All Half-Life 2 owners are getting a free RTX mod demo very soon, and it looks glorious

Half-Life 2 is an excellent game, even by today’s standards. Sure, the graphics may not still have the same impact as they had back in 2004, but they still look great and hold up 21 years later. Well, if you’ve been hankering for an excuse to replay this golden oldie, you’re getting a free demo for the RTX revamp mod for Half-Life 2, and it’s coming very soon.

Half-Life 2’s unofficial RTX mod will get a demo on March 18th

Nvidia announced the demo on its X account, showing off some of the visual goodness that await you in the demo. Everything looks amazing, especially the headcrabs that now look like some sort of fleshy plague-ridden monster.

Sure enough, there’s now a Steam entry for the Half-Life 2 RTX mod. Interestingly, it appears the mod is not the product of Valve or Nvidia but a company called “Orbifold Studios.” This was the same team that gave us Half-Life 2 VR (no, not Alyx, a VR mod for Half-Life 2).

The only requirement for this mod is that you own a copy of Half-Life 2. If you do, you can give it a try on March 18th for free. If you don’t own Half-Life 2, well, congratulations on being the first PC gamer I’ve ever heard of that doesn’t own it. It’s actually more of a rarity to be a gamer who hasn’t played the game once in their life. If you want to fix that, Half-Life 2 is on an 80% discount right now for the Spring sale, so I implore you to grab it, even if you don’t touch it until the RTX mod releases in full. Then, check out our list of classic games you haven’t played (but should) for further reading.

Half-Life 2