Screen shot from Subway demo by Geomerics
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ARM launches Enlighten 3 global illumination tool for games

  • Posted byby Dean Takahashi
  • Updated
  • 2 min

ARM’s Geomerics division is launching a new tool to make 3D graphics better in video games through more realistic lighting and shadows.

The Enlighten 3 tool with Forge is the latest version of Geomerics’ technology for illuminating all of the 3D objects in a video game scene using a single light source, such as the sun. The lighting is more realistic because it captures not only direct but indirect light that bounces around a scene and hits a variety of objects, said Chris Porthouse, the vice president of gaming middleware at ARM, in an interview with GamesBeat. It essentially delivers an accurate simulation of how light interacts with materials.

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Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.