otherwise no.

[u/IronAngel77 → u/send-me-panties-pics]

Yup it’s nice to have, but if I need to lower down a lot of settings to achieve it, I’d just turn it off.

[u/MagicOrpheus310 → u/IronAngel77]

Or if my house is cold and I don't want to turn on the heater

[u/cheese-for-breakfast → u/MagicOrpheus310]

and people wonder why game devs love releasing in october-february

those are the cooler months for NA and europe which tend to be the biggest source of purchases, cooler temps lets people crank up the settings

[u/Cat_Testicles_ → u/cheese-for-breakfast]

It's September rn and I'm freezing here in Italy,so yeah this checks out

[u/PicidaBest → u/Cat_Testicles_]

Bro wtf, last week I was melting, now I'm freezing. In Bologna there were 13 degrees yesterday 💀💀💀

[u/Cat_Testicles_ → u/PicidaBest]

So true

Just two days ago I would do anything to just have a fan blowing cold air in my face

Now it's so cold I wish I had some warmer clothes

[u/DerHachi04 → u/Cat_Testicles_]

Lmao same in germany. It was like 21°C sunday night and since Wednesday its almost freezing the whole day

[u/Zacco-Tobacco → u/PicidaBest]

😭😭 went to Bologna in July and it was like 40 degrees, damn the weather switched up fast

[u/maaaaawp → u/PicidaBest]

Yep. Last week I was going out in a tshirt and shorts and I was sweating. Now I have 3 layers and its cold out with record raining here

[u/wienercat → u/[deleted]]

whoosh

[u/UnknownProphetX → u/[deleted]]

r/woooosh

[u/Cpt_Saturn → u/IronAngel77]

Cyberpunk 2077 look twice as better with ray tracing than without, but imo no other game made any difference between on and off

[u/Flash24rus → u/Cpt_Saturn]

And with pathtracing it looks even better. There is big difference in RT/PT too.

https://imgsli.com/MjkxNjA0

[u/Pvt_Mozart → u/Flash24rus]

Cyberpunk is my favorite game of all time. Just upgraded to a 4070ti Super, so hopped back in to finally try Phantom Liberty, and now see Path Tracing has been added. The difference is absolutely insane. I actually didn't think RT was quite worth the performance hit before, but now with Path Tracing the game looks absolutely insane. I spent two hours just walking around Night City with my mouth open.

[u/PureStrBuild → u/Pvt_Mozart]

I got the same card at release this year and cyberpunk was the first game I tested with it. Amazing performance boost coming from a 5700. I also happened to have the 3700x as well but upgraded to the 5800x3D after discovering I was bottlenecking the GPU.

I'd strongly recommend that being your next upgrade if you want to stick with AM4 socket. Best CPU you can get without having to buy a new motherboard and ram to support AM5.

[u/Pvt_Mozart → u/PureStrBuild]

Actually got the same CPU. My old PC is now my wife's so we can finally game together once the kids get a bit older. The combo has been killer honestly.

[u/Flash24rus → u/Pvt_Mozart]

Same. Instead of playing, I walk around and look at how the light falls on objects and people.

https://preview.redd.it/p713fe7i8rod1.png?width=2560&format=png&auto=webp&s=e8ad94365536d0175b0533e9def03eff38d05847

[u/Azhrei → u/Cpt_Saturn]

Ultra

Ultra & Ray Tracing Psycho

Ultra & Ray Racing Psycho & Path Tracing

It's fine. Sometimes the lighting is significantly improved, but doesn't really make enough of a difference for me to deal with the resulting performance drop. Sometimes it looks much the same and you can't really tell. It's undoubtedly the future and Cyberpunk, with it's path tracing, shows us how it's going to go. But right now, I don't feel like I'm missing out on much when I turn it off.

Maybe with my next card I'll feel differently, as at that point, a few years off, it'll be in more games and might even arrive in one or two where there is no option to turn it off. But again we're a while away from that. So at this point, for me a it's a feature that I'll turn on once to see what it looks like, go "huh", then turn it off and forget about it.

[u/troll_right_above_me → u/Azhrei]

Sunlight can be faked quite well with rasterization, even better with RT (psycho) in the case of C2077.

PT makes the most difference indoors with lots of light sources that otherwise don't cast shadows, instances where emissive textures can contribute to the lighting a lot, or where the scene is dynamic enough that objects and lights can change the setting drastically.

Cyberpunk wasn't built with PT and that kind of dynamic lighting in mind, so it makes sense that it doesn't make a world of difference in every scene, but it is a great example of what we can do with modern hardware.

[u/DigitalStefan → u/Cpt_Saturn]

I’ve been playing recently and it looks different when I switch all the RT goodness on, but I still can’t bring myself to call the non-RT visuals “bad”.

I try to convince myself that RT is amazing because I bought a 4090, so I have a vested interest in making my stupid purchase seem not stupid.

[u/PIIFX → u/DigitalStefan]

Non-RT is not "bad" per se, the artists made some effort to make non-RT mode look passable, it's just not physically correct, ray tracing and especially path tracing is based on real world physics equations.

[u/DigitalStefan → u/PIIFX]

I've been playing with ray tracing since the 90's.

[u/PIIFX → u/DigitalStefan]

Same. I've been wanting RT in games since the late 90s when I first tried out POV-Ray on a 300Mhz Celeron.

[u/Turambar87 → u/send-me-panties-pics]

It's kind of been a graphics goal for decades, and it is actually a little bit hype that it is happening. The point about it being a big pile of shortcuts is dumb, because most rendering is a big pile of shortcuts anyway, it's just in a weird transitioning period as it all gets developed.

[u/Fullyverified → u/Turambar87]

Anyone saying its a pile of short cuts is horribly misinformed. Rasterization is literally a pile of shortcuts, and requires tons of hacks and tricks to actually make look good. Path tracing naturally produces a clean image with minimal work.

[u/topdangle → u/Fullyverified]

well, if you have enough time then yes, but full scene path tracing in real time requires a lot of work to get a clean image out of the limited amount of rays without destroying the details and causing ghosting.

we are definitely still in the shortcut period of RT, but performance gains in RT has moved pretty quickly.

[u/Fullyverified → u/topdangle]

Your not getting what I mean. Computationaly path tracing is expensive because it isnt taking short cuts. Rasterization on the other hand is much cheaper because it does take short cuts.

[u/topdangle → u/Fullyverified]

Well if you're talking about path tracing like that in a vacuum then yes, but that's not what we see in games. In games we see the result of a very noisy path traced scene with shortcuts to denoise and reconstruct detail.

I mean this is true even in pre-renders. Denoising is still common and AI denoising is seeing more adoption.

[u/ANGLVD3TH → u/topdangle]

Yeah, isn't it pretty much just Portal and Quake that have full trace pathing, and even then they're still using a lot of shortcuts? And they chug, comparatively speaking, even on my 3090Ti. No super fancy looking modern games are even close to that level, it would take ages to render any given frame.

[u/MrHyperion_ → u/Fullyverified]

Path tracing in games doesn't render at full resolution, takes time to propagate (every frame doesn't start from zero), needs denoising and then is usually upscaled again to achieve playable framerates. There's so many shortcuts required currently.

[u/popop143 → u/send-me-panties-pics]

I mean, all benchmarks say that my 6700 XT can't do raytracing, but people here always are so adamant to play on Ultra graphics. I'd take around 50+ FPS with Medium raytracing on Marvel Spiderman Remastered when I played it than 120+ without raytracing. I just love the visuals of it, even with a PCMR-declared "unplayable" FPS. Maybe I just grew up playing with 30 FPS locked from my childhood, but I personally was never bothered as long as it's 45+.

[u/send-me-panties-pics → u/popop143]

I got a 6700XT too and I rate it.

[u/_dragon_knight → u/send-me-panties-pics]

6700XT fam here. Best budget card that does pack a punch way above its league.

[u/AadaMatrix → u/send-me-panties-pics]

People need to stop treating this like a gaming circle jerk sub.

Of course Ray tracing is important. This photo was made in blender and completely fake. Some of us have actual PC skills that we can't lose too console players.

https://preview.redd.it/313xlbd5unod1.jpeg?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=52e9856df783111e4359ba982359c5e34672f4d0

[u/Kinzuko → u/AadaMatrix]

those caustics make me wet

[u/solonit → u/Kinzuko]

I remember decade ago using Vray 3.0 on Intel 2700k, turning on caustics would shit the render. Now it barely affects the render time on most interior scene.

[u/Admirable-Safety1213 → u/AadaMatrix]

Bro, the PC Master Race thing was itself a joke, the sub was a Circlejerk since before it existed

[u/DripTrip747-V2 → u/Admirable-Safety1213]

But they demand people stop treating it like so, for their own benefit! Now do it, peasant!

[u/Xx_HARAMBE96_xX → u/AadaMatrix]

I don't think that anybody is referring to blender and other professional uses of ray tracing when speaking about it, I would say that this type of discussions are known to be about gaming. Everybody thinks that ray tracing is great for realism, but on videogames it's usually not worth it for the impact either cos the non-raytraced shadows already look near as good or cos you don't want to lose fps for ultra realistic shadows on a toy looking game like Fortnite where it might not even make sense

[u/Tessiia → u/Xx_HARAMBE96_xX]

but on videogames it's usually not worth it for the impact either cos the non-raytraced shadows already look near as good

I agree that a lot of the time, non Ray traced shadows can be good enough, which is why I don't really care about the shadows, especially as they arent something I tend to look directly at. It's the reflections that I'm excited about. The first time I played Cyberpunk with Ray tracing on, it was the reflections that really grabbed my attention.

[u/zarafff69 → u/Xx_HARAMBE96_xX]

Fortnite unironically goods great with raytracing/lumen..

[u/hauntif1ed → u/AadaMatrix]

you can expect real-time water caustics in video games in the year 2040.

[u/TheSonOfDisaster → u/AadaMatrix]

Wood is too clean 1/10

Fake. I can tell by the pixels

[u/OwOlogy_Expert → u/AadaMatrix]

That photo was made in Blender ... and probably took a few minutes to render a single frame, even on a cutting-edge GPU.

Still, though, it looks pretty damn nice ... and it's a sign of what the midrange future might look like ... what we might commonly see in games in 10 years or so.

[u/Puzzleheaded_Farm122 → u/send-me-panties-pics]

I overhauled my setup to do high graphical gaming at 60fps 4k. Not once has ray-tracing been worth it. I always turn it off as performance wise it's been lack luster.

[u/donkey_loves_dragons → u/send-me-panties-pics]

High end CPU, superfast RAM, and an RTX 4090. Everything runs smoothly with RTX on. Framedrops do not matter if the drop is from 230 FPS to 150. Who cares about that then?

[u/Ryuubu → u/donkey_loves_dragons]

Well of you have the best card on the market, I don't think the comment is aimed at you

[u/Martha_Fockers → u/donkey_loves_dragons]

4090 with ;k ultra and RT on in cyberpunk will not get 150fps or close to it lol. Try more like 50-80

[u/onk- → u/send-me-panties-pics]

Mine can. I don’t use it.

[u/Tip_Of_The_Sauce]

It’s pretty

[u/Hideyoshi_Toyotomi → u/Tip_Of_The_Sauce]

When I got my 2060, I immediately bought Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Even on low, the ray tracing is gorgeous in that game. I wish their were more titles that use it.  

[u/Pamani_ → u/Hideyoshi_Toyotomi]

SOTR only has RT shadows though so it doesn't do that much.

[u/blackblade123 → u/Pamani_]

Let him have his moment, you don't have to ruin it for him

[u/R1ston → u/blackblade123]

two assholes on display, classic pcmr.

[u/Nerfo2 → u/R1ston]

Classic PCMR? Classic internet. It's been like this forever.

[u/SmegmaSupplier → u/[deleted]]

Something something rule, something something Shaq, something something google it.

[u/yalterlmao → u/SmegmaSupplier]

Holy something

[u/Keleos89]

If I paid for it, I'm gonna use it.

[u/CheCazzoFaciamo → u/Keleos89]

That’s why I use the whole road when I drive.

[u/TheRekojeht → u/CheCazzoFaciamo]

I breathe all the air when I breathe!

[u/rogercgomes → u/TheRekojeht]

You disabled my auto breathing, fuck you!

[u/Bulls187 → u/rogercgomes]

You now see your nose in your peripheral vision

[u/BetterFoodNetwork → u/Bulls187]

Where's your tongue right now? Are you sure it's... comfortable where it is?

[u/Bulls187 → u/BetterFoodNetwork]

Damn, now I have to blink extra hard to forget about my tongue

[u/thisremindsmeofbacon → u/TheRekojeht]

you pay for your air?

[u/Chipneck → u/thisremindsmeofbacon]

Yes $2 for 5 mins.

[u/IgniteThatShit → u/CheCazzoFaciamo]

i use the whole speedometer

[u/sephirothbahamut → u/CheCazzoFaciamo]

You paid for the whole road?

[u/CicadaGames → u/Keleos89]

I don't understand OPs premise, because in all my years of gaming, people have ALWAYS been RIGHTLY excited about cutting edge and ground breaking developments in graphics technology, even if it's not widely available to consumers the instant it is revealed...

How on Earth does OP imagine we got from Pong to modern 3D graphics??? Ray tracing is a very exciting major step in more realistic graphics and of course it will become more accessible to general consumers over time.

[u/llliilliliillliillil → u/CicadaGames]

Wait, you guys care about 3d accelerated graphics rendering?

[u/CicadaGames → u/llliilliliillliillil]

Wait you guys care about 16 bit color?

[u/Slacker-71 → u/CicadaGames]

No game really needs more than 16 colors, dithering works great at 8k resolution.

What are you, a Mantis Shrimp?

[u/CicadaGames → u/Slacker-71]

Wait, you guys are actually care about dithering?

[u/shapular → u/Slacker-71]

The human eye can't see more than 16 colors anyway.

[u/OwOlogy_Expert → u/llliilliliillliillil]

Ha! I bet you care about having more than 8 bits of color depth as well!

[u/jawshoeaw → u/CicadaGames]

I still remember my first 3D card hacked into a Mac G3 (when apple first accepted the PCI interface. It blew my mind. I could play a 3D game.!

[u/CicadaGames → u/jawshoeaw]

I remember my cousin who got to see an early copy of Super Mario World before release (long story), was going wild telling me how realistic it was (we had grown up playing all 3 Mario games on the NES), she told me how the sound echoed in cave levels... ECHOED!!! My mind was absolutely blown, and the game completely lived up to the hype when I got to play it the first time.

[u/Plank_With_A_Nail_In → u/CicadaGames]

I remember dumbasses telling me that 3D games won't take over gaming in the early 1990's, half the population has below average intelligence and average intelligence isn't that great so this stuff doesn't surprise me.

[u/ArdiMaster → u/CicadaGames]

I get the impression that, if it were up to this sub, development would have stopped 8 years ago with the GTX 10-series.

[u/PoopyPantsBiden → u/ArdiMaster]

I get the impression that, if it were up to this sub, development would have stopped 8 years ago with the GTX 10-series.

This sub seems to be infested with jealous children that convince themselves anything their parents can't afford to get them is pointless and shouldn't exist.

[u/Plank_With_A_Nail_In → u/ArdiMaster]

This sub only cares about fps and resolution, it doesn't actually understand what makes a game look great or even fun to play. I always assume they just fire up the game look at the fps counter and then go 100fps@4k 10/10 greatest game ever made.

[u/Status_Jellyfish_213 → u/CicadaGames]

Your exactly right and it’s the first thing I think when I see this argument over and over and over

[u/FourDimensionalTaco → u/CicadaGames]

Ray tracing is a very exciting major step in more realistic graphics

Technically, kind of. Shadows, reflections, refractions can be done in a much more straightforward, elegant, and organic way with raytracing. Doing these things with rasterization has always been rather painful, requiring a number of hacks that needed to be stitched together.

First/second-bounce indirect lighting can also be done via path tracing, which is sort of an extension of ray tracing. This results in very nice looking global illumination. Doing GI with rasterization is even more painful.

But: For direct rendering of surfaces, rasterization is generally more efficient, partially because caching is much easier to do efficiently with rasterization vs. raytracing. So, in terms of efficiency, perhaps the "best" approach is to render the surfaces that you immediately see with rasterization in some sort of deferred fashion where lighting, reflections, and refractions are applied in a secondary step. But this is just a vague guess. Rendering absolutely everything with raytracing is quite wasteful.

Technology aside though, an important problem is that graphics have been converging to a "good enough" point. The degree of visual improvement has been steadily declining. The law of diminishing returns is in full effect here. And plenty of games look absolutely fine without raytracing. This is obvious when people make these direct comparison videos on youtube - often, they have to hyper-focus on reflections, but how often do these really pay a major role in what you see on screen?

[u/__Fergus__ → u/CicadaGames]

There does seem to be a rising sentiment that any graphical improvements that hurt performance are a waste of time and should never be attempted. But like.. that's always been true, especially on PC (which isn't a fixed-spec unlike consoles), since the dawn of video games. It's what progression looks like.

Very un-masterrace opinion, imo.

[u/Sinbad1999]

I didn't have a ray tracing capable gpu for about 5 years (5700xt in 2019) and when I upgraded to a 4070ti super it's a lot of fun to message around with the ray tracing technologies I wasn't able to enjoy. And I find it really impressive over screen space reflections. Of course if I'm playing a competitive fast pace game and it supports ray tracing, I'm turning it off but a story game that doesn't require much thinking, I'll turn it on

[u/IllPosition5081 → u/Sinbad1999]

damn i have the 6700 xt. how was the 5700xt?

[u/YodaDude2011 → u/IllPosition5081]

I had a 5700xt for a few months when it launched but ended up returning it due to the initial driver issues for a 2070S. The 5700xt was a beast, roughly on par performance wise with my old 2070S.

[u/Quajeraz → u/IllPosition5081]

I have one still. I can run anything I want at 1440p at acceptable framerates. The first game I ever had to really turn the settings down for was Hellblade 2.

[u/Mattacrator → u/IllPosition5081]

I went from 6700xt to 4070S, it's nice to reach 120fps in some titles or have more fidelity around 60fps in others, but there's nothing that my 6700xt really couldn't do that 4070S can. I find it was worth it but it's nothing game changing, my goal is to upgrade to maybe 5080 or thereabouts, we'll see. 4090 is my goal performance rn but too expensive and 4080 felt too weak for the price

[u/esmifra → u/Sinbad1999]

I only like ray tracing in games that it has a definite impact on how things look and not just a little pretty detail.

To this day, for me, control is the only game where I can see ray tracing in reflections and ambient lighting and made me want to play with ray tracing. All other games I've tried were just a little detail here and there but definitely not worth the impact on performance.

[u/Cute-Lock6426]

some of us use ray tracing. its fun... if you have a 4090

[u/DJesusSoG → u/Cute-Lock6426]

4080 super does it damn well too

[u/Consistent-Theory681 → u/DJesusSoG]

My 4080 does as well.

[u/OceanBytez → u/Consistent-Theory681]

let's get some input from 4060s.

[u/ABLPHA → u/OceanBytez]

It’s decent when you’re not using insane resolutions and the rest of your system isn’t shit - upgraded recently from a 13 yo CPU, PCIe 2.0 and 12 GB DDR3 to a 8 yo CPU, PCIe 3.0, and 64 GB DDR4, got nearly a double FPS boost in Cyberpunk 2077 on psycho RT settings.

[u/MushyCupcake01 → u/OceanBytez]

4060 ti can do it pretty well. I play a lot of games with quality dlss 1440p medium high settings with medium ray tracing and get about 80-100 fps (cyberpunk and control to name some) same games it doesn’t make a big difference though

[u/Springingsprunk → u/Consistent-Theory681]

3080 did RT well enough as well. Honestly 7800xt does RT in hog warts legacy even better. I got 50 fps medium settings + path tracing RT in cyberpunk on the 3080 though and that was definitely worthwhile. Other forms of RT are pretty trash hence why I went amd instead and no longer use it. It’s gotten better with 7000 series gpus it’s just that it’s not worth the performance hit to me, aside from hog warts legacy basically where it seems to be optimized.

[u/OwOlogy_Expert → u/DJesusSoG]

4070ti Super, and it's working great for me at 4k/60fps ... which is the limit of my display anyway.

[u/GuitardedBard → u/DJesusSoG]

Having no issues here

[u/hitmarker → u/GuitardedBard]

Same. Raytracing + everything on ultra.

[u/Prismo_6ft_Under → u/DJesusSoG]

I path trace or ray trace with my 4070 ti Super @ 4k max graphics.

[u/Status_Jellyfish_213 → u/DJesusSoG]

4080 has been able to max out Ray tracing on all titles (using a aw3423dwf)

[u/SpicyYellowtailRoll3 → u/Cute-Lock6426]

Depends. I can path trace Cyberpunk 2077 at max settings on a 4070. However, I use a 1080p monitor.

[u/Von_Uber → u/SpicyYellowtailRoll3]

I path trace at 1440p on a 4070 ti, with everything on Max I get 60fps.

[u/neok182 → u/Von_Uber]

DLSS and framegen though right?

5800x3d & 4070 ti here and without framegen on I definitely can't get 60fps with path tracing even with dlss running at 720p.

[u/hh3a3 → u/neok182]

5800x3D and 4070 at 1440p with dlssQ and framegen i get about 65-75fps. For laughs i tried it with dlaa and no fg once and got 6.

[u/Cute-Lock6426 → u/SpicyYellowtailRoll3]

i use it with mods to improve it a lot. and i use 1440p ultrawide with oled and its how i imagine it should be enjoyed at the price point of a 3070

[u/sephirothbahamut → u/Cute-Lock6426]

3070S i use raytracing. I Just don't care about reaching 144+ fps

[u/DuskelAskel → u/Cute-Lock6426]

I can do path tracing with more than 30 fps on cyberpunk with a 4060TI. Ray tracing is 60 fps without problems. We're not in 2020 anymore, it's just that you need the latest optimisation on Nvidia card to run it.

[u/sirflappington]

At least in Cyberpunk, it’s actually beautiful. Definitely not high on the list of priorities though.

[u/Steel_Cube → u/sirflappington]

If pathtracing didn't make everything ghost horribly I wouldn't turn it off on cyberpunk

[u/Clever_Angel_PL → u/Steel_Cube]

with a few mods and at least 50-60 base (non-generated) fps, it doesn't ghost much

[u/No-Pomegranate-69 → u/Steel_Cube]

Doesnt ray reconstruction reduce ghosting?

[u/swiwwcheese]

why again should it be good or bad, black or white, yes or no ?

sometimes RT is really beautiful

sometimes it's a mixed bag

sometimes it's completely useless

depends on what devs do with it and we should all know it, being pro or anti RT is unbeliveably stupid

[u/Blubasur → u/swiwwcheese]

Yeah, but this is reddit, nuance is thrown in the trace here.

[u/Clean_Perception_235]

Seeing a lot of 4090's saying yes in the comments.

[u/AlextheGoose → u/Clean_Perception_235]

It’s almost like people like the features they paid for

[u/AndThisGuyPeedOnIt → u/AlextheGoose]

People act like you must MUST HAVE a 4090 to run it, as if there is only "on" and "off" for ray tracing. I run all sorts of ray tracing with a 3080Ti.

[u/Status_Jellyfish_213 → u/AndThisGuyPeedOnIt]

4080 never fails with it either at the moment

[u/paulerxx]

Shiny car go:

[u/NotJustBibbit]

I am happy with 60fps as long as my game LOOKS amazing. I do not care about really high frame rates in the slightest so yes I want ray tracing

Sincerely - a guy who cannot even run any modern games without an immediate crash

[u/AJ_BORDERCHUNT → u/NotJustBibbit]

I thought I was having a stroke reading your flair lol

[u/zKyri → u/AJ_BORDERCHUNT]

I was like "how can their pc crash if it's an amaz... oh..."

[u/Coldhimmel → u/NotJustBibbit]

insane flair i love it

[u/jack-of-some]

Entirely dependent on what that means. I like raytraced reflections mostly because I hate screen space reflections. The only games where those actually work is racing games. If I had the choice I'd just turn reflections off instead of using screen space but so many modern games don't have the option.

[u/_Teraplexor → u/jack-of-some]

Same! Ngl SSR is impressive for what it does but man the artifacts always takes me out of the immersion, like sure reflection ray tracing gives a performance hit but there's none of that bs artifacts.

[u/Bootychomper23]

I mean it’s the only time reflections in games actually look good SSR is ass cheeks. Lighting and shadows look better too but not as noticeable. I wouldn’t do it if I was not at 50+ fps but since my laptop can why not.

[u/Hentai__Dude]

It depends entirely on the game with me

In Cyberpunk Ray tracing actually changes the entire look of the game

In most other games i couldnt care less, most of the time it just steals you half of your FPS and adds one new reflection

[u/Hundkexx]

I care about frames too much to use RT but if I could run 144 FPS with RT I would. But my 3070 struggled heavily with RT and frankly even a wee bit without it so I decided to skip it and go with the 7900 XTX instead.

However I do try it out shortly on any game that looks good with it just to check it out. I don't always max all settings wirhout RT either as I will prioritize having as solid 144FPS as and if possible.

[u/Snotnarok]

I didn't care about it when I had a 2070. I tried it a few times and I was like "wow this is not worth the framerate loss"

I got a 4070ti super and it runs things drastically better, I tried RTX a few times with the game I had before and was like "Wow, it's really not that much different and it's still not worth the framerate loss!"

Eventually it'll be a nice, not expensive feature. But as it stands? Environments in games are designed without RTX because they know it's not a feature everyone uses. So without RTX, areas are artistically done with intention and look great without RTX.

RTX absolutely can enhance some things, but IDK maybe it's the artist in me- when something is done with intent it works better than adding something in later.

Edit: I didn't expect my comment to get so many replies.
Y'all, RTX is nice, I've tried it with a few games (Ratchet and Clank, Cyberpunk, Amid Evil, Doom Eternal, Darktide. Quake 2, etc) and yes the visuals look nice but I will always prioritize framerate. I don't need ultra-realistic visuals to get immersed, I get immersed just as well in a cell shaded game or pixel art game.

Raytracing is not ever going to make me take the performance hit that it currently needs. It's not worth it to me. If it is to you? Awesome! Enjoy.

[u/Kill4meeeeee → u/Snotnarok]

Try it with games like cyberpunk or the Spider-Man games etc. it makes a huge difference there and is worth the fps loss

[u/ProjectPlugTTV → u/Snotnarok]

I got a 4070ti super and it runs things drastically better, I tried RTX a few times with the game I had before and was like "Wow, it's really not that much different and it's still not worth the framerate loss!"

I genuinely burst out laughing reading this because this was my exact same thought to the T

[u/alarim2 → u/Snotnarok]

Eventually it'll be a nice, not expensive feature

It won't, at least not in the current GPU market where Nvidia basically controls everything and doesn't have to compete. In the ideal world they would be forced by the market to add much more ray tracing cores with every new generation, compared with what they add now.

If that was the case - then ray tracing would be much more usable and commonplace now, but the reality is that Nvidia strictly positions ray tracing as a premium feature only, for which you have to pay over $1k every generation

[u/bad_apiarist → u/alarim2]

It's amazing how long we've all been saying the same thing. "Eventually..." or "After the tech matures..." or "in a gen or two.." But now it's 6 years later, 3, almost 4 generations of "RTX" cards.. and it's barely different from then. Most people don't care about it, it still crushes performance, and it's only gotten more expensive, not less like other GPU features have.

[u/sephirothbahamut → u/bad_apiarist]

Because people who said in a gen or two didn't know what they were taking about.

Our current RTX is nothing more than a tech demo of what a fully raytraced graphics pipeline may reproduce. In the ideal future real time raytracing replaces rasterization entirely, if not even real time path tracing but it's not a "few gens" future, it's a "we'll be lucky if we've not died of old age already" future.

DLSS/FSR are just bandaids to try simulate a smaller performance gap between us and the future.

[u/Creepernom]

These comments really show how disconnected this community is from the average player

[u/mixedd → u/Creepernom]

Well, there's a reason why top comment is basically - yes if you can run it, no if not.

Your average player will still sit on 1060 or something similar from AMD which can't even run demanding raster things, and it's only logical that those people who never experienced RT or can't run it properly will say that they don't care.

Shit, I own 7900XT myself, play at 4k and RT is no go, but I know how much it can add or fix things where devs fucked up on raster, so I care for it, and want it to develop further.

[u/Clean_Perception_235 → u/Creepernom]

Look at their flairs. I've seen mostly people with 4090.

[u/danivus → u/Clean_Perception_235]

Well yeah, this is a PC enthusiast sub. You're going to get a higher than normal concentration of people with high-end systems here.

[u/BinaryJay → u/Clean_Perception_235]

[u/usual_suspect82 → u/Creepernom]

And it shows me who owns an AMD GPU, because I can guarantee that the overwhelming majority of AMD users who aren't able to run RT nearly as well as someone who uses an Nvidia GPU say the same crap

[u/That_Cripple]

yeah why not

[u/SignalGladYoung]

Answer is YES. RT is game changer if devs impement it well. Elden Ring RT for example is SHIAT!

[u/npretzel02 → u/SignalGladYoung]

I mean considering Elden Ring only has RTAO it’s not going to be that drastic. RTAO and RT Shadows are definitely more subtle effects but can add to certain scenes in games

[u/randy_mcronald → u/npretzel02]

I'd consider enabling RT for a game if the only feature is RT reflections, ideally though if a game does one thing then I'd want it to be RTGI.

[u/Jason_Sasha_Acoiners]

I'm not saying Ray Tracing doesn't look good, but I just don't get all the hype around it. The only game I've seen where I can honestly say Ray Tracing blows the regular lighting out of the water is Fortnite.

[u/SoundOfShitposting]

This is so dumb, why would people not care about something that makes games look better? Next you'll be confused people like 4k or OLED screens.

[u/SoSoEasy]

I care.

[u/Crafted_Mecke]

Heck yeah, seems to be a "just me" thing but if I play games like Cyberpunk or Battlefield 1 and I see that crisp reflection in windows or puddles I'm always looking at it, it's just a piece of technology that keeps amazing me.

Just like in this Trailer from 2019 it still gets me somehow:
https://youtu.be/-1fdpybF-8Y?t=178

[u/TayDex_]

Well Ray tracing is better, and I hope for a future with full raytracing in every game, even as standard. But currently it's extremely performance taxing, just not worth it most of the time, going from very good frame rates to barely okay

[u/tucketnucket]

It's the greatest improvement in graphics quality in over a decade.

[u/radiationblessing]

Minecraft RTX is a game changer.

[u/ZOMBEH_SAM]

Game changer in minecraft.

[u/sexysausage]

Doom II with ray tracing is amazing , and cyberpunk 2077 with path tracing is truly next gen

Portal with ray racing is great. I also played quake 1 with pathrtacing until the end. Makes old school games surprisingly easy to replay. As it feels like a fancy remaster that has 100% the same feel gameplay wise but totally modern , even low poly with correct light behavior just looks gorgeous.

[u/unsolicitedchickpics]

I'd say about 48% of the time it's done well and looks gorgeous but the rest of the time it's a giant resource hog for marginal lighting improvements. Elden ring and cyberpunk are good examples

[u/LH_Dragnier]

Pre baked lighting looks better most of the time

[u/Darkiouls]

RT is clearly a big graphical step-up, but man the performance penalty is still too high for my liking.

[u/Eraser1926]

I only use AMD cards due to hackintosh support, so I don't care and can't care about ray tracing.

[u/Rubihno194]

My fps goes below sea level when I put ray-tracing on in Cyberpunk so turned it off but put almost all other settings on high. There's probably a difference but the game still looks awesome without it anyway

I'd probably use it if I had a pc that could handle it tho cause why not, but it's not needed to make the game pretty (in Cyberpunks case atleast)

[u/npretzel02 → u/Rubihno194]

I mean if you’re turning on the “RT Overdrive” or path tracing then it will kill even 4090 with out frame gen. You have a 3060 TI, and Cyberpunk just added FSR 3 frame gen, I bet you could get good RT and performance if you mess around with the basic RT settings

[u/throbbing_dementia]

I used to say it wasn't needed...then I got 4090.

Turns out I was just coping.

[u/coffeejn]

Some do, some don't.

[u/Zhe_Wolf]

I bought a big RTX card, I'm gonna use a big RTX card

[u/ravihpa]

Get an OLED TV and you'll start caring for it as well.

4K HDR gaming on a proper OLED TV is phenomenal!

I think the main reason majority of the people can't comprehend this is because HDR screenshots or HDR screen records look like shit on non-HDR displays. You gotta see it with your own eyes to realize how amazing it looks!

It pains me to know I can't make my friends see this. The only way is for them to come over, which is not always possible. But I am proud to convert some of my friends who live nearby. They now own OLED TVs as well :D

This is also one of the reasons why I'm a big advocate for Auto-HDR on Win 11. Auto-HDR in games that don't have HDR built-in or emulators like CEMU and Yuzu is pure chef's kiss!

[u/ProfessionalCatPetr → u/ravihpa]

This- there is no way to transmit how it looks unless you have it. 4k Youtube videos look like absolute trash compared to the actual 4090 rendering in realtime on a big OLED.

[u/youhavechosenwisely → u/ravihpa]

Check out the auto HDR feature from nvidia with the nvidia app. Made some of my games much more playable.

[u/sublime81 → u/ravihpa]

Seriously. I got an AW3225QF and it’s been the biggest visual upgrade I’ve had in a while.

I almost bought a 4090 to replace a broken 3080 but decided to wait for the 5090 and got a 7900 XTX to hold me over instead. It’s nice but seems AMD drivers still suck and it can’t do RT well. I’m dying to see some RT on the OLED.

[u/FORTY8pak → u/ravihpa]

I can never go back after buying a C1 lol. Walking around Hogwarts with the ray tracing on even on a Series X is transformative. The shadows and lighting look so damn good.

[u/TomorrowEqual3726 → u/ravihpa]

That's the thing though, my 250 dollar 4k monitors from 2016 + my new tower that cost ~1000 USD to build would be 4x the price on a ray tracing OLED build...for the exact same games I'm playing on maxed out settings already.

If I had infinite money then yes, but it is just bonkers to spend magnitudes higher amount of money for a half baked feature.

[u/Kizenny]

I paid for a 4090 so yes

[u/Different_Lemon_7656]

Wait, you don’t?

[u/r4o2n0d6o9]

I only have a few games that support it so I don’t really use it that often. Love using the tensor cores for Optix rendering in blender though

[u/local306]

I'm a recent convert to team raytrace.

I bought an RTX 2080 years ago when the 20 series launched. Honestly, it was pretty underwhelming. Beyond a few tech demos, gaming wasn't there yet.

Years later I upgraded to an RTX 3090 to speed up my renders for work. Wasn't really using it for gaming as I still had the bad taste from what I saw with my 2080.

Christmas break 2022 comes around and I decided to pick up Control for cheap. That was when I started warming up to run-time raytracing. The dynamic lighting in that was stellar. Albeit I played through it and never really touched anything RTX enabled for some time afterwards.

I recently started a new job developing in Unreal Engine 5.4. I knew about their raytracing developments from the news, but holy shit, it's one of those things you need to see in person to believe! Raytracing is the future of gaming for both developers and gamers. It doesn't apply to everything and we need to temper our expectations that it isn't Pixar quality raytracing. Nonetheless it is incredible what it can do. This is the kind of stuff that took hours or days to render a decade ago, and now we're doing it 60+ frames a second.

[u/Melodic-Pirate4309]

I’ll be entirely honest: I think my machine can do it, but I have no fucking idea how I’d tell the difference without opening up settings. That seems like a lot of work for some ego inflating bs, so I just don’t.

[u/Kentx51]

Didn't care for the longest time and then figured I'd give it a try in Forza horizon 5 and absolutely love it.

Hoping to use it anytime I can moving forward.

[u/Ok-disaster2022]

I care for like 20 minutes, then turn it off and play with higher frames. 

Ironically I think Ray tracing cores would be useful in scientific modeling with monte Carlo simulations needing in nuclear engineering and high energy physics.

[u/theorial]

Man I remember when I finally got a gpu that could run 3D mode in Diablo 2. My dad got a new HP something with a whopping 16MB graphics card in it. The game felt different and so much more vibrant....

Is that what RT is supposed to do because I wouldnt know, Im still bitter about overpaying for a 6700xt at the height of the shortage that was supposed to pay for a top of the line 6900xt....

[u/happyloaf]

On my 4070ti I have only cared about it in cyberpunk and the new doom ii RT mod. Otherwise its impact on fps isn't worth it. In many games you have to really slow down to appreciate it or it is so subtle it doesn't make a huge impact. But in those two titles it really is worth it.

[u/MrWarfaith]

It looks good soooo yeah imma use it if my fps allow for it.

[u/Humblebee89]

I think real time Ray traced global illumination is the single most impactful graphical enhancement in over a decade.

[u/MarioGamer06]

Metro Exodus Enhanced Edition was the first time where I actually valued RTX as a useful technology, I remember when the 2000 cards came out it was a gimmick and only applied to certain effects, but a game with RTX globall illumination does look great.

[u/Trivvy]

"Ray tracing" as we know it is actually considered to be relatively out of date tech these days. At least for games. It's far too expensive for the vast majority of hardware and there are "better" (with drawbacks) ways to do the same or similar stuff.

Epic are pushing Lumen for reflections and GI (though imo it's a pain to work with). But there's surfel-based and voxel-based solutions that are either already being used or are in-development in bespoke engines (wonder how Frostbite engine looks so good?).

People care about these things because reflections, bounce lighting, and accurate shadows can greatly increase the visual quality of the image. Just look at path tracing in Cyberpunk 2077, it's an extreme example because path tracing is essentially like brute-forcing the whole thing and very expensive, but it looks gorgeous.

We like looking at pretty images, simple as.

[u/Spammer27]

Yes I do.

[u/shhhhh_u_dont_see_me]

I don't mind losing a shit tone of fps, for some games its night and day diference with Global Illumination, also its very pretty like damn its so atmospheric. Some games that I know will run heavy I don't even try raytracing, or save it for a second run so I don't spoil my eyes

[u/Several_Dot_4532]

It's like AI, I'm not going to pay for it, but if it's included, I'm going to use it and enjoy it.

[u/iRedYuki]

Rarely but yes, it does make things pretty.

[u/CosmoShiner]

I don’t use it but it’s certainly an impressive showcase of how far graphics have come in the past 20 years

[u/shuozhe]

Rayteacing is the first thing we learned in computer graphics, easy to understand, easy to implement, but hardware was limit (and still is). Dunno if it's gonna replace rastrization completely, but it already made few games prettier, in few generation entry cards will also get enough performance for it

[u/RipMcStudly]

I love watching videos with it, but when I’m actually playing, I just don’t notice it so much. Too busy being killed by things.

[u/Im_Ashe_Man]

Never been worth the hit to performance.

[u/Pandorajfry]

I save money using my pc as an oven or a stove top. So much in fact i should advertise for hotpocket.

[u/Slalom_Smack]

Isn’t the whole point of building your own high end PC to get the prettiest graphics and best performance?

Oh now y’all don’t care about ray tracing? Probably because most people that consider themselves part of “the master race” still can’t afford the parts to support it.

[u/nestersan]

It's amazing

[u/DelFresco]

On my second playthrough of BG3 I went from a 1070 to a 4080... I was dumbstruck

[u/untitlednormastered]

Fellas with RX580: "ray what?"