Thanks for playing the Half-Life 2 RTX demo and sharing your feedback. It has given our mod team a lot of insight on what we should change for the final release.

Our latest update fixes some scenarios where users were experiencing crashes, as well as introduces a more accurate tonemapper in response to community feedback.

This new tonemapper fixes an issue that caused the displayed image to be over-brightened. When you now play Half-Life 2 RTX, you will see more accurate colorization, especially in areas of extreme light and dark. Areas in shadow will feel much darker, while areas in light will still allow details to shine through without being overexposed and “washed out”.



Additionally, some game objects with extreme bright light (like fire) have been colorized by the new tone mapper to better show the full spectrum of light, making it look more realistic and closer to the original game.


This new tonemapper represents our first step in responding to community feedback, with many more adjustments to lighting and volumetrics to come in a future patch.

We released the Half-Life 2 RTX Demo as a way to get feedback from the community early to build the best remaster we can–we thank you for taking the time to play it, and letting us know what you want to see from Half-Life 2 RTX. We hope to remaster this classic we all love in a way that respects your memory of it, and also feels exciting for a new generation of players who have never played it before.

Changes:

• Tonemapper has been updated to display a more accurate image
  
• Fix for a softlock in town_02 where Grigori would occasionally not throw the shotgun to the player
  
• Fix for a crash state
  
• Fix for a stall on initial game load
  
• Issued fixes to the crossbow, Grigori bucket, and mine-hopper assets
  
• Fix for a visual artifact when initially moving with DLSS Frame Generation on
  

Investigating Reported Issues:

• We are investigating an issue where some game overlays can cause crashes when used with the Half-Life 2 RTX Demo. We recommend disabling overlays before starting the demo, but can confirm players looking to measure performance can use FrameView without risking a crash.
  
• Some players are reporting a crash during the first-time they start the game, due to issues with shader compilation. If you experience this, please start the game again.
  
• Steam Hotkey for Screenshots (F12) will crash Half-Life 2 RTX. We recommend using NVIDIA app’s Alt+F1 screenshot feature, NVIDIA app’s Alt+F9 video recording feature, or OBS “Display Capture” to take screenshots and video.
  
• When Desktop Capture is active in NVIDIA app’s settings (Alt+Z --> settings cog --> Video capture) video recording can at times cease working in the Half-Life 2 RTX demo, requiring users to restart the demo. To prevent this, please disable Desktop Capture in NVIDIA app’s settings.
  

For recommended specs and optimization to get the best performance in Half-Life 2 RTX please see here.
Orbifold Team