For example, ray tracing will let gamers use reflections off the car's surface as a mirror to see if snipers are approaching from the rear, Pohl said. Ray tracing could also add more visual detail such as shadows, which could help enhance 3D effects in a game.

Modern device screens employ millions of pixels and millions of rays are sent out for every pixel, which creates a challenge as a lot of processing power is needed, said John Owens, associate professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at University of California at Davis, during the podcast.

Billions of rays may need to be continually bounced off objects to accurately sample the changing scenes in a game. Modeling becomes even more complex if a game has a lot of moving objects and changing scenes.

"The reason [ray tracing] isn't pursued in your normal graphics cards today or that most of your games aren't done through it is that actually doing that computation is very challenging," Owens said.

Intel is trying to address the challenge through an experimental server chip called Knights Ferry, which is based on the company's new MIC (many integrated core) architecture. The chip, which was announced in May at the International Supercomputing Conference, is designed for intensive graphics and high-performance computing.