How this free platform helps modders revitalize classic games

There’s something magical about firing up your favorite old-school PC game. The excitement as the splash screen fades in, the thrill as you’re transported to a world so distant, yet so familiar. For many of us, retro titles aren’t just a source of nostalgic entertainment — they’re a touchstone to key moments in our lives, a comforting escape we return to again and again.

But as cherished as these games are, there’s no denying the march of technological progress. Re-playing beloved classics can be a bittersweet experience, the once-groundbreaking graphics now appearing dated, even crude. Jagged edges, blurry textures, and stiff animations can pull us out of the experience, a jarring reminder of just how much time has passed.

For game modders, revisiting these classics presents its own set of challenges. The process of modding — extracting assets, tweaking textures, overhauling lighting — is a passionate pursuit that can revitalize vintage games. But remastering can be arduous and time-consuming, often requiring significant technical knowledge and a patchwork of tools and workarounds. With NVIDIA RTX Remix, that process becomes much easier.

RTX Remix is a revolutionary toolkit that puts the power of remastering into the hands of modders, breathing fresh life into bygone games by infusing them with next-generation graphics and the transformative effects of full ray tracing (also known as path tracing). By automatically converting legacy light sources into fully ray-traced lights, the platform ensures that in-game lighting interacts realistically with the environment, casting accurate shadows and eliminating the need for less effective methods like fake lights or baked-in illumination. This simplifies the relighting process for modders, allowing them to achieve stunning results with less effort.

Take, for instance, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. With NVIDIA RTX Remix, the other-worldly landscapes of this much-loved RPG are teeming with newfound detail, the lighting dynamic and immersive. Sunbeams filter through dense foliage, casting dappled shadows on the ground. Water shimmers and reflects the surrounding world with crystal clarity. Textures of ancient ruins and strange flora are rich and detailed, inviting exploration.

If you’re more of an urban adventurer, consider the dystopian world of Deus Ex, released almost 25 years ago and now primed for a full-on remaster thanks to an RTX Remix community-created renderer. The renderer has fully ray-traced each light source and NVIDIA DLSS 3.5 with Ray Reconstruction has improved the new ray-traced visuals. Modders can now utilize RTX Remix to do a full-on remaster with updated textures and materials. Imagine the neon-drenched cityscape glistening after a rain shower, with the puddles accurately mirroring towering skyscrapers. Bullet holes and explosion marks marring the walls, each one uniquely detailed and dynamically lit. The possibilities are limitless.

At the heart of RTX Remix’s magic is its ability to replace outdated rendering pipelines with advanced RTX technology. By integrating features like full ray tracing, AI-enhanced textures, physically accurate materials, and DLSS 3.5 with Ray Reconstruction for improved image quality and boosted performance, NVIDIA RTX Remix injects energy into classic titles without extensive rewriting or recoding.

Crucially, RTX Remix is designed to make this process accessible to modders of all skill levels. Replacing a low-poly character model with a highly detailed one is straightforward with the platform’s tools for importing and integrating assets, while upscaling original textures can be nimbly handled by AI functionality, using machine learning to intelligently fill in details and sharpen edges.

Another strength of RTX Remix lies in its extensive compatibility and streamlined modding process. The platform supports an ever-expanding range of games and makes remastering more efficient with its use of the OpenUSD file format. OpenUSD is compatible with all major 3D tools, allowing assets to be easily transferred between applications. This marks a significant improvement over past modding approaches, which often required the use of numerous game- or engine-specific tools to extract, modify, and reintegrate assets. With RTX Remix and OpenUSD, the process is standardized across supported titles, enabling modders to apply their skills to multiple games without relearning the toolchain each time.

RTX Remix is not just about enhancing graphics — it’s a means of opening whole new avenues for creativity and collaboration within the modding community.

A prime example of this is the recently released REST API integration. This potentially game-changing feature allows modders to connect RTX Remix with powerful tools like Blender and ComfyUI. With this integration, modders can design a 3D model in Blender, tweak it to perfection, and then seamlessly import it into their virtual world.

And this is just the beginning. With the release of the RTX Remix Runtime SDK, NVIDIA is paving the way for even more games to be enhanced with the power of RTX. From adding fully ray-traced lighting to early 3D titles, to upscaling textures in time-honored classics, the potential for RTX Remix to reshape the modding landscape is immense.

The impact of RTX Remix is already being felt. Community-led projects, like Deus Ex RTX and Unreal Tournament RTX, aren’t just technical demos — they’re labors of love, crafted by dedicated modders who are passionate about preserving and enhancing the games they hold so dear. These projects, and the many more like them in the works, are a testament to the power of RTX Remix to inspire and enable a new generation of modders.

Ready to embark on your own remastering journey? Download NVIDIA RTX Remix for free and start revitalizing classic titles with cutting-edge graphics and incredible lighting.