Elden Ring Gets Ray Tracing, But You’ll Probably Turn It Off

The latest Elden Ring update allows ray tracing to be turned on for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC versions of the game, but there is a downside to using it.

As IGN reports(Opens in a new window), the Elden Ring v1.09 patch includes lots of balance adjustments and bug fixes, but the headline new feature is the introduction of support for ray tracing. It’s available as an option on current gen consoles and PCs with compatible hardware, but not the PS4 and Xbox One versions of the game.

Although ray tracing is now an option, developer FromSoftware is warning that it will negatively impact the performance of the game. The frame rate and resolution will suffer across all platforms, but on PC the extent of the performance drop will depend on the spec of your machine.

For both the minimum and recommended PC spec for playing the game, FromSoftware suggests(Opens in a new window) only using a 1080p resolution when ray tracing is turned on. Here’s the two suggested specifications in full as provided by the developer:

Minimum

• Windows 10

• Intel Core i5-10600K or AMD Ryzen 5 3600XT

• 16 GB RAM

• Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, 8 GB or AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT, 12 GB

• 1080p – Low quality – Low Ray Tracing

Recommended

• Windows 11

• Intel Core i7-10700K or AMD Ryzen 7 3800XT

• 16 GB RAM

• Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti, 8 GB or AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT, 16 GB

• 1080p – High quality – High Ray Tracing

Anyone who has a Nvidia 40-series or AMD 7000-series graphics card in their gaming rig will be able to set their resolution considerably higher without suffering a noticeable performance impact. The majority of PC gamers on Steam are unlikely to have those graphic cards yet, though, meaning many may try ray tracing but turn it off again pretty quickly.

Ray tracing is a desirable illumination technique because it makes the 3D worlds we play in look more realistic. Every year we see higher performance components released that make ray tracing easier to utilize without the big performance hit. However, for now many gamers will choose performance and leave the ray tracing option disabled in the games they play.

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