NVIDIA is giving away the 'Quake II' ray tracing demo on June 6th
A limited, three-level demo will be available to download and play.
Earlier this year, a team inside NVIDIA took Quake II and ran it through its ray tracing system to see if the 1997 title could be gussied up. The resulting tech demo, shown off at GDC, received more than half a million YouTube views and more than a little hype. From June 6th, the company will allow people to play a limited version of the game — Quake II RTX — for free.
NVIDIA's Jeff Fisher explained that the company's Lightspeed Studios have added in realistic lighting effects for the classic shooter. The revamped version gets time-of-day lighting, accurate sunlight, indirect illumination and reflections on water. As a consequence, the 22-year-old game has been given a new lease of life to demonstrate the power of NVIDIA's Turing architecture on older titles.
Quake II RTX is a fairly limited, three-level version of the title that you'll be able to snag from the NVIDIA website and Steam. It's not clear, because what Fisher said and the slides behind him didn't agree, but it may be the case that If you have a Quake II license, you might be able to get the full game in this format. We'll hassle NVIDIA for more information on this and update our story when we know more.
At the same time, NVIDIA has let slip that it will offer a Wolfenstein: Youngblood bundle with ray tracing and adaptive shading. That'll be available on May 28th, paired with the GeForce RT 2060, 2070, 2080 and 2080 Ti, although the company hasn't yet mentioned how much it'll cost.
Update 27/5/19 3:35am ET: NVIDIA has confirmed that if you already own Quake II, you'll be able to play the whole title in ray tracing mode. It's $5 on Steam, if you want to get prepared.
