TheRetroArcade
Veteran
Posts: 2,005
Joined: Feb 2026
Joined: Feb 2026
Can't brute force your way to path tracing nirvana, so it'll be AI all the way into the future of graphics.
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At this year's GDC event in San Francisco, Nvidia took to the stage to tell game developers something that they, and anyone for that matter, already knew: future games will only have film-level graphics by 'fully leaning into AI to cross that chasm between what's attainable [now] and what's attainable in film rendering.'
Those were the precise words from John Spitzer, vice president of developer and performance technology (4:51 mins into the above video), when describing Nvidia's ambitions for path traced graphics in games. But as anyone who has tried using said rendering feature in the likes of Resident Evil Requiem, Doom: The Dark Ages, and Alan Wake 2 will know, path tracing comes at a seriously hefty performance cost right now.
In fact, there will always be a high price to pay, because there are no shortcuts to achieving what Nvidia is targeting for games. "We're still not to where we want to be. We want that the real-time images to look indistinguishable from reality. We want them to look like a film."
The fact that we can even use path tracing now is down to the use of ASICs (application specific integrated circuits) in our GPUs, namely RT cores, that do nothing but accelerate calculations for ray intersections with triangles and figuring out which object a ray has hit out of the tens of thousands in a scene.
It's also down to the use of upscaling and frame generation, the former for lowering the performance hit, and the latter for creating additional pixels to bridge the gap even further. AI is used heavily in both, as things currently stand, so it's only natural to expect that Nvidia is going to leverage it completely to reach a future where the path tracing performance relative to a Pascal-era GPU is a million times greater.
We've already seen elements of what Nvidia has planned, such as the new RTX Mega Geometry foliage system and DLSS's 6x frame generation mode, so it's fair to say that we'll probably see an even bigger focus on RTX and DLSS tech in the coming years. However, most game devs aren't really interested in what's to come five or more years down the road: they're being paid to work on projects now.
To that end, Nvidia has announced two specific things that should help make an immediate difference, whether path tr...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?
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Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.
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Every Friday
GamesRadar+
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Every Thursday
GTA 6 O'clock
Our special GTA 6 newsletter, with breaking news, insider info, and rumor analysis from the award-winning GTA 6 O'clock experts.
Every Friday
Knowledge
From the creators of Edge: A weekly videogame industry newsletter with analysis from expert writers, guidance from professionals, and insight into what's on the horizon.
Every Thursday
The Setup
Hardware nerds unite, sign up to our free tech newsletter for a weekly digest of the hottest new tech, the latest gadgets on the test bench, and much more.
Every Wednesday
Switch 2 Spotlight
Sign up to our new Switch 2 newsletter, where we bring you the latest talking points on Nintendo's new console each week, bring you up to date on the news, and recommend what games to play.
Every Saturday
The Watchlist
Subscribe for a weekly digest of the movie and TV news that matters, direct to your inbox. From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we've got you covered.
Once a month
SFX
Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month!
At this year's GDC event in San Francisco, Nvidia took to the stage to tell game developers something that they, and anyone for that matter, already knew: future games will only have film-level graphics by 'fully leaning into AI to cross that chasm between what's attainable [now] and what's attainable in film rendering.'
Those were the precise words from John Spitzer, vice president of developer and performance technology (4:51 mins into the above video), when describing Nvidia's ambitions for path traced graphics in games. But as anyone who has tried using said rendering feature in the likes of Resident Evil Requiem, Doom: The Dark Ages, and Alan Wake 2 will know, path tracing comes at a seriously hefty performance cost right now.
In fact, there will always be a high price to pay, because there are no shortcuts to achieving what Nvidia is targeting for games. "We're still not to where we want to be. We want that the real-time images to look indistinguishable from reality. We want them to look like a film."
The fact that we can even use path tracing now is down to the use of ASICs (application specific integrated circuits) in our GPUs, namely RT cores, that do nothing but accelerate calculations for ray intersections with triangles and figuring out which object a ray has hit out of the tens of thousands in a scene.
It's also down to the use of upscaling and frame generation, the former for lowering the performance hit, and the latter for creating additional pixels to bridge the gap even further. AI is used heavily in both, as things currently stand, so it's only natural to expect that Nvidia is going to leverage it completely to reach a future where the path tracing performance relative to a Pascal-era GPU is a million times greater.
We've already seen elements of what Nvidia has planned, such as the new RTX Mega Geometry foliage system and DLSS's 6x frame generation mode, so it's fair to say that we'll probably see an even bigger focus on RTX and DLSS tech in the coming years. However, most game devs aren't really interested in what's to come five or more years down the road: they're being paid to work on projects now.
To that end, Nvidia has announced two specific things that should help make an immediate difference, whether path tr...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?