Is DS2 Lighting Engine Path Tracing Worth It? | Vanilla vs Path Tracing Side by Side Comparison
DS2 Lighting Engine Path Tracing (BETA) removes almost all fake lights in Dark Souls 2 SotFS, replacing the original flat lighting with real-time path traced illumination that makes every torch, ember and light source behave physically accurately. Native HDR is fully supported, torches and light-producing items become genuinely essential in darker areas, and DLSS and FSR4 handle the performance demands of real-time path tracing at 4K.
This comparison covers multiple locations across Dark Souls 2 to give the most complete picture of what path tracing actually changes in practice, from outdoor environments and interior dungeons to boss arenas and lighting edge cases where the difference is most dramatic.
I'm also making a couple of videos comparing HDR and Lighting Engine HDR, as well as a special video comparing the vanilla game and E3 colour grading (my personal favourite).
So, which version do you guys like the most? What a time to be a fan of Peak Souls 2! :)
P.S. Please remember that this mod is currently in Beta, so it is subject to improvements and changes.