Integrating real-time ray tracing in MOBA games: enhancements for PC and console gamers

It is a technique invented in 2018, that mimics the behavior of light in the physical world. As light bounces off the different objects in a game scene, its path is traced to render a precise and realistic depiction of lights, shadows, and reflections.

While it has been in use in film production and animation for some time, real-time ray tracing or RTRT is a recent entrant into the gaming world. It has already made waves by enhancing the visual appeal of games like never before.

Here’s a simple way to look at it:
You walk into a dark room and switch on a flashlight at something there; you then trace the manner in which it bounces off its surface. Then you shoot several rays, observe how they return or not, and that will help you determine how a scene should appear. Rays that didn’t return were probably blocked by something, and this will create a shadow.

Ray tracing is a highly effective technique used to illuminate a game scene generated by a computer. PC game developers can use it to craft games with spectacular visual realism. Lifelike lighting, shadows, and reflection, can make game quality on par with cinema graphics, immersing players in the game with intensity.

By mimicking phenomena in the physical world, like precisely depicting reflection in water and on glass or polished surfaces, and accurate shadows in various topographies, ray tracing makes the games highly interactive.

With modern GPUs being designed to handle the complicated real time ray tracing computations, games can be rendered faster with higher frame rates. This definitely delivers a smoother gaming experience than without RTRT. In fact, nowadays, ray tracing can be run on entry-level GPUs too.

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 was the first graphic card from Nvidia in the GeForce RTX series that made it possible.

• Gamers need powerful hardware, like high performing CPUs and GPUs, to play them
• It needs substantial resources for computing and may hamper optimization.
• To fully leverage the technology, a specialized set of skills, tools and assets like 3D models and textures, are a must.

A video game development company will not find this a problem as they will have the computational resources, technology, skills, and assets required to develop games with RTRT.

While both techniques are used for making the lighting, shadows, and reflections more realistic, the real time path tracer helps to render well-lit scenes in an arresting manner as there is more data off which it can bounce. Ray tracing helps to render scenes with shadows effectively and impressively.

1. Battlefield V

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Developer: DICE
Game Engine: Frostbite 3
Genre: First-person shooter
Platforms: PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox One

2. Metro Exodus DLC

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Developer: 4A Games
Game Engine: 4A
Genre: First-person shooter
Platforms: PS5 , PS4 , Xbox Series X , Xbox Series S , Xbox One , PC

3.Deathloop

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Developer: Arcane Studios
Game Engine: Void
Type: First-person shooter
Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S

A technique called rasterization was used to render scenes where objects were first colored and then logic applied to display pixels nearest to the eyes. Whereas, ray tracing colors the pixels and then relates them to the objects. In simpler terms, rasterization uses special techniques to render realistic imagery along with some tweaking, but doesn’t require much processing power.

Ray tracing is applied more generically as the basis of this technique is shooting light rays; meaning, the technique depends on the manner in which rays are used. For example, you need to shoot more rays to achieve soft shadows or reflections. However, to achieve blurs or motion effects, you may have to change the origin point or ray timing.

To understand how real time ray tracing significantly improves game visuals, let us compare two images:

Raterization effect or without ray tracing

Image showing softer, realistic shadows

Once you experience a game with real-time ray tracing, you won’t want to play without it!
Ray tracing games are supported by PC, PS5, and the Xbox Series X, as they have the requisite hardware to run RTRT games.

Multi-player online battle arena or MOBA games are a type of strategy games where two teams compete against each other. There is a set battlefield, with each player controlling a single online character with specific skills which improve as the game progresses. The main aim of most MOBA games is the destruction of the enemy team’s structure at the opposite side of the battlefield. Characters have specific roles, receive gold to purchase skills and tools, and become stronger – which obviously increase chances of winning.

Here are some of the popular MOBA PC games:

League of Legends

Developer: Riot Games
Game Engine: Proprietary engine
Platforms: Mac OS, Windows

Defense of the Ancients

Developer: Valve Corporation
Game Engine: The source engine
Platforms: Microsoft Windows, macOS

Dungeon Defenders

Developer: Trendy Entertainment
Game Engine: Unreal Engine 3
Platforms: iOS, Android, PlayStation 3 (PSN), Xbox 360 (XBLA), Windows, Mac OS X, Linux

As to which is the best MOBA game for pc, gamers intensely debate whether it is the League of Legends or Defense of the Ancients. There is no doubt, however, that these two are among the most popular MOBA games for PCs.

It all depends on individual preferences regarding characters and gameplay eventually. Imagine a MOBA game that is already exciting and immersive, with RTRT. It will make the game so much more exciting, interactive, and engaging, that gamers will be hooked for a long time

MOBA games and real time ray tracing

As of now, there is very little real time ray tracing in MOBA games, probably because they are very complex to develop. At Juego Studios, however, we have the skills, resources, and experience required to incorporate real time ray tracing into MOBA games for PCs and consoles easily and efficiently. If you have an idea for a game, we will turn it into reality