Quake 2 RTX is NVIDIA's attempt at implementing a fully functional version of Id Software's 1997 hit game Quake II with RTX path-traced global illumination.

Relive the classic Quake II, now with Vulkan-based real-time ray tracing on NVIDIA graphics cards with RTX support (GeForce GTX 1060 and newer, all GeForce RTX 20 cards).

Experience realistic reflections, refraction, shadows, and global illumination while you fight your way through the hostile Strogg civilization in the first three levels of the original game. Only then will the fate of humanity be known. Quake 2 with RTX—It's On.

Global lighting effects like realistic reflections, refraction, shadows, and global illumination create a whole new Quake II experience.

This installer comes with the free shareware levels, or you can point it to the folder of your Quake 2 installation to get the full Quake II experience.

Quake II RTX builds upon the Q2VKPT branch of the Quake II open source engine. Q2VKPT was created by former NVIDIA intern Christoph Schied, a Ph.D. student at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany.

Q2VKPT, in turn, builds upon Q2PRO, which is a modernized version of the Quake II engine. Consequently, many of the settings and console variables that work for Q2PRO also work for Quake 2 RTX. The client and server manuals are particularly useful.

Quake 2 RTX introduces the following features:

• Caustics approximation
• Cylindrical projection mode
• Dynamic lighting for items such as blinking lights, signs, switches, elevators and moving objects
• Dynamic real-time "time of day" lighting
• Flare gun and other high-detail weapons
• High-quality screenshot mode
• Improved denoising technology
• Multi-GPU (SLI) support
• Multiplayer modes (deathmatch and cooperative)
• Optional two-bounce indirect illumination
• Particles, laser beams, and new explosion sprites
• Physically based materials, including roughness, metallic, emissive, and normal maps
• Player avatar (casting shadows, visible in reflections)
• Reflections and refractions on water and glass, reflective chrome and screen surfaces
• Procedural environments (sky, mountains, clouds that react to lighting; also space)
• Sunlight with direct and indirect illumination
• Volumetric lighting (god-rays)

The source code is available here.