Microsoft Promises to bring significant boost for games

With DirectX Raytracing 1.2, Microsoft introduces two new technologies that accelerate raytracing effects in games. The update is intended to lead to a tremendous performance improvement. The new functions also benefit owners of older graphics cards.

Raytracing becomes more efficient

With DirectX-Raytracing (DXR), Microsoft expanded its graphic interface a few years ago. As early as October 2018, DXR came to Windows 10 PCs for the first time as part of DirectX 12. The function enables hardware-accelerated ray tracing through so-called RT cores from GPUS such as the Geforce RTX series from Nvidia or the Radeon cards from AMD.

Now Microsoft has announced a new update for DXR at the Game Developers Conference 2025 and explains the details in his Developer blog. Version 1.2 adds some new functions and improvements. This is to achieve a “groundbreaking increase in performance” and significant acceleration of raytracing effects in PC games. This could benefit more games from more realistic lighting effects without making excessive hardware requirements.

New technologies for better performance

The upcoming update introduces two new technologies to optimize the graphic calculation. The first innovation are “opacity micromaps” (OMM) that specialize in the representation of transparent objects such as vegetation or grid. The system simplifies the management of transparency data and reduces the required shader calculations. The second innovation is the “Shader Execution R haveing” (Ser), which grouped the execution of shaders more efficiently.

This increases the frame rate, which leads to a more fluid representation. According to Microsoft, both new technologies should lead to enormous performance increases. In Pathtracing applications, OMM enables speed advantages by a factor of 2.3. Ser should double the image rate in certain scenarios. A technical demonstration by Alan Wake 2 showed performance improvements of up to 40 percent in complex scenes.

Hardware support depending on the manufacturer

Nvidia plans to integrate the new features into graphics cards from the RTX 2000 series. Intel wants to incorporate Om into the upcoming Celestial GPU generation. AMD is also working on the implementation, but has not yet named any specific models. Qualcomm intends integration into future mobile chips.

Practical benefit for players

For players, DXR 1.2 primarily means a more fluid representation of raytracing effects. More recent titles such as Star Wars Outlaws or Indiana Jones and the large circle are already relying on this technology. The Doom that appears in May: The Dark Ages will even require raytracing. The new optimizations also enable owners of older or weaker graphics cards access to raytracing effects.