Fortnite brings long-awaited ray tracing to PC version

Ray tracing — the high-quality lighting effect taking gaming by storm — has arrived on one of the biggest franchises.

Starting on Thursday, players of Fortnite on the PC can turn on ray tracing and experience the title with far more fidelity.

The feature, which is only available on PCs running Nvidia GPU cards and DirectX 12, allows for dramatically improved visual and lighting effects, creating a more realistic in-game experience, developer Epic Games announced in a blog post.

Epic Games showed a before-and-after shot detailing how big of a difference ray tracing makes.

In the first, with ray tracing on, there’s far more detail on cars and you can see the reflections of other players on windows. In the other, with ray tracing turned off, the same scene looks rather dull in comparison.

Ray tracing is a newer technology developers are increasingly adding support for in games. In addition to PCs, the technology will be available on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X, both of which launch this November. Ray tracing is a rendering technique that mimics real-life light and how it affects how we see the world. Ray tracing should make games far more realistic, developers say.

In addition to ray tracing, the Fortnite update also includes support for Nvidia’s DLSS, which allows for ray tracing to work at higher frame rates. Another feature, called Nvidia Reflex, reduces Fortnite‘s latency and renders the ray tracing effects in real time.

How to turn on ray tracing in Fortnite

First, you’ll need to have PCs that work with DirectX 12 and have four or more cores in their CPUs. An Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 or higher is also required. However, Epic says the game will look best on CPUs with eight or more cores and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 or higher.

To turn on the feature, follow these steps:

1. Install Microsoft’s Windows 10 May 2020 update.
2. Install the R455 Driver.
3. In the Fortnite settings, scroll down to Advanced Settings and change the DirectX version to DirectX 12.
4. Also in Advanced Settings, players will find their Nvidia DLSS options. They can choose Quality, Balanced, or Performance.
5. Finally, find Ray Tracing in that pane and turn it on. Next, decide whether to activate shadows, reflections, ambient occlusion, or global illumination. The settings can also be configured from low to high, allowing players to control how it looks.

Once those steps are completed, the game will automatically turn ray tracing on and players will be all set.