Capcom says Resident Evil 2 and 3 ray tracing removal was an error

Ray tracing and 3D audio are now back

Update: 4/20/2023 - 8:00 a.m. ET

Capcom has now said that an update has been pushed to Steam fixing the issue, and that ray tracing and 3D audio should be back for players who update their games.

Update for Steam users: A patch for the missing raytracing options should now be available! https://t.co/56RO7cnMlP

— Resident Evil (@RE_Games) April 20, 2023

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Original story

Last week, a number of Resident Evil fans noticed that an update for Resident Evil 2 and 3 remakes on Steam removed ray tracing and 3D audio from the game. After a week of speculation as to why, Capcom has finally commented on the situation.

The removal of ray tracing, as well as options for 3D audio, happened with an update to both games on April 14, and a number of players speculated that it seemed to be intentional as it happened to both games. Resident Evil 7 and Resident Evil Village were reportedly updated on the same day, and while some players reported that ray tracing was missing from those games too, it does not appear as if it was widespread.

The updates didn’t appear to change much else either, and patch notes weren’t made available, so it seemed like Capcom had done a sneaky and quietly removed some things.

Fortunately, it seems like this was actually a bug of some kind, as Capcom released a statement on Twitter assuring players that the options would return (thanks PC Gamer).

“To all Resident Evil 2/Resident Evil 3 users on Steam,” Capcom wrote on Twitter, “We’re aware of an ongoing issue with the raytracing option not appearing in the graphics menu and presets. We’ll have this addressed in a future update and apologize for any inconvenience!”

Capcom didn’t say when the update adding the options back in would be available, or what caused the problem in the first place. A number of other Resident Evil games, such as the recently released Resident Evil 4 Remake which runs on the same engine, still have both ray tracing and 3D audio options available.

Unfortunately it’s not the only controversy to hit Resident Evil in recent weeks. Following the release of Resident Evil 4 Remake, Capcom updated the game to include microtransactions. While the microtransactions only allow you to upgrade your weapons all the way, many have raised eyebrows at Capcom only adding them to the game after reviews were out.

It’s unlikely their inclusion would have meant much for reviews though. As we said in our Resident Evil 4 Remake review, it’s worth every penny as one of the best games in the series.