NVIDIA has unveiled substantial enhancements to its RTX neural rendering technologies, coinciding with the Game Developers Conference (GDC). A key highlight is the collaboration with Microsoft to integrate neural shading support into the Microsoft DirectX preview slated for April. This allows developers to utilize AI Tensor Cores within NVIDIA GeForce RTX GPUs, accelerating neural networks directly in a game’s graphics pipeline.
Neural shading represents a significant leap in graphics programming, blending artificial intelligence with conventional rendering to achieve dramatic improvements in frame rates, image quality, and system resource efficiency. Shawn Hargreaves, Direct3D development manager at Microsoft, noted, “Microsoft is adding cooperative vector support to DirectX and HLSL, starting with a preview this April. This will advance the future of graphics programming by enabling neural rendering across the gaming industry. Unlocking Tensor Cores on NVIDIA RTX will allow developers to fully leverage RTX Neural Shaders for richer, more immersive experiences on Windows.”
RTX Kit Updates for Unreal Engine 5
Furthering the advancements, the NVIDIA RTX Kit, a suite of neural rendering technologies designed for game developers, is receiving significant updates. These include extended support for Unreal Engine 5, specifically for the RTX Mega Geometry and RTX Hair features. This allows modders to create stunning remasters of games.
The open-source platform, NVIDIA RTX Remix, has officially launched, further empowering modders to update classic games. Additionally, a playable demo of Half-Life 2 RTX will be released on Tuesday, March 18, featuring the latest neural rendering enhancements, including full ray tracing, NVIDIA DLSS 4 Multi Frame Generation, RTX Neural Radiance Cache, and RTX Skin.
NVIDIA is also celebrating a major milestone with over 100 DLSS 4 games and apps now available.
RTX Mega Geometry and RTX Hair
The use of triangles in game creation has increased exponentially over the past three decades. With Unreal Engine 5’s Nanite geometry system, developers can build expansive open worlds. The complex geometry, however, increases the cost of ray tracing, making real-time frame rates difficult to achieve. RTX Mega Geometry addresses this by accelerating ray tracing in geometrically complex scenes allowing developers to use up to 100x more triangles than current standards. RTX Mega Geometry will be available to developers in the NVIDIA RTX (NvRTX) branch of Unreal Engine 5.
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 50 Series GPUs introduced RTX Hair, which utilizes a linear swept sphere primitive. This significantly improves the acceleration of ray tracing for hair and fur rendering. These linear swept spheres offer a more accurate representation of individual hair strands, which enhances image quality and overall performance in rendering realistic digital characters. RTX Hair is also becoming available in the NvRTX branch of Unreal Engine 5.
During the CES trade show, NVIDIA showcased neural rendering technology with its “Zorah” demo. The updated Zorah demo, developed in Unreal Engine 5, will now showcase the latest advancements in neural rendering, including RTX Mega Geometry, RTX Hair, ReSTIR Path Tracing, and ReSTIR Direct Illumination.
Return to ‘Half-Life 2’
The release of RTX Remix offers enhanced features, including DLSS 4 with Multi Frame Generation, numerous RTX neural rendering technologies, and several community-requested upgrades. This provides modders with the ability to create stunning RTX remasters with improved image quality and higher frame rates. Over 30,000 modders have utilized the platform to update hundreds of classic titles since its beta release, and over 1 million gamers have played RTX Remix mods.
Owners of Half-Life 2 can access the capabilities of RTX Remix in Ravenholm and Nova Prospekt by downloading a free Half-Life 2 RTX demo from Steam, starting March 18. The remaster is a collaborative project by four of Half-Life 2‘s leading mod teams, functioning under the banner of Orbifold Studios. The Half-Life 2 RTX features full ray tracing, remastered assets, DLSS 4, NVIDIA Reflex, RTX Neural Radiance Cache, RTX Skin, and RTX Volumetrics.
DLSS 4 Milestone
DLSS 4 was introduced with GeForce RTX 50 Series GPUs. It has experienced rapid adoption from both gamers and developers. Now supported in over 100 games and applications, it reached this milestone two years faster than DLSS 3, establishing itself as NVIDIA’s most rapidly adopted game technology.
DLSS 4 debuted Multi Frame Generation, which leverages AI to produce up to three additional frames per frame. This is done in conjunction with other DLSS technologies to increase frame rates by up to 8x compared to traditional rendering. This performance leap on GeForce RTX 50 Series graphics cards enables gamers to maximize visual settings at high resolutions and enjoy high frame rates.
In addition, the games Lost Soul Aside, Mecha BREAK, Phantom Blade Zero, Stellar Blade, Tides of Annihilation, and Wild Assault will launch with DLSS 4, promising an enhanced PC gaming experience for GeForce RTX users.
