GPU Ray Tracing Performance Comparisons [2021] *spawn*

You two misunderstood me. Yes the difference is very clear. But compared to games with other RTGI solutions like Metro Exodus Enhanced Edition, it runs very slow with worse quality (single bounce). Also the game looks very last gen in its polygon count, textures and overall detail, that's why I said Dying Light 2 is eating performance for practically no reason.

 

DF, who tested the game on pc doesnt agree.
I havent myself but will test on a 2080ti and see how the game holds up visually.

 

I disagree. The scale and density seems very different, so I'm not sure comparing the tech just like that is pertinent ?

 

Aside from resolution, shadows and Raytracing on the PC version, the differences between last gen and current gen are tiny. If you look at the geometric detail, the rocks in the first shot for example, the polygon count is exactly the same. Later in the video there's also a comparison for physics. Again, very similar aside from improved density of smoke. If you look at the last comparison, it's even hard to spot differences in LOD. Other cross gen games like Forza and Horizon increase the geometric and ground detail massively compared to last gen. This is not the case here.

It's not a next gen experience at all. It's very last gen. You can disagree, but the video provides me all the facts I need. And especially with RT on this game is way heavier than it has any right to be. There are more competent RTGI solutions out there, namely RTXGI, Metro EE and of course Lumen with HW-Raytracing, so that does not impress me very much (the matrix demo has a bigger open world with more stuff going on, much better RT and 1000 times higher polygon counts for every object and runs better on the consoles at that).

I am super, super tired of all these polished last gen games. It's 2022 and I desperately want a next gen experience...

 

I disagree. Image on the left is has unnatural glows everywhere -- underneath the bus in the distance, underneath the balcony/overhang, next to the car. The ground between the car and the wall should be significantly darker, there's literally no way for light to reach it without bouncing around 3-4 times, yet it's as bright as the main street with a direct view of the skybox. All of this creates a "gamey" look that we've grown so accustomed to over the years that it almost seems "natural" to us.

I did think that the wall on the right looked completely black -- until I looked at it on a different monitor which is set up to be brighter. The wall is definitely lit (probably by light bouncing off the street, as it should be), and there's a gradient -- it's brighter (near the camera) and gradually darkens as it moves away towards the corner. Keep in mind that the shot is under-exposing the entire foreground (it seems to be exposed correctly for the sunlit foliage in the background). Perhaps the contrast curve needs some tweaking.

Seriously -- if I stare at the shot on the right for a few seconds and then jump to the one on the left, it feels like I jumped straight into Quake 3 Arena or something, with walls, floors, ceilings all lit up.

 

Well, you can only do so much with the baseline they currently have (5700XT/RX6700). You wont get that giant leap your looking for in most titles that are not technology demonstrators.

 

Nah. The baselines are still the last gen consoles. Once those are gone, games will look much better and run better using techniques like SFS, Mesh Shaders, Ryzen CPUs, DirectStorage, more meaningful HW-RT etc.

The last gen consoles are holding back current gen massively. The current gen consoles are plenty powerful and have the important featureset (I still think PS5 is RDNA2, not RDNA1 and Sony very likely has equivalent features to DX12U in their API.)

Matrix demo demonstrates nicely what's possible once the last gen consoles are out of the equation.

 

The baseline, for current generation, is 5700XT/RX6700, Zen2 CPU and Nvme SSD. Thats your baseline and you can only do so much with that. A roughly 2x improvement isnt all that huge and SSD's dont render any graphics or trace any rays unfortunately.

 

https://www.techradar.com/news/dying-light-2-pc-performance

If these graphs are accurate, the Ampere vs Turing performance profile is wild. 3080 being 55% faster at both 1440p and 4k than a 2080TI. And 92% faster than a 6800XT

 

Yeah they mirror the GameGPU numbers, the 3070 is often 15% faster than 2080Ti in Dying Light 2, while being 35% to 40% faster than 6800XT, the 3080 is 80% to 90% faster than 6800XT depending on the resolution, the 3080Ti and 3090 are even further ahead.

 

Why do people keep repeating these falsehoods as fact? It's not a 2x improvement at all. 8th to 9th gen is a ~5.5x improvement for playstation and ~8.6x improvement for Xbox on the gpu side. On the cpu side, its ~4x improvement for both consoles.. Last gen consoles play absolutely no role in calculating the gen on gen improvements. The power of last gen consoles was used to push higher resolutions and in the case of the PS4 Pro, it at times performed worse than the ps4 on the frame rate side of things. Tangible improvements in graphical fidelity was a rarity for the mid gen refreshes. Once the burden of cross gen has been lifted, I expect to see notable improvements in visuals. I for one look forward to that day as even on pc now, we're playing last gen games with ray-tracing tacked on.

Take the Dying Light 2 video produced by DF as an example, it's a video where Alex raves about ray-tracing in a visually unimpressive game. Yes, the ray-tracing implementation makes a difference but, a polished turd is still a turd.

 

The PS4 Pro was at 4.x something TF right? Are we going to dismiss SKU's? Even if you'd be doing that, your looking at the smallest leap so far in gpu power, hence why if we look at KZ4 (ps4 launch game) to PS5 launch titles, their not as far apart as one would have seen in previous generational shifts.

We already do have games that are not cross-gen right?

Scaling does wonders these days. Thats what forbidden west and ragnarok are supposed to show, according to some.

That video hit deep, indeed.

 

If they mid-gen consoles brought tangible visual upgrades barring resolution, they would be worth holding in high regard. They did not and as a result, they had no meaningful impact on graphics for the previous generation.

Like what? Microsoft Flight Simulator? Demon Souls remake? That pretty much covers it no?

Ragnarok looks exactly like God of war 2018 and I don't see any generational scaling in Forbidden west so I'm not sure what you're referring to?

If you think dying light looks impressive, more power to you I guess. To my eye, it looks worse that Metro exodus when fully ray-traced and I've also called Metro exodus a last gen game with tacked on ray-tracing. In a world where the unreal engine matrix demo exists, I don't know how anyone can look at dying light and say, "it looks next gen".

 

I think the RTGI looks impressive but I don't think Dying Light 2 looks particularly impressive. IMO visuals generally don't scale up very well relative to performance when looking at actual practice and not theory. Art assets/geometry/materials in games are still far too primitive and a very limiting factor. Their improvement each generation is at least as important as tech advances in raising the visual bar.

 

I agree, ironically, it was the tweet by @Dictator which was quoted earlier, that made me pause for a bit here. The car and the bus in both shots look very much like assets from a mit edit: mid 2000's game, not like something you would like to see in a graphically appealing game with state-of-the-art technology. RT(GI) looks good, I won't argue that, but also kinda like bolted on as an afterthought and cannot save the overall impression for me.

 

So you're saying that it makes no difference?

 

https://www.computerbase.de/2022-02...t/2/#abschnitt_die_performance_von_raytracing

I honestly don't understand how some people don't see this difference as monumental:

https://pics.computerbase.de/1/0/2/3/5/4-f7427d9b38192573/85-2160.14072888.jpg
https://pics.computerbase.de/1/0/2/3/5/4-f7427d9b38192573/87-2160.4f1ed062.jpg

The change in lighting is generational without any doubt. The fact that the game is cross-gen and thus is forced to use previous gen assets means little for ray tracing. It may even help it in fact as the difference becomes more apparent.

 

That particular scene does look terrible I agree. But in the main video there are some really impressive looking scenes. The early example of the church is seriously impressive IMO.

Also the Matrix has spolied everything now in terms of expectations.

 

I think one could hand-pick scenes that dont look all that stunning in almost any game.

Thats what tech demos usually do.