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Nvidia ray-tracing?

Dreadlordnaf
Explorer
I keep hearing everyone having orgasms about Nvidia's new "real-time ray-racing" GPU that is coming out...  I don't totally understand it, but I kinda get it, that it's the much better looking method of rendering light and shadows that special effects in movies use vs the rasterisation in current games.

My main question is, will a GPU that can do this real-time ray-tracing actually matter anytime soon?  Nvidia made some announcement about releasing an SDK for ray tracing for developers which makes me think that games have to be specifically written in a way to make use of this new ray-tracing tech. Is that correct?  If so then I'm assuming it will be years before we start seeing a decent number of games utilizing it.

Or am I not understanding it correctly and the ray-tracing tech will basically make all existing games look better because it will render them differently somehow?  
Another way to put it:  Will my existing games I own now for VR and non-VR all of a sudden look amazingly better if I got the new card?
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LZoltowski
Champion
We have started a thread here, with examples, some developer feedback and what we might expect https://forums.oculusvr.com/community/discussion/68591/nvidia-and-gamescom-megathread-update-new-rtx-quadro-announced-rtx-2080-in-2-days/p1
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kojack
MVP
MVP
Ray tracing is a very different technique and will need to be implemented for each game. It uses a new kind of shader.

DirectX 12 already has support for it, you can download demos and sdk info, but currently it only runs on Nvidia Titan V gpus and you need to switch windows to developer mode. A GTX 1080 can't start it at all.


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wanoennogs
Heroic Explorer


I keep hearing everyone having orgasms about Nvidia's new "real-time ray-racing" GPU that is coming out...  I don't totally understand it, but I kinda get it, that it's the much better looking method of rendering light and shadows that special effects in movies use vs the rasterisation in current games.

My main question is, will a GPU that can do this real-time ray-tracing actually matter anytime soon?  Nvidia made some announcement about releasing an SDK for ray tracing for developers which makes me think that games have to be specifically written in a way to make use of this new ray-tracing tech. Is that correct?  If so then I'm assuming it will be years before we start seeing a decent number of games utilizing it.

Or am I not understanding it correctly and the ray-tracing tech will basically make all existing games look better because it will render them differently somehow?  
Another way to put it:  Will my existing games I own now for VR and non-VR all of a sudden look amazingly better if I got the new card?

For ray tracing to be effective game developers have to program for it. As ray tracing cards are only just about to come out don't expect to see games with ray tracing any time soon.   I think you will see ray tracing in games in about 2 years time from now and you will see it in most if not all games in about 5 years from now. 

RedRizla
Honored Visionary

What's in store for gaming this year won't be quite as dazzling. Ray tracing is a computationally demanding technology, which is why it has eluded games for so long. What we'll see instead is a combination of traditional rasterization rendering with ray tracing bits sprinkled into scenes as needed, and where possible with today's hardware.

Fully ray traced games are still a long ways off, due to hardware constraints. But in the meantime, it looks like we'll get to experience a bit of ray traced gameplay relatively soon.

Dreadlordnaf
Explorer
Ah didnt realize there was a different thread, but the last post answers my question perfectly, thanks.  Looks like I will wait for a bit before upgrading since it wont do much for all my current games.

falken76
Expert Consultant
Ray tracing is a renderer that traces lights and how they bounce.  It creates realistic scenery but is very heavy on the CPU.  Many of the games you enjoy today have objects that were rendered out through a shader that had ray tracing, but what you see today is all put together in post.  These new cards can do these renders in real time.  Back in the day I used to work with 3dsmax.  It was called 3d studio max way back then.  I made an animation that was rendered out to targa files.  It was a black background with an eyeball dancing to staying alive while it was on fire.  I used a ray tracing shader to render it out.  It took over 2 hours a frame to render that out using ray tracing.  It had no other objects to bounce light off of and it took that long.  I think the games that will be produced with this in mind will look fantastic.

PhoenixSpyder
Rising Star
FYI, the only confirmed upcoming game to use ray tracing (presently) is Metro Exodus in Feb 2019, there will be a new demo showing on Aug 22 2018, probably to coincide with the RTX release.

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danybonin
Protege


a new demo showing on Aug 22 2019


gess you mean 2018?
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PhoenixSpyder
Rising Star
yes, changed it. Thanks

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