Dragon's Dogma 2 Path Tracing: It's Real, It Works And Here's How It Looks

This week, we were approached by modder EXXXcellent with something remarkable: the existence of a path tracing renderer within Dragon's Dogma 2. The technology is far from a shippable state for gamers, but it is there, it works and it looks terrific. In this video, Alex Battaglia shows you the path-traced renderer in action, how to install EXXXcellent's mod and speculates on why the renderer is in there in the first place.

[respectfulremastersbymetal]

Grain? 24FPS?
FINALLY, A TRULY CINEMATIC EXPERIENCE!

[apostolos]

As soon as I started watching this video, my 4070 began to shake in what I can only assume as fear.

[Withing_]

Wow. The path tracing genuinely looks absolutely incredible. When PT comes to mainstream and can run alright it's gonna be so awesome

[Alovon]

Honestly the biggest improvement is more the material properties the Total RT Reflections add. Not just to metals and glass, but skin, eyes.etc everything feels a lot more realistically lit.

[EXXXcellent]

Hey, little update on Path Tracing: Praydog has added a feature to the latest Nightly build of REFramework that enables you to layer 2 RT modes, letting you denoise a bit of the path tracing with the regular ASVGF RTGI (also helps illuminate some pitch black shadows where the PT isn't working quite right). In conjunction, I've added a sun fix to the Graphis Suite for path tracing that re-adds specular details and decreases the overall sun intensity. Together with these 2 aspects bringing the image contrast more in line, the noise is reduced quite a bit and you can even play with 0 bounces on the path tracing for 0 noise altogether, though you'll be relying on the RTGI for reflection light etc and only really have the path traced shadows.

[kurtwells]

Finally, 4090 users can get the same performance as the rest of us!

[ArathirCz]

3:30 this is a great example how much better lighting and reflections add to the perceived realism of a scene. I could see this mod being used by people who take "cinematic"/artistic screenshots in games.

[davidburk]

7:32 “big outdoor lights like the sun or sky.” Something you’ll only hear on DF 😂

[KaiSchSp]

My graphics card took off and shot out the window, but the two frames of gameplay I got were pretty great.

[ibrokemykeyboard]

Amazing how even rough path tracing shows off all the other materials and work that went into them

[colossusrageblack]

There's a hybrid path tracing mode too. It helps with the noise and indoors while most of the surface material detail you get from path tracing.

[DavyDavePapi]

Path tracing is so beautiful. Really makes games come to life. I can't wait to own a 6090 to play it at 60 fps

[EXXXcellent]

Thanks for the coverage! Still working on adding more options to the mod as and when I can. Just found a way to make the clouds in the game render at the correct resolution, no more blurry pixellated clouds.

[SICK_O]

"Look at the richness of the door frame." 😅 This is why I love Alex's tech breakdowns.

[PedroGhost]

"I recommend you try out... if you can"
My 3060 hearing this: alright lemme cook

[fnvfanMSPR]

The lighting and shadows look absolutely amazing but the noise is something I have noticed since the start of this video

[itsuadman]

It looks incredible, especially the shadows as time passes. Those standard shadows seriously look like theyre about to artifact out of existence. Thanks for highlighting this mod, Alex!
A shame about the denoiser but it just shows the absolute potential beneath the surface

[IndieForever]

My PC unplugged itself, jumped on the table and is staring at me.

[Wladislav]

Cinematic film grain to compliment your cinematic 24fps.

[mw]

My Legion Go will play Ray Charles records backwards with this mod.