ReShade RTGI (Ray Traced Global Illumination) shader, developed by Pascal Gilcher (also known as Marty McFly), is a post-processing tool designed to add realistic lighting effects to video games that do not natively support hardware-level ray tracing. marty's mods Key Features of RTGI 0.33 (2021-2022)
Released during the 2021–2022 period as a significant update, version 0.33 introduced technical improvements to enhance both visual quality and performance: Motion Vector Support
: One of the most critical additions in version 0.33 was the integration of motion vectors
. This allows the shader to track object movement across frames, significantly reducing the "ghosting" or trailing artifacts common in previous screen-space ray tracing implementations. Improved Global Illumination
: The shader simulates how light bounces off surfaces, allowing colors from a bright object to "bleed" onto nearby geometry, creating a more cohesive and immersive scene. Hardware Agnostic
: Unlike native NVIDIA RTX or AMD Ray Tracing solutions, RTGI works on almost any GPU (including older cards) because it is a screen-space effect
that traces rays against the game's depth buffer rather than actual 3D geometry. Integration with NVIDIA
: The technology behind Pascal Gilcher's RTGI was influential enough to be officially adopted by NVIDIA into their FreeStyle and Ansel
drivers as "SSRTGI" (Screen Space Ray Traced Global Illumination). How It Works ReShade 5.3 and RTGI 0.33 Update | August 2022
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Before CDPR released the official next-gen update, RTGI 0.33 was the only way to get true Global Illumination in Novigrad. The shader fixed the "floating character" look by grounding them with proper ambient occlusion.
They called it RTGI 033 because people love neat names. To the shader devs on the forum it was just another fork in an endless chain: Reshade, ray tracing, promises and smoke. To Kira it was a quiet revolution hidden in a repository readme and a single build log.
Kira first found the shader at 03:12, scrolling through commit messages while the city outside her window was still a smear of sodium-orange lights. The title—"rtgi_033_2021"—sounded like a radio frequency. The README promised a small, improbable thing: global illumination inside post-process space, an illusion of geometry built from traced photons after the game had already painted its frame. People argued on the thread about sampling, denoising, and licensing; others posted benchmarks like flags planted on distant peaks. Kira saved the zip and brewed coffee. reshade ray tracing shader rtgi 033 2021
Installing Reshade felt like a ritual. The installer asked what libraries she wanted; she selected a handful and dragged the shader file into the right folder. She launched the game—an old indie world with sunlit plazas and broken archways—and toggled the shader with a keypress. The screen stuttered. The shader compiled. A console line flashed: RTGI v0.33 (2021): initializing.
At first there was nothing, then there was light. What had been flat and matte became layered; sunbeams threaded through dust motes, bounced off wet cobblestones, pooled in the hollow of a statue’s hand. The shader didn't recreate geometry so much as eavesdrop on the scene's light and invent depth from it. It stitched tentative rays through the pixels, following reflections like a haphazard choreographer tracing movements on a dim stage. The effect wasn't photorealism—that would have required budgets and farms of GPUs—but it was intimacy: the scene looked as if someone had turned on a room-light inside the image.
Kira walked slowly, enjoying the new information. A doorway that had seemed unremarkable now glowed at its threshold. Shadows unfolded as if the world beneath the texture maps had finally exhaled. The shader's subtle errors were charming: occasional speckled noise like film grain, ghostly smears where the algorithm misread a transparent surface. It felt handcrafted, a code-smith’s flavor rather than corporate polish.
On the subreddit, people posted side-by-sides: before and after screenshots that read like confessions. "Look at the way the light pools," one user wrote. Another posted a short clip where a character lit a cigarette and the ember threw orange halos over the empty room—an almost sacred animation created entirely by the shader’s afterthought of rays. Arguments flared about frame rate drops and flicker; someone shared a script that toggled RTGI only in still screenshots. Kira didn't care about frames per second. She recorded a clip and sent it to her friend Aarav.
"That looks alive," he replied. "Feels like it's telling you where to look."
Weeks passed. The author of rtgi_033—an account named smallforge—released incremental builds. Each one introduced tiny miracles: better temporal stability, an improved denoiser, a fix for specular runaway on chrome surfaces. The changelog was written in short, plain lines like a diary. Kira watched the thread grow into a community: shader writers offering patches, artists creating LUTs to complement the lighting, modders bundling the shader into texture packs. A handful of players started creating in-game photography exhibits, sharing curated scenes enhanced by RTGI. What had been a utility became a style.
There were arguments, too. Purists said it changed an artist's intent. Speedrunners complained that light cues could reveal shortcuts. But new players discovered older games anew: a quiet corner rendered with newfound warmth; a storm-scape where puddles told a story about the sky. For many, the shader became a lens through which the virtual worlds felt less like surfaces and more like interiors.
Kira took screenshots and printed one, a glossy 4x6 of a rain-slick alley, and slipped it into a notebook. Sometimes, when the day's work had been too much, she opened the folder and let the light from that small, forged alley rest behind her eyes. The shader had not changed the game's code; it had changed how she looked at it.
Months later, a lightweight library ported RTGI into a handful of engines. The name—033—stuck like a nickname. In talk threads and tiny conference booths, people who had once argued about sampling patterns now shared stories: shots that moved millions to tears, virtual sunsets that taught someone to miss their home less. Smallforge rarely posted beyond the changelogs, but once—just a brief line—appeared in the thread: "I like how it makes old things feel used."
Kira smiled when she read it. In the end, the shader did what great small tools do: it invited attention. A ripple of simulated photons had illuminated not just pixels but a community that cared about light, craft, and the little human scale moments shading could reveal.
Report Title: Technical Evaluation of ReShade RTGI Shader (v0.33) – 2021 Implementation Date: [Current Date] Subject: Analysis of screen-space ray traced global illumination shader for legacy game compatibility.
The RTGI 0.3.3 shader from 2021, compatible with Reshade, marks a notable point in the evolution of real-time lighting technology. By bringing advanced ray tracing and global illumination capabilities to a wide range of games and applications, it helps bridge the gap between pre-rendered and real-time graphics, pushing the boundaries of visual fidelity in interactive media.
The story of Reshade RTGI 0.33 (2021) is a journey from a niche Patreon project to a industry-shifting technical breakthrough in the world of PC modding. The Architect: Pascal Gilcher Pros and Cons Pros:
The story begins with Pascal Gilcher, a German mathematician and rendering engineer known online as "Marty McFly". Working from his home, Gilcher set out to achieve something many thought impossible: bringing modern, expensive ray-tracing effects to old games that were never built for them. The Invention: Screen-Space Path Tracing
Unlike "native" ray tracing, which requires the computer to know about everything in a game world (even what's behind the character), Gilcher’s RTGI (Ray Traced Global Illumination) shader uses the "Depth Buffer"—the map of what is currently on your screen.
The Magic: By "marching" tiny rays of light across these on-screen pixels, the shader calculates how light should bounce off a red wall onto a character’s face or cast a soft shadow in a dark corner.
The Accessibility: Because it only needs the pixels you can see, it doesn't require a high-end RTX graphics card, making "ray tracing" accessible to a much wider audience. 2021: The Turning Point
By 2021, the RTGI shader reached its legendary v0.33 milestone. This era was significant because: RTGI (Diffuse) - Marty's Mods Guides
ReShade RTGI 0.33 (Ray Traced Global Illumination) shader, developed by Marty McFly (Pascal Gilcher) , was a major update released in
(with further refinements reaching version 0.33 by August 2022). It is a screen-space post-processing effect that simulates ray-traced lighting and shadows by using a game's depth buffer. Key Features of RTGI 0.33 Motion Vectors Support:
One of the most significant additions in the 0.33 update was support for motion vectors
, which improved temporal stability and reduced shimmering or ghosting during movement. Hardware Independence:
Unlike native RTX ray tracing, RTGI does not require specialized hardware (like RT cores) and can run on any powerful GPU, including older non-RTX cards. Global Illumination:
It adds fully dynamic diffuse and specular global illumination, allowing light to bounce between surfaces realistically. Screen-Space Limitations:
As a post-processing effect, it can only trace light within the player's current view (screen space). It cannot account for objects behind the camera or off-screen, which can sometimes lead to artifacts. How to Get and Install RTGI RTGI is primarily available through Pascal Gilcher's Patreon
, where a subscription (typically at the $5 tier) grants access to the latest beta versions and the community Discord. Reshade RTGI vs 'real' Ray-Traced GI 20 Aug 2021 — Enhanced Visuals: It brings a significant boost in
ReShade Ray Tracing: Unlocking Next-Gen Visuals with RTGI 0.33 (2021)
The year 2021 was a transformative era for PC gaming graphics, largely due to the widespread adoption of the ReShade Ray Traced Global Illumination (RTGI) shader. Developed by Pascal Gilcher (also known as Marty McFly), the RTGI shader version 0.33 represented a pinnacle of post-processing technology, allowing gamers to inject sophisticated lighting effects into almost any title—even those released long before the hardware ray tracing era. What is the RTGI Shader?
The ReShade RTGI shader is a post-processing effect that simulates Ray Traced Global Illumination. Unlike traditional baked lighting, RTGI facilitates real-time interactive "bounce lighting," where light reflects off surfaces to illuminate areas not directly hit by a primary light source. Key benefits of the 0.33 version include:
Dynamic Lighting: Adds realistic shadow casting and material interaction that adapts to the in-game environment.
Hardware Independence: Unlike native RTX implementations, RTGI operates solely on depth data, making it compatible with non-RTX video cards.
Temporal Stability: Minimized flickering and lag, providing a smoother visual experience compared to earlier versions.
Motion Vectors: One of the most significant updates in the 0.33 release was the addition of motion vectors, which drastically improved the accuracy of lighting during fast movement. Key Features of Version 0.33 (2021)
The 2021 release of RTGI 0.33 brought several refinements that bridged the gap between offline rendered images and real-time gaming.
Enhanced Denoising: Improved algorithms to reduce the "noise" often associated with ray tracing, leading to a cleaner image.
Immersive Launchpad Integration: Best used with the "Launchpad" pre-pass shader, which provides motion estimation using optical flow for more precise lighting updates.
Specular Global Illumination: Accurate modeling of both diffuse and specular light, ensuring that shiny surfaces reflect the environment correctly. How to Install and Optimize RTGI 0.33
Using RTGI requires a standard ReShade installation and access to Pascal Gilcher's shader files.