How exactly is it going to destroy WoW?
Nice, was definitely not aware of that. Thanks for sharing. 
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One of the main draws of wow originally was its ability to play on pretty crap computers, this has changed somewhat but there is a clear number of people that would not be able to play with raytracing implemented.
Although this is a small group ive had many guild members quit raiding because their computer could not handle raid sizes.
The sheer number of people who would have to make massive upgrades to the computer would instantly lash back.
Or they could just not turn it on in the settings?
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Ray Tracing would be entirely optional, depending on your graphical capabilities.
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The system requirements for Shadowlands have already been posted. Potato computers can still run it.
Just don’t turn it on. Problem solved.
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I suppose you have a point there.
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It’s one of the few things left we have a choice with in this game. LOL
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doesn’t really make sense with a game whose art style is not photo realistic and is based more on an acrylic painting cartoonish look.
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I’m going to be honest, I 100% forgot about optional settings. Ive had coffee since.
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I beg to differ. Seriously look at ray tracing in games like minecraft. It’s the perfect example of why it’s suitable for any style. It’s because ray tracing is not an artistic development, it’s a development of fidelity.
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I’m pretty sure that raytracing is on its way to becoming a standard graphics feature anyway… even Macs support it now (yes really). Only odd one out right now is AMD’s consumer graphics cards (the custom designed AMD GPU in the PS5 and XboX both support raytracing, as noted by OP).
We are in 8.3.
Blizz update the engines with every patch/expansion release.
Just remember when they update the Direct X from 11 to 12 to take advantage of new graphic possibilities.
ray tracing?
But does a game like minecraft need it… no. Lets keep things retro was the point of minecraft to begin with.
Depend on what you mean I guess.
Technically a lot of game already have ray tracing. In the from of ray tracing shadow. That included WoW. Graphic cards are capable of this for a while now. The first game I remember seeing it is one of the splinter cell. That’s the one in tomb raider ray tracing demo back during nvidia announcement. Which made it the kinda lame demo.
The other common techniques are ambient occlusion and reflection. I think SSAO is already in WoW. The reflection is more of a niche technique since it’ll need reflective surface.
The usual technique that people mean with hardware specific for ray tracing is the global illumination. I don’t think that one is possible for WoW. Hardware accelerated ray tracing could be possible but not the commercially available one. WoW render stuffs for miles and there are also so many object in the game.
Though, I could see WoW use ray tracing hardware to handle SSAO and soft shadow to improve frame rate. Reworking the lighting system to global illumination? That one I don’t think it’s likely.
The WoW 2, if it ever comes, had BETTER BE FULL DIVE. not VR, FULL DIVE. someone make it happen. then we can just go to work in a virtual world.
I think raytracing has its place in gaming. In new high fidelity and more realistic looking games. I don’t think it will do anything for WoW or any other cartoonish game.
When I saw the Minecraft demo all I could think was, this is a massive waste in this game. Sure it could bring a lot to a machinima video where you are telling a story and visuals are everything. But just playing the game it’s going to be utterly pointless and possibly even detrimental.
Imho raytracing will bring nothing to a game like WoW. Now something like the new Last of Us game or Forza, those game would benefit greatly.
My understanding is you need the newest Nvidia card (2080 I think?) to even start using ray tracing. Even then alot of people on steam talk about barely running the Quake 2 RTX version. I suspect in an MMO you would have to run a rather impressive rig to get a playable framerate.
Oh you can download the shareware version of Quake 2 RTX for free on steam but it won’t even open if you don’t have an RTX card from Nvidia.
Yes, I do believe a game like minecraft needs ray tracing. It adds an extremely captivating level of detail to the world’s materials when light reflects off them differently depending on their physical composition. It’s especially cool in games like minecraft, while borderline unnoticeable in realistic games depending on the application. I would be really interested to see WoW as it is now, only with ray tracing. I bet it would look incredible.