Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 devs had to rework almost the entire game for this one feature. The engine wasn’t made for HDR

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I was so excited to see the 1.4 update drop for Kingdom Come: Deliverance! One of the coolest things they added was HDR support, and now Filip Storch, one of the developers, is giving us a peek behind the curtain on X. Apparently, getting HDR working wasn’t easy – they had to really overhaul the CryEngine to make it happen! It’s amazing how much work went into this feature.

As Storch writes:

Many game engines, including CryEngine, weren’t initially built to support High Dynamic Range (HDR) graphics. As a result, certain effects like LUT color grading and sunshafts function best with Standard Dynamic Range (SDR).

Some games can output in 10-bit SDR, but this doesn’t unlock the full benefits of HDR. Our developers worked to find the necessary calculations within the game itself to improve accuracy and get closer to true HDR visuals.

We had to adjust many visual effects, including things like global lighting and weather. Before, colors were restricted by standard display settings. Switching to HDR allowed for a much more vibrant and noticeable change in how the world appears.

The developers worked hard to keep the game’s original look and feel, balancing their artistic goals with the need to match the existing, pre-rendered visuals. Storch points out that while they did their best, the HDR update might not be for everyone. However, he believes the game still looks fantastic, and he’s shared a screenshot below to demonstrate.

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2025-09-16 13:33