Ray Tracing x Pixel art in GMS2

Bunelee

Member
Hey GameMakers!
My team and I recently began our gamedev journey with a new GMS2 project (name TBD).
It follows a private eye, "Matt Thompson", in 1940s London. The narrative is not linear, and
can change depending on your choices.

Story aside, just wanted to share a screenshot of some of the lighting work I've been doing.
I programmed in real-time ray tracing to create light, and reflections. (though, it will tank FPS)
It certainly runs better on my PC than some of my friends (I have a pretty high-end GPU).
I might share some code snippets later, but for now here's the photo!

Criticism is welcomed with open arms!

(P.S., name recommendations are welcome, too.)

SS:


View attachment 43676
 
Honestly, even though it looks nice, it looks the same as a lot of cheaper lighting solutions to me. Not just your game, but raytracing in general. Not sure it's worth it yet.
 
D

Deleted member 13992

Guest
I see ray tracing as definitely worthy in 3D games. Makes reflections more straightforward, screen-space local reflections are fine for bumpy and rough surfaces, but for mirror-like reflections they're pretty bad, so RT is king here. And stuff like GI and better shadows. But for 2D games, especially platformers, I'm unsure what visual benefit RT brings that can't just be done using surface/shader manipulations and a bit of creativity. Though that's maybe from a lack of foresight on my part.

Eventually it'll be at a point where it's essentially "free" and we won't have to take shortcuts or use hacks for lighting anymore.

Some friendly critisism. Do you have an omni light somewhere (for the highlight in the middle). The pink highlight seemingly comes from nowhere. If there's a light source well above the frame of the view, then we would see its specular highlight equally "distant" from the reflecting plane. Hard to tell if it's reflecting the wall, also. I'd also recommend making the brickwork on the ground larger to better fit the pixel style of the rest of the game. Along with some kind of bump or spec map/mask.

Maybe with the use of AO maps and normalmaps, yo ucan really make use of RT to give all the sprites volume and self-casting shadows. Such as the arm casting a shadow on the coat and updating in realtime relative to the lights. Just a thought.

I love seeing people pushing visual boundaries like this though! Keep it up!
 
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