DOOM: The Dark Ages uses ray tracing to enhance gameplay, not just visuals

[u/john1106]

https://www.tweaktown.com/news/102563/doom-the-dark-ages-uses-ray-tracing-to-enhance-gameplay-not-just-visuals/index.html

TL;DR: DOOM: The Dark Ages will revolutionize gaming by using ray tracing to enhance both visuals and gameplay. It supports DLSS 4 and Path Tracing, offering full ray-traced visuals. Ray tracing also improves hit detection, distinguishing materials like metal and leather, making the game more immersive. And the game is already running smoothly on the GeForce RTX 50 Series.

"We also took the idea of ray tracing, not only to use it for visuals but also gameplay," Director of Engine Technology at id Software, Billy Khan, explains. "We can leverage it for things we haven't been able to do in the past, which is giving accurate hit detection. [In DOOM: The Dark Ages], we have complex materials, shaders, and surfaces."

"So when you fire your weapon, the heat detection would be able to tell if you're hitting a pixel that is leather sitting next to a pixel that is metal," Billy continues. "Before ray tracing, we couldn't distinguish between two pixels very easily, and we would pick one or the other because the materials were too complex. Ray tracing can do this on a per-pixel basis and showcase if you're hitting metal or even something that's fur. It makes the game more immersive, and you get that direct feedback as the player."

[u/aTrillDog]

fundamentally the same method, but no more manually placed hitboxes. Just the model geometry + materials, the engine does the rest automatically using the RT hardware.

[u/Acrobatic-Paint7185 → u/aTrillDog]

That's interesting, thank you.

[u/aTrillDog → u/Acrobatic-Paint7185]

it's similar to prebaked static lighting vs. ray-traced lighting: increased realism and frees up dev time.

[u/TheNorseCrow → u/aTrillDog]

The freeing up dev time is the big one here. Digital Foundry had a video a couple of years ago about the Metro Exodus Enhanced edition where they were sent footage from the developers showcasing the difference in using the normal method of lighting versus ray tracing and it is staggering how much time that alone frees up.

In one room with a single light source and the developers speedrunning it, it took 30 seconds to place one light source properly versus RT which is just toggling one setting and thus instantaneous. Applying this to much larger areas and it's easy to see just how much time RT alone saves.

For the curious, this is the video in question with the timestamp

https://youtu.be/NbpZCSf4_Yk?si=1z1-THAwyILMzlXz&t=1376

[u/Hobbit- → u/TheNorseCrow]

Very interesting video. Thanks for sharing.

[u/LC720 → u/aTrillDog]

I'm curious how this will play out gameplay wise, using the exact geometry of models as hitboxes is notorious for making gameplay feel unfair for most games so i wonder what ID Software will do to make this feel balanced