Path tracing? In Dragon’s Dogma 2? The game shipped with ray-traced global illumination but a path tracer sits within Capcom’s code – exposed thanks to a new mod for the PC version of the game. Graphics Suite Alpha, made by developer EXXXCellent, is available on Nexus Mods and includes path-traced lighting, shadows and reflections, all running in real-time. So, how does it look, how well does it run – and why exactly is it there in the first place?
To install the mod, you’ll also need the most recent REFramework tool from Github, extract that into the Dragon’s Dogma 2 install directory, then add in the mod’s Lua script to the autorun folder. Go in-game, and you should have access to a bunch of additional options at the bottom of the REFramework overlay related to RT and path tracing.
With PT enabled, you’ll see significantly more material and lighting detail versus the standard ray-traced global illumination (RTGI) with the option to use a per-pixel or four-samples-per-pixel level of granularity – each with a corresponding performance cost, of course. The standard RTGI has significantly less information to work with – one sample for every four pixels, so it has a lot more compromises compared to the ‘ground truth’ of path tracing.
Another reason the path-traced version of the game looks better is because it includes specular light paths, or reflections. This can make a big difference to the appearance of shiny objects like suits of armour, where the standard RTGI doesn’t look realistic – it can look splotchy and glows oddly. In comparison, the same piece of armour with path tracing enabled like metal, with real-time reflections and self occlusion. This addition of proper reflectivity greatly enhances a wide range of the game’s materials and textures with proper colouring and shading, and makes differentiation between materials like glass, wood, stone and metal easier too.