World of Warcraft’s Shadowlands Alpha hints at raytracing and VRS support

With the MMO’s Battle for Azeroth expansion, World of Warcraft gained support for Microsoft’s DirectX 12 API, a move which prepared the game for the future with enhanced multi-threading support and increased performance levels for users of modern processors. 

With the game’s upcoming Shadowlands expansion, it looks like World of Warcraft will be taking another bold step forward with its engine, with Alpha files hinting at support for raytracing and other advanced graphical features. These references were uncovered by Lemon King on the WOW subreddit. 

While these features do not work within Shadowlands’ alpha, support for DXR (DirectX Raytracing) 1.0, Raytraced Shadows and Variable Rate Shading have all been found within the game’s engine code, suggesting that Blizzard is adopting Microsoft’s DirectX Ultimate feature set within World of Warcraft.  

These features have the potential to make World of Warcraft look better and run faster on modern systems, with raytracing offering users improved visuals while Variable Rate Shading allows gamers to boost World of Warcraft’s performance without any graphical downsides. 

Variable Rate Shading is currently supported on Nvidia’s RTX series graphics cards and Intel’s 11th Generation or newer graphics architectures. Hardware-accelerated attracting is currently supported on Nvidia’s RTX series graphics card, though support for this feature will arrive with AMD’s upcoming Radeon RDNA 2 series graphics cards. 

With the upcoming release of the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5, it is possible that these engine upgrades could come as part of a multi-platform shift from Blizzard. VRS and DXR support are key parts of Microsoft’s Xbox Series X, and similar features are likely included in Sony’s console platform. Combine that with the use of powerful Zen 2 series processors, and there has never been a better time to bring World of Warcraft to consoles. 

As World of Warcraft: Shadowlands approaches its launch, we expect to hear a lot more about the game’s planned engine changes and other feature upgrades.