“Doom: The Dark Ages – Revelations” offers an exciting expansion packed with new environments, enemies, and secrets, while simultaneously launching a free update called “Ripatorium 3.0” for current owners of the main game. One of the standout features of this DLC is its use of the id Tech 8 engine, which requires hardware-accelerated ray tracing and accommodates Vulkan instead of DirectX or OpenGL. With multiple updates and new graphics card drivers issued since the main game’s launch, the benchmark tests conducted by PCGH revealed impressive results across 33 graphics cards and 30 CPUs.
id Tech 8: Ray Tracing is Essential
The engine powering “Doom: The Dark Ages – Revelations” is designed for expansive areas, numerous foes, significant destruction, and high frame rates. Here, ray tracing isn’t just a graphical option; it’s a core element of the game. Ray tracing calculations impact lighting, shadows, reflections, visibility, and hitscan queries, making it integral to gameplay. Consequently, the title only runs on graphics cards that support hardware ray tracing and modern shader capabilities, specifically Geforce RTX models from the 2000 series, Radeon RX 6000, and Intel Arc. Older models, such as the Geforce GTX 1080 Ti and Radeon RX 5700 XT, are not supported.
The integrated ray-traced lighting is intricately linked to game design, allowing destruction of buildings, statues, trees, and other objects while dynamically altering light and shadow within the environment. This makes ray tracing more than just an aesthetic enhancement, particularly with optional path tracing, which significantly raises hardware requirements.
Modern streaming techniques, virtualized geometry, and rapid load times necessitate an NVME SSD. To optimize image reconstruction, players can utilize DLSS, FSR, and XeSS, based on their graphics card, combined with frame generation. The game’s TAA also delivers excellent image quality.
Graphics Cards: Radeons Perform Strongly, But Path Tracing Favors GeForce
Our graphics card benchmarks employed integrated ray tracing and the game’s TAA at native resolution. Compared to “Doom Eternal,” the GPU demands are considerably higher due to more extensive environments, dynamic lighting, and complex destruction mechanics. Only high-performance graphics cards can attain triple-digit frame rates at maximum detail. Above Full HD, upsampling becomes essential, especially if aiming to push a high refresh rate monitor.
The Radeon models showcased strong performance, with RX 6000 and RX 7000 series delivering solid results in standard ray tracing. Notably, a Radeon RX 9070 can nearly match the RTX 5070 Ti, and the RX 9060 XT 16 GB holds its ground against the RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB. Issues observed with Nvidia’s Blackwell graphics cards have since been resolved, reinstating expected performance dynamics between the Geforce RTX 50 and RTX 40 series.
The path tracing test revealed harsher conditions, leading to measurements conducted at a 67% internal render resolution: DLSS Quality on Geforce, FSR Quality on Radeon, and XeSS Ultra Quality on Intel Arc. Here, Nvidia clearly outpaced competitors, with the Geforce RTX 5000 series benefiting from superior ray tracing performance. Those wanting to utilize path tracing without hefty compromises should consider a Geforce RTX 5070 Ti as a baseline.
CPUs: Even Older Six-Core Processors Hold Up
While the shooter places substantial demands on graphics cards, CPU requirements remain comparatively moderate. Our CPU performance assessments employed a particularly demanding scene from the sixth chapter of the main game, featuring numerous simultaneously rendered enemies. A Ryzen 5 3600 achieved about 60 fps, while a Ryzen 5 7600X surpassed 100 fps. Over 120 fps were seen with a Core Ultra 5 225F, and the fastest CPUs exceeded 150 fps. Consistent frame times and negligible latency issues were notable.
This efficiency in utilizing modern processors is impressive, especially given the extensive environments and enemy counts. Players should prioritize upgrading their graphics card when considering enhancements, as GPU bottlenecks appear more commonly in resolutions from WQHD upward, especially with path tracing enabled.
Conclusion: Technically Demanding Yet Scalable
“Doom: The Dark Ages – Revelations” demonstrates id Software’s capability to implement modern rendering techniques effectively. The id Tech 8 engine demands ray tracing hardware but rewards players with vast, destructible environments and high detail levels with compelling frame rates. While regular ray tracing is playable across multiple contemporary graphics cards, path tracing is strictly a high-end option, demanding considerable performance and memory. Nvidia is currently the leader in this domain, with a recommendation of at least 16 GB of graphics memory for optimal performance. On the CPU side, Revelations is quite forgiving: even older AM4 six-core processors can hit over 60 fps. Prospective upgraders should funnel their budgets towards a capable ray tracing graphics card, especially if they aim for high fidelity gaming experiences.
