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Raytracing = Future PC gaming?

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For a long time now, Intel is promoting Raytracing as the future-proof technology for games. At the Intel Developer Forum, Intel's chief technology guru Pat Gelsinger said that the days of traditional 3D renderer have gone. In 2-3 years, Raytracing will be widely available in applications like games.

So German website PCGH.de puts together some raytraced pictures to show what games in 2-3 year could look like. These pics are not raytraced in realtime, but with 8 core CPU around the corner who knows... Some of the pics in their gallery are up to 8 years old, and they still look good.
View Screenshots >>   
pcgameshardware.de
Extreme_Coolcat - contributor
Published: 625 days 17 hours ago | Screenshots | Gaming | PC
 
 

Showing: 1 - 16 of 16 Comments
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Ludwig - 625 days 4 hours ago
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1 -
O_o .. are you guys seriously posting a POSER image gallery, of rendered images .. as reference to the "awesome" power of Raytracing? .. seriously? ..

Raytracing is no revolution ... even in the CGI industry we frequently use scanline and even more abstracts forms of rendering alond with raytracing .. and games do use raytracing in some forms to execute some shaders efficiently .. it's all mixed up ..

http://www.ydnar.com/2008/0...
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ip-student - 625 days 4 hours ago
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2 - Agree
The linked article is pretty weak - this doesn't seem like a proper post to me.

The real question with ray tracing is whether the computational cost will be worth it or whether other algorithms will turn out to be more effective. I personally think ray tracing will win out but this article is pretty weak.
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bakasora - 625 days 4 hours ago
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3 -
Real time raytracing is like a dream.
I see how they pull that off.
Now I can think of (much more)future console; capable of real time raytracing!
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XephyrNesion - 625 days 4 hours ago
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Anyone mind to explain raytracing in simpleton terms? This is the first time I've heard of it.

Does it involve light tracing of a person/model/whatever to be rendered into a 3D image on a computer?
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XephyrNesion - 625 days 4 hours ago
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4.2 -
thanks man. it looks complex
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DarkArcani - 625 days 3 hours ago
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4.3 - WELL....
Try to think of it in terms of a room with a light in it. The light is the source.
Now imagine that tiny particles called photons leave this source. These photons go everywhere in the room. Depending on the materials used the photos could be absorbed or reflected.
Now when using this type of rendering, you have millions of photons bouncing around, hitting different objects.
This is where it gets interesting. Add elements like SSS(sub-surface scattering) where you look at an object that while light passes through it, the levels of color change; and caustics(glass)where the photons bend through the transparent object which can be seen here http://www.duarte.cl/blog/m...

I hope that helps a bit.
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Cupid_Viper_3 - 625 days 3 hours ago
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5 - after reading some stuff from the link above
my question is as follow

given the facts that RayTracing dont use any graphic cards, and rely on the CPU to do the calculations in relation to interacting with the "pixels" on the screen, does that mean that the PS3's CELL would be efficient at RayTracing? Given its potentials for ultra fast speed, and is that what SONY was betting on by putting the CELL and BLURAY in every PS3?

anybody with the same thoughts?

** thanks guys, i knew i was on the right track, just wanted to make sure i wasn't alone. So that seems to explain why SONY was pushing for the HD with bluray and CELL and HDMI standard on the PS3.

Man i'm thinkink way back, On the 1st playstation, DEMO disk JAMPACK 4 with Ridge Racer and MGS1, we've come such a long way, Gamers, no matter what your console of choice. I guess the real question is, Are we ready to go even further for even longer? I plan on gaming until the day i die, i wanna beat my grandkids playing KILLER INSTINCT XV, and MGS11, Mario Flying Cart 4, and Gears Of War: Endwar, lol.

forgive me guys, sleepy talk..... Ouchhhh, Who Goes There?!, HUH!? We have spotted the ene....zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz im outttttttt.
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DarkArcani - 625 days 3 hours ago
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5.1 - yes
seeming raytracing is all math based the cell can take advantage of this.
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gambare - 625 days 3 hours ago
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5.2 -
yes, it's capable and it's thought for that purpose, the problem is , the devs.
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Lord Anubis - 625 days 3 hours ago
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i want ray tracing.

I want it bad!


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Teh-Venom - 625 days 3 hours ago
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those pics are truly amazing but they said the pictures are 8 years old, I imagine how the graphics look now wich we will have to wait and see but i know were going to get blown away when Ray-Tracing becomes the "Norm".
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snakeater3 - 625 days 2 hours ago
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at some point in time, when computer graphics mimic reality in real time....graphical advancements will have to stop .... i mean how can you improve on reality? i think we will see this in our lifetime. what you think?
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Fanboi - 624 days 23 hours ago
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9 - A pipe dream
Forget about it. Ray tracing is incredibly CPU intensive and is not suited for games which require 30 fps or more. I just don't see this happening for the next five years, if it does it'll hit the PC first anyways.

Oh,GT5 use a limited form of ray tracing in the garage.
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Leathersoup - 624 days 19 hours ago
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10 - The problem with Ray Tracing is that it's too expensive CPU wise.
With the current Raster or Ray Casting system developers are able to cheat the system. If they were to start using Ray Tracing you'd have to be prepared to expect less from games for a while. These losses would take place in the form of model quality, frame rates, polygon counts etc.

Ray Tracing is able to create very nice images, but the lovely ray traced images that you see are not rendered at a sub-second rate. They take minutes to hours to render.
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f789790 - 624 days 12 hours ago
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11 - Raytracing will never arrive
Textures and details in games are going as fast as technology allows and they wont slow so raytracing can fit in the picture. It will arrive when games look like real life.
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