The effects are not always clearly visible
Ray tracing games have been on the market for several years now. Tracing itself has become much more widespread, but it is still far from dominating even among large projects, let alone the entire industry as a whole. The author of the MxBenchmarkPC channel decided to show what the trace looks like at the end of 2023 — approximately five years after the release of the first such modern game.
For example, the author took projects where tracing is implemented “to the fullest”, as well as games where such effects are less noticeable.
As you can see, in Cyberpunk 2077 and Alan Wake 2 the difference is most noticeable. Moreover, for the second game the author did not even show the locations where the tracing effects are most noticeable.
For comparison, in Elden Ring without direct comparison it is generally very difficult to tell whether tracing is enabled in the game.
In general, effects based on ray tracing are not always clearly visible. Most often, they look most advantageous in night locations with numerous bright light sources and surfaces where light from such sources can be reflected. Then the picture changes very noticeably. If the game at some point displays, for example, a forest or a field in daylight, the difference most often tends to zero. In addition, in a number of scenarios with good lighting, the difference is very noticeable (for example, in Metro Exodus), but at the same time this difference simply takes place — I can’t say that it makes the picture more beautiful.
Unfortunately, ray tracing is still very demanding, and the path tracing available in several games makes the situation even worse.