Implementing ray tracing and path tracing in video games is driving significant tangible game development improvements in games, as recently shown by id Software in DOOM: The Dark Ages.
As highlighted by Digital Foundry during their weekly podcast, the creator of the DOOM series hosted a presentation during SIGGRAPH 2025 focused on the global illumination tech featured in the id Tech 7 engine, which was first showcased in the excellent Indiana Jones and The Great Circle by MachineGames a few months before the debut of DOOM: The Dark Ages earlier this year. Besides showcasing the visual improvements the new technology brings, id Software revealed how RTGI has streamlined game development, significantly reducing minimum and maximum pre-computation times per level, as well as lowering disk requirements, network storage, and turnaround time compared to older technology.
While only having RTGI prevents players with older hardware from enjoying recent releases, such as DOOM: The Dark Ages and the aforementioned Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, these tangible game development benefits will likely drive more developers to adopt ray tracing and path tracing over traditional lighting tech. This isn't the first time we have heard about these benefits, as earlier this year, Ubisoft's Nicolas Lopez highlighted how Assassin's Creed Shadows would have had 2 TB of lighting data, and would have taken almost 2 years to bake the lighting if the game used the same lighting tech seen in Assassin's Creed Unity.
Though RTGI makes DOOM: The Dark Ages look stunning, the game would have been a worthwhile purchase even without ray tracing and path tracing, as it is an extremely fun game with a meaty campaign that's well worth the money. You can learn more about the game now out on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S by checking out Chris' review.
About the author: Francesco De Meo has been covering video games and technology since 2012, starting his career at small outlets like Gamersyndrome and GeekSnack. After joining Wccftech gaming section in 2015, he quickly expanded his video gaming coverage with in-depth reporting, interviews with iconic industry figures such as Grasshopper Manufacture founder and No More Heroes creator Goichi "Suda51" Suda, Resident Evil series creator Shinji Mikami, Team NINJA's president and Nioh series director Fumihiko Yasuda, and Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama, reviews and on-the-ground coverage of major industry events such as Gamescom and E3. When he's not reporting or reviewing, Francesco can be found playing the genres he loves most, spending time with his six cats, reading, writing music, playing guitar and drumming for his progressive rock band.
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