EA has officially announced that the highly anticipated October release, 'Battlefield 6', will ship without ray tracing features.

Christian Bull, the technical director at Ripple Effect—the Battlefield studio primarily handling the battle royale mode—confirmed in an interview with the US media outlet ComicBook that "ray tracing will not be present at launch, nor are there any plans to add it in the near future." The developer clarified that this decision is aimed at broadening the player base, specifically to accommodate those on lower-end PCs by keeping the minimum system requirements as accessible as possible.

It is quite a pivot from previous titles that prioritised visual spectacle above all else. While the series first introduced ray tracing with 'Battlefield 5', the subsequent 'Battlefield 2042' faced a nightmare of optimisation woes at launch. With 'Battlefield 6', the studio appears to be deliberately sidestepping the performance tax that comes with ray tracing, making smooth gameplay across a wide spectrum of PCs and consoles their absolute priority.

The strategy seems to be paying off already. In the recent open beta test, 'Battlefield 6' managed to avoid any major optimisation disasters. EA noted that a significant portion of beta participants were running the game on machines below the recommended specs, and the studio reaffirmed its commitment to ensuring these players can enjoy a stable experience. By focusing on stability over eye-watering graphics, the beta test saw the highest number of participants in the series' history.

As for the visual trade-off resulting from the absence of ray tracing, the developer plans to compensate using the latest upscaling technologies. By supporting Nvidia’s DLSS 4, AMD’s FSR 4, and Intel’s XeSS 2, the studio intends to let players strike their own balance between frame rate and image quality. Furthermore, the developer added that the game engine itself is efficient enough to deliver solid performance even without relying on external upscalers.

'Battlefield 6' is set to launch on October 10 for PC, Xbox Series X/S, and PS5.