It's not just the neon signs having a soft glow, about half of the lighting in that entire scene changes in the comparison you posted. The Fuyutsuki building gets far-away reflections and shadows that were absent before, while the big overhanging section is casting shadows while simultaneously being lit from the lights at street level as it should be. The Relic building no longer has a fake screen-space reflection of the Fuyutsuki sign across windows that don't have a proper angle to it from your POV. The building across the street to the left has far sharper detail on its large windows, possibly from interior lights which were not shining through before, and it's catching some exterior light near the top from toward the Captain Caliente building. The building at the far end of the street is reflecting ambient light as it should be. Innumerable other small light sources are casting shadows and having their light properly occluded by objects (i.e. the fire escape at the north-northeast position, as well as the garage with surrounding fencing and barricades below it). Cars have real, dark shadows instead of fake little grey blobs, which is one of those things that really helps with objects being 'grounded' in the game world, as previously mentioned. In the same vein, pedestrians being shaded properly makes them blend into the scenery a lot more.

Those latter few things are what will really make the difference as you play more with it enabled. Seeing everything in motion with the light interacting accurately around it is what grows on you. The thing with having more realistic lighting vs. fake video game tricks is it doesn't always make you 'ooh' and 'ahh,' it just looks right. You'll get used to it as you do looking at things in real life, and there will still be moments when you think something looks really pretty (or especially technically impressive because you've never seen a game do that before), but it's not until you were to toggle path-tracing off again that you will be shocked at how many things don't look right anymore.

With that said, there are some real issues with DLSS 3.5/ray reconstruction right now that in some cases can completely shatter that illusion of reality which path-tracing strives to create. As we've seen with previous iterations, the problems with ghosting or smearing tend to get better over time as NVIDIA and developers alike continue to refine the model and its implementation in games. So combined with the fact that the path-tracing mode itself is in an unfinished state, it's probably the case that playing this way later is probably going to be better than it is right now. Your performance preference is important to consider, too. I don't care if a game runs 'only' 50-60 fps if that enables me to turn up the eye candy at a clear enough resolution, as long as it's not fluctuating like crazy. But some people really want the much higher framerate, and if not having that is going to ruin your enjoyment of the game, why play that way?

Enabled Ray Tracing, enabled Path Tracing. Right?

Call me old, blind, stupid, or whatever, but I just don't see all THAT big a difference, not enough to rationalize HALVING my frame rate.

Yes, the neon signs have a realistic soft glow from them striking the building underneath. Is it earth shattering? No.

I'm still getting around 70 fps with path tracing enabled, but the way the frames dip in this game as you move around, I'd rather have 120 fps. I changed three Ultra settings to high and getting more like 80 fps now with path tracing enabled, but I'm not willing to trade off quality settings any more than that. Using DLSS Super Resolution on Balanced and DLSS Ray Reconstruction.

I posted a couple of screenshots here with Path Tracing off and on (3440x1440 images, so fullscreen your browser if you want): https://www.pcabusers.org/phpbb3/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=66226

I'll try it for a while to see if it grows on me, and how much of a hit it is in areas where the FPS drops.

This comment was edited on Sep 26, 2023, 23:39.

jacobvandy wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 20:10:

RedEye9 wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 16:18:
So I am really out of the loop on this.
Ray Reconstruction is only available on the 4000 series, is that correct?
https://www.techspot.com/article/2740-dlss-35-ray-reconstruction/

This is a bit disappointing for most GeForce RTX GPU owners because the path traced mode in Cyberpunk is punishing on GPU hardware. Unless you have a high-end GPU like an RTX 4090 or RTX 4080, it's hard to achieve acceptable performance using RT Overdrive even at lower resolutions like 1080p.

Ray reconstruction is usable on all RTX cards, however CDPR only allows it to be used in path-tracing mode by default. Presumably because they still call path-tracing a 'technology preview' and are actively working on tuning both that and the new DLSS. It can be forced on even for the standard RT with a config tweak, though (which is information this article seems to be missing).

The only thing exclusive to the 4000 series is frame generation.

Thank you.

RedEye9 wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 16:18:
So I am really out of the loop on this.
Ray Reconstruction is only available on the 4000 series, is that correct?
https://www.techspot.com/article/2740-dlss-35-ray-reconstruction/

This is a bit disappointing for most GeForce RTX GPU owners because the path traced mode in Cyberpunk is punishing on GPU hardware. Unless you have a high-end GPU like an RTX 4090 or RTX 4080, it's hard to achieve acceptable performance using RT Overdrive even at lower resolutions like 1080p.

Ray reconstruction is usable on all RTX cards, however CDPR only allows it to be used in path-tracing mode by default. Presumably because they still call path-tracing a 'technology preview' and are actively working on tuning both that and the new DLSS. It can be forced on even for the standard RT with a config tweak, though (which is information this article seems to be missing).

The only thing exclusive to the 4000 series is frame generation.

WannaLogAlready wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 12:25:
For anyone that wants to experience chilling in a luxury yacht, I recommend it, try it !

Just kidding Slick, happy for you, congrats and enjoy your monster setup.

Also you convey vividly that you have the sensibilities to make the most of it, that's excellent and exciting to hear.
Some extoll their hardware for one-upmanship ("I have a Van Gogh") while not getting that much out of it, not bad per se, but not uplifting.

Well I have a Michael Angelo painting of a Banksy mural so there!

The Flying Penguin wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 15:26:
Fair enough. Going to fire it up now with path tracing and check it out.

So I am really out of the loop on this.
Ray Reconstruction is only available on the 4000 series, is that correct?
https://www.techspot.com/article/2740-dlss-35-ray-reconstruction/

This is a bit disappointing for most GeForce RTX GPU owners because the path traced mode in Cyberpunk is punishing on GPU hardware. Unless you have a high-end GPU like an RTX 4090 or RTX 4080, it's hard to achieve acceptable performance using RT Overdrive even at lower resolutions like 1080p.

TFG, your 3080 ...
EDIT
Nevermind, I see where you ordered a 4090 a couple days ago.
CRANK IT UP

lol ( I really don't know what I'm doing, besides making the plastic on my laptop turn yellow) https://ibb.co/GQtXczV
(a little better, but why) https://ibb.co/30jqcb1
goes back to playing minesweeper and candycrush

This comment was edited on Sep 26, 2023, 16:50.

Fair enough. Going to fire it up now with path tracing and check it out.

I'm using a 13900KF and 4090, at 3840x1600, everything turned up to 11 and it's fantastic. The HDR is terrific too. Best looking game I've ever played.

For anyone that wants to experience chilling in a luxury yacht, I recommend it, try it !

Just kidding Slick, happy for you, congrats and enjoy your monster setup.

Also you convey vividly that you have the sensibilities to make the most of it, that's excellent and exciting to hear.
Some extoll their hardware for one-upmanship ("I have a Van Gogh") while not getting that much out of it, not bad per se, but not uplifting.

PSA: For anyone who wants to experience the apex of gaming fidelity right now, and if you have a 4080 or 4090 to play this game at 4k with pathtracing, do yourself a favour, get a QD-OLED. S95B or S95C. Do it. Not a tiny QD-OLED monitor, a freaking screeeeeeeeen. (The small panels pixels are too small and dainty, they can't achieve anywhere near the brightness (and therefore colour volume) of a proper 55"

It's just as hard to describe the effect as it would to someone that's never experienced a 120hz monitor. But it's flipping unreal.

It doesn't look better, it FEELS better. It tricks my brain into thinking that this is reality.

When I walk out from the shadow of a megabuilding and into the sunlight, I swear I can FEEL the freaking sunlight.

It's the wildest thing I've ever experienced. I show exactly that to anyone that stops by my place, they all have the same reaction, it feels like real sunlight. It's triggering a billions year's worth of evolution to think that this is really outdoors, this is real sunlight.

Again, it sounds like "magic" to anyone who hasn't experienced it, no different than how 120hz is magic compared to 60hz.

And I haven't even talked about how much all the neon everything pops at night, it's like a rave in my head.

Agree to disagree Penguin.

Pathtracing makes a very noticeable difference in CP2077.

Sure games have had screen-space reflections for ages, and they're "fine", but they can't handle multiple bounces, they have weird artifacting, and they can't show a reflection of anything if it isn't being rendered currently on-screen.

RT shadows are all about those small contact shadows that make a world of difference. All objects all of a sudden look like they're actually in the scene, instead of floating a few cm above the ground.

But I'll admit, reflections and shadows are the least impressive part of pathtracing. The most impressive part is dynamic global illumination. Just every. single. scene. is turned up to 11 now. I've honestly found it difficult to actually play the game since I got path tracing working on a 4090 at 4k on a 55" QD-OLED. It's the most impressive ANYTHING I've ever seen in videogaming. I just walk around gawking at everything.

The crazy thing is, I'd be tempted to call this a "Crysis" moment, but we kinda skipped past the whole "can it run Crysis" part of it being "a Crysis"

I don't mean that all GPUs/CPUs can run pathtracing flawlessly, but I do mean that the day this was available to us, there are actually cards that CAN run at 4k with path tracing at very reasonable framerates. I'm getting 90 FPS or so, consistently. Even with top-shelf gear, Crysis was a hog. Every hardware cycle for the next decade we'd ask "can it run Crysis"? Because even a decade later running at ultra everything at good framerates wasn't guaranteed.

The Flying Penguin wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 10:42:
I tried ray tracing, but honestly (I know this will stir up a hornets nest) it adds nothing to this game. This game, like most modern games, already have 'cheats' in the engine that emulate what ray tracing does. For instance: Reflections in water puddles. With RT off, you still see reflections, because the devs put fake reflections in the water, and they look fine. Sure, turning RT on gives you REAL reflections, but unless you're specifically looking for the difference, you'll never notice. Same for shadows. 3D engines have gotten VERY good at faking shadows. It adds nothing to this game.

Compare that to Control, which VERY effectively uses RT. With RT on, the world comes alive with reflections in the windows of all the glass cubicles, and enhances the spooky dark areas. Also the Dead Space remake, where RT shadows enhance the scariness of the ship, and actually adds a sense of foreboding when you catch the first glimpse of a monster coming up behind you as a shadow on the wall.

I disagree with the sentiment on screen-space effects, I'm so tired of that hacky stuff and welcome this ray-tracing revolution with open arms. But part of the reason to feel this way about Cyberpunk is that it wasn't using full ray-tracing for a long time, even the highest setting 'Psycho' is a hybrid mode where they're still using screen-space effects in combination with a low number of RT light sources (which makes the global illumination much less accurate overall). They had enough issues getting their huge open world city to run acceptably well without having pure RT everywhere on top of that. And I may be remembering incorrectly, but I feel like there was a nerf to the overall RT quality shortly after launch as a band-aid fix for the performance complaints (including stuff like disabling reflections on the mirror at your home until you... 'turn it on' and use it).

If I had a 4000 series card, I'd be playing with path-tracing enabled. That's the REAL shit, and it's an even bigger leap going to that from their original ray-tracing than it was from turning the RT effects on in the first place: https://youtu.be/I-ORt8313Og?t=327

This comment was edited on Sep 26, 2023, 11:57.

Oooh, refreshing good sense found, thanks !

The game always ran decently enough for me on the 3080. I fired up Update 2 the other day, with the new 4080 and cranked up the visuals and getting a fairly steady 120fps at 2K. Looking forward to the DLC because it's supposed to be a linear story. I actually prefer a more linear story.

I tried ray tracing, but honestly (I know this will stir up a hornets nest) it adds nothing to this game. This game, like most modern games, already have 'cheats' in the engine that emulate what ray tracing does. For instance: Reflections in water puddles. With RT off, you still see reflections, because the devs put fake reflections in the water, and they look fine. Sure, turning RT on gives you REAL reflections, but unless you're specifically looking for the difference, you'll never notice. Same for shadows. 3D engines have gotten VERY good at faking shadows. It adds nothing to this game.

Compare that to Control, which VERY effectively uses RT. With RT on, the world comes alive with reflections in the windows of all the glass cubicles, and shadows enhance the spooky dark areas. Also the Dead Space remake, where RT shadows enhance the scariness of the ship, and actually adds a sense of foreboding when you catch the first glimpse of a monster coming up behind you as a shadow on the wall.

It remains a gimmick until it becomes baked into everything, and devs can put it into EVERY game, and everyone can afford to turn it on and it becomes a default. Then you can actually use it to help tell the story.

This comment was edited on Sep 26, 2023, 11:43.

I uninstalled CP2077 a month ago, but willing to give it another shot soon. Not so much because of this DLC, but the big updates they dropped as well. I thought it ran fine, but when I cranked up the Full Ray Tracing, it had insane lag on the initial load, though then settled. Although it settled, it still had some frame dip. I guess I got too greedy and could have turned some settings down, but wondering now with the new update, if it won't dip as hard. This was running at 1440p, everything maxed on 3090, i9 11k.

That said, although it looked incredible graphically, I did encounter some odd gameplay bugs that just took me out of the immersion. That and feeling overwhelmed by all the places you can go.

https://www.pcgamer.com/playing-starfield-made-me-appreciate-cyberpunk-2077-so-much-more/

Can't wait to see it run on fridges.

jdreyer wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 06:12:

Kosumo wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 01:15:
Can I play this on my PS2?

No, but there's a Gameboy port in the works.

And a 2D pixel arts remake for pc.

Kosumo wrote on Sep 26, 2023, 01:15:
Can I play this on my PS2?

No, but there's a Gameboy port in the works.

Can I play this on my PS2?