Minecraft Is Getting a Whole New Look With Ray Tracing Support

Last Monday, Microsoft announced it will no longer be releasing the Super Duper Graphics Pack that was supposed to introduce a new look for Minecraft due to performance and technical issues. And if you were disappointed by the news, you may be really happy with the latest announcement from the company.

Microsoft is today announcing some new features for Minecraft: Ray Tracing and a new Render Dragon gaming engine.

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Mojang, the makers of Minecraft, is teaming up with NVIDIA to bring Ray Tracing support to Minecraft on NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX GPUs. The support for Ray Tracing will essentially introduce a new look for Minecraft, adding realistic lighting, volumetric water, vibrant colors, and emissive textures. Here’s a video showing off Ray Tracing in action on Minecraft (spoiler: it’s pretty gorgeous):

Microsoft is also going to introduce a new game engine called Render Dragon on devices that support the Minecraft Bedrock platform, bringing features like directional lighting and emissivity. The new game engine is used on Microsoft’s upcoming Minecraft Earth game, and it will introduce things like edge highlighting, as well as new highting techniques for Minecraft. Microsoft says the new game engine will introduce a range of graphics features that will vary depending on your hardware.

Microsoft will be launching the new Ray Tracing features in Minecraft for Windows 10 as part of a preview in 2020, and it’s being pretty tight-lipped about all the details on these new features.

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Conversation 6 comments

  • waethorn

    19 August, 2019 - 9:39 am

    <p>Um…so they're going from a graphics engine that would've worked on current-gen consoles to a proprietary engine that only benefits NVIDIA-equipped PC's?</p><p><br></p><p>#FAIL!</p><p><br></p><p>Edit: GeForce **RTX**-equipped PC's. Not even the flagship Xbox One X console, which has an AMD GPU (actually integrated into an APU).</p>

    • JoePaulson

      19 August, 2019 - 11:44 am

      <blockquote><em><a href="#450335">In reply to Waethorn:</a></em></blockquote><p>Uh….you….turn it off…*GASP*</p><p><br></p><p>That's how this stuff has always worked. If your hardware doesn't support a feature in a game, the game does not turn that feature on.</p><p><br></p><p>But, sure, we should make game developers just work to the lowest common denominator when they create new games….that's how innovation happens. *eyeroll*</p>

    • Calibr21

      19 August, 2019 - 8:19 pm

      <blockquote><em><a href="#450335">In reply to Waethorn:</a></em></blockquote><p>It’s not restricted to Nvidia cards. It’s implemented using DXR, not RTX. It’s just that right now NVida cards are the only consumer cards that implement accelerated DXR. You know what also will run DXR? Project Scarlet.</p><p><br></p><p>This is to get next gen Minecraft prepped and mature for Scarlet.</p><p><br></p>

  • jimchamplin

    Premium Member
    19 August, 2019 - 11:21 am

    <p>? But…</p><p><br></p><p><img draggable="false" class="emoji" alt="?" src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/12.0.0-1/svg/1f612.svg"></p><p><br></p><p><img draggable="false" class="emoji" alt="?" src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/12.0.0-1/svg/1f928.svg"></p><p><br></p><p&gt;? Dirty pool, Microsoft!</p>

  • red.radar

    Premium Member
    19 August, 2019 - 12:46 pm

    <p>So… whats the point of Minecraft? You play with virtual legos and your defending your creation from people or things that try to destroy it? So its a little bit of child's free play and creativity mixed with defend your castle?</p><p><br></p><p>With all the information I have casually picked up over the last 10 years I am really confused what the point is. The wiki didn't help clarify things.</p>

  • chaad_losan

    19 August, 2019 - 6:34 pm

    <p>Why? No one asked for this. It's a half-assed RTX sheen on an engine that would run on even the lowest of computers and now requires a machine that is $2000+ just to run with this one feature on. Is this the salvage of the 4k expansion that was recently aborted?!?!? So sad at every level. Just like Quake RTX. </p>

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