Fallout 4 is easily going to be one of the biggest gaming launches this year, with many PC gamers waiting eagerly to see how the game looks, performs and plays on their system.

Ahead of the game's launch, developer Bethesda Game Studios is giving us an insight into the graphics technology used in the game. As expected, Fallout 4 uses a modified version of the Creation Engine (first used for Skyrim in 2011), which now includes enhanced dynamic lighting thanks to a physically-based deferred renderer, allowing the developers to create natural reflections based on an object's material.

Fallout 4 also uses volumetric light effects from Nvidia, which creates a natural atmosphere in the game depending on the time of day and the weather. This effect uses hardware tessellation, and although it was developed in partnership with Nvidia, Bethesda claims they've "made it work great regardless of your platform."

The updated Creation Engine includes a range of other new graphics features, such as an updated materials system and new cloth simulations, as well as dynamic post-process techniques, and upgrades to the virtual camera that include depth of field. Bethesda has even listed some of the new features to expect in Fallout 4:

  • Tiled Deferred Lighting
  • Temporal Anti-Aliasing
  • Screen Space Reflections
  • Bokeh Depth of Field
  • Screen Space Ambient Occlusion
  • Height Fog
  • Motion Blur
  • Filmic Tonemapping
  • Custom Skin and Hair Shading
  • Dynamic Dismemberment using Hardware Tessellation
  • Volumetric Lighting
  • Gamma Correct Physically Based Shading

Fallout 4 will be released on November 10th on PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4, but to take advantage of all of these new graphics features, you're going to need to play on PC.