Ray tracing in Elden Ring is finally here, but prepare to be underwhelmed.
Yesterday, March 23, FromSoftware released Elden Ring patch 1.09, which along with some balance changes and bug fixes, added the long-awaited ray tracing capabilities on new-gen consoles as well as PC. Sadly, it seems that the wait has not been worth it.
As reported by PlayerAuctions, the latest update enables ray tracing for ambient occlusion and shadows but no ray traced reflections. As such, you'll see better shadowing on foliage and added depth to some textures, but sadly, it's far from the striking visual upgrade that players were hoping for.
Modder Lance McDonald noted on Twitter that "indoor shadows see basically no improvement" and that it "mostly adds vegetation shadows in the overworld". The modder shared images of the game running on their Geforce RTX 2070 Super, both with and without ray tracing, and as you can see below, the difference is negligible.
First image: ray tracing off. Second image: ray tracing on. Third image demonstrates how RTAO eliminates the glow around the cliff/rock edge in close areas (but not far ones). Basically, it's a very minimal difference. pic.twitter.com/cZ7tE1YJYdMarch 23, 2023
To make matters worse, the update doesn't offer upscaling support, such as Nvidia DLSS or AMD FSR, and Lance, as well as others, have noted that "performance takes a severe hit" when ray tracing is enabled.
In the patch notes, FromSoftware warns players that "performance - such as frame rate and resolution - may be impacted while playing with Ray Tracing on" and advises PC players to keep the resolution at 1080p when using the feature. You'll find the minimum and recommended PC specs for ray tracing, as well as a full rundown of all the changes that patch 1.09 brings on Bandai Namco's official website.
FromSoftware is set to release Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree and Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon later this year, and that's seemingly not all it's working on. According to a staff member's LinkedIn profile, an "unannounced project" has been in development at the studio since January 2022.
Take a look at our Elden Ring DLC wishlist for everything we'd like to see from Shadow of the Erdtree.
