AMD is tuning its graphics cards for esports games like Overwatch and PUBG

AMD wants to tempt gamers who play popular esports titles to buy one of its graphics cards, rather than an Nvidia model, by focusing on eking out faster frame rates for games like Overwatch, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) and Dota 2.

AMD’s newest release of the Radeon Software Adrenalin Edition (version 18.3.1) benefits from tweaks which have been cooked up by Project ReSX (Radeon eSports Experience).

In other words, this is work from an internal group at AMD to hone the drivers to better run these eSports titles, and it also involves working directly with the developers of these popular games.

As Engadget spotted, this has resulted in an impressive 11% improvement in the frame rate of PUBG when running at 1080p, which hits almost 70 frames per second (fps) as benchmarked on a PC with an Intel Core i7 7700K CPU and an AMD Radeon RX 580 graphics card with 8GB of video memory.

That frame rate boost is compared to the Radeon Software Adrenalin Edition version 17.12.1, by the way.

The fresh drivers also resulted in 6% better frame rates in Dota 2 which hit almost 96 fps in 4K resolution, and a 3% improvement in Overwatch which nearly touched 118 fps in 1440p resolution. All of those benchmarks were performed at ‘ultra’ graphics details.

Smoothly does it

Improvements were also realized for the ‘99th percentile frame time’ – which essentially refers to the most difficult frames to render, which represent the biggest dips in performance – to the tune of 9% with PUBG, 7% with Dota 2 and 2% with Overwatch. And this means that these games will run more fluidly on an overall level, with less effect felt from those big jitters.

Clearly, it’s good to see AMD making a push on this front for those who might be dreaming of one day becoming a pro gamer, and they will doubtless appreciate these boosted frame rates and smoother overall gameplay.

Meantime, the new Radeon drivers also introduced support for Final Fantasy XV and Warhammer: Vermintide II, a pair of games which are just about to be launched (indeed, the former is released later on today).

• We’ve picked out the best graphics cards of 2018