Explain Like I'm Five

14389 readers

1 users here now

Simplifying Complexity, One Answer at a Time!

Rules

Be respectful and inclusive.
No harassment, hate speech, or trolling.
Engage in constructive discussions.
Share relevant content.
Follow guidelines and moderators' instructions.
Use appropriate language and tone.
Report violations.
Foster a continuous learning environment.

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

ELI5 What is Ray Tracing? And is it really that much of a game changer in video games? (lemmy.world)

submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

21 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] yonder 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I would like to add that the way movies use raytracing (usually called path tracing in that context) is very different from how games use raytracing. While animated movies will simulate every ray of light to create the entire image, games use raytracing typically only for reflections and global illumination, while the rest of the image is still rendered using traditional techniques. (I'm no expert, though I have spent a bunch of time using Blender and playing around with Minecraft Raytracing mods)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

Yeah, I think the Quake II RTX version uses it to completely render the scene. That's about the level of graphics we're at for whole scene path tracing.

RT is in a PS1 era right now. We're like 15 years from games having modern graphics (by today's standards) and fully pathtraced.