Remastering older games for modern-day PCs is nothing new. However, thanks to NVIDIA, we may soon see an explosion of these kinds of remasters. That’s because NVIDIA has launched the promised open beta for its RTX Remix tools.
In a blog post, NVIDIA stated that RTX Remix will let PC game modders upgrade the graphics of older DirectX 8 and 9 games with NVIDIA GeForce-based visual features like NVIDIA DLSS and NVIDIA Reflex. The new tools will also support adding ray tracing graphics effects, along with “modern physically-based rendering (PBR) assets” and the use of generative AI tools to update textures.
NVIDIA added:
Beyond its core capabilities, what makes RTX Remix special is that it offers modders a chance to remaster the graphics of a wide variety of games with the same exact workflow and tool–a rarity in modding. Experts who have mastered traditional modding tools can use them in tandem with RTX Remix to make even more impressive mods.
The tools have been used for a while by a group of Half-Life modders to remaster Valve’s first-person shooter, Half-Life 2. Now, anyone can download the same tools from this NVIDIA webpage.
NVIDIA is working with the ModDB.com site to help mod makers with these remastering projects. The site even has a long, long list of games that can be upgraded with the RTX Remix tools. Deus Ex, Unreal Tournament 2004, and Freedom Force are just some of the games that are listed on the site as being fully playable in RTX Remix right now, and many more are at least partially playable at the moment.
Modders who might need some help or who just want to find collaborators for their own game remastering project can head over to the RTX Remix Discord channel to chat with other mod makers.