no HDR enabled

bloom effect only enabled

full HDR enabled

While the HDR effects in the game are subtle, we should mention that after a bit of play testing, we found that our eyes tended to adapt to the auto-exposure and bloom effects and everything seemed to blend together in a way which added a lot to the gameplay. In fact, when playing the game with the HDR settings turned off, the game looks surprisingly flat by comparison. We are impressed at how Valve was able to enhance the source engine in such a major way, while keeping everything subtle enough to sometimes forget that it's there. Much like the Matrix, it's hard to understand until you experience it for yourself.

If you played much Day of Defeat before the upgrade, the source version will no doubt make you very happy, just as Counterstrike: Source did when it first came out. However, by now, the Halflife 2 engine isn't quite as new and exciting as it was when CS Source came out, and in spite of the new HDR effects, the "wow" factor isn't quite as pronounced. Still, there is no denying that the new lighting effects add a kind of sparkle to the HL2 graphics, which, while still excellent, had seemed to have lost a bit of luster with time. These graphical enhancements are certainly a step forward, and it will be very interesting to see how these new effects will be used in games of the near future.