this is what ray tracing looks like on consoles • Eurogamer.net

The release of Crysis Remastered is approaching and today we can reveal a technical feature of the console versions that we simply did not think possible just a few months ago: the implementation of real-time ray traced reflections. In a console game? Really? You can cut to the chase by watching the embedded video below to see this tech in action on Xbox One X, but the fact remains that through clever optimizations, the software-controlled RT found in Crytek’s Neon Noir demo has been optimized for Microsoft and Sony’s enhanced consoles, and they look very, very impressive.

This continues a trend from Crytek offering cutting edge visual features to hardware that just doesn’t seem capable of running them. For Crysis Remastered on Switch, Crytek and their developer partner Saber Interactive impressed us by dramatically re-lighting the game using real-time global lighting via SVOGI: Scattered Voxel Octree Global Lighting. In effect, SVOGI allowed surfaces to approximate the way light bounces, a form of ray tracing in itself … running on Switch! The ray-traced reflections in Crytek software work as an extension of that technology, covering specular reflections around the player’s view.

It’s computationally expensive, limited in certain respects, but definitely has a positive impact on the overall presentation. Metal surfaces and glass produce precise reflections, even on objects that are not present in the screen space. A very subtle yet impressive effect is delivered through RT reflections that are mapped onto the Nanosuit itself, as seen in the various scenes in the game. Limitations To begin with, the technology is so GPU intensive that it is only implemented on the upgraded consoles: PS4 Pro and Xbox One X. The vanilla variants of each machine are not invited to the RT party. Second, if you select the ray tracing option (there are also performance and resolution / quality modes), the resolution drops to 1080p dynamic.

The way Crytek makes this possible on a console is an impressive feat, but it requires some clever optimizations. For starters, the ray tracing structures around the player operate within a limited radius, and are also rendered with a lower level of geometric precision. The reflections themselves are also rendered at a quarter resolution, but the effect is higher fidelity thanks to an interlaced style effect, switching between two different ‘fields’ in each frame (imperceptible in the final presentation). No dynamic objects are plotted either – that’s the domain of the hardware-accelerated form of ray tracing found on the PC, which is also supported by Crytek’s RT software and for those with unsupported GPUs.

When looking at the console versions of Crysis Remastered, it’s fascinating to see how ray-traced reflections blend into the overall visual composition of the title because RT isn’t the only way this effect is rendered in-game. When appropriate, standard screen space reflections (SSR) make their way into the presentation, as do flat reflections, effectively rendering the scene twice. Both techniques are used for reflections in water, for example, that do not feature ray tracing at all, another performance saving measure.

Crytek is locking down the final features and polishing for the release of Crysis Remastered on September 16, and you can be sure we’ll be seeing all the console versions of the game closer to launch, with PC specialist Alex Battaglia executing the rule on the PC game. . However, suffice it to say that we are very impressed with what we’ve seen so far and can’t wait to get familiar with the final code.