Nvidia releases a 'Game Ready' GPU driver optimized for Control

Control comes out today, and right on cue, Nvidia is pushing out a new "Game Ready" GPU driver (version 436.15) intended to yield the best performance from its GeForce graphics cards.

"Game Ready Drivers provide the best possible gaming experience for all major new releases, including Virtual Reality games. Prior to a new title launching, our driver team is working up until the last minute to ensure every performance tweak and bug fix is included for the best gameplay on day-1," Nvidia explains.

These release are fairly routine for Nvidia. In this case, however, it's a bit more noteworthy because Control represents the best use of ray tracing in a shipping game that we have seen to date.

Even without RTX turned on, Control is a demanding game. For an in-depth evaluation, check out Jarred's comprehensive performance analysis. Note that Nvidia doesn't actually mention any specific performance improvements, but he'll check out Control performance with the new driver to see if anything has changed.

Beyond being optimized for Control, the 436.15 driver release delivers a couple of bug fixes. They include:

[Forza Motorsport 7]: There is corruption on the tracks in the game.
System crash occurs while installing the drivers on a system with GPUs from mixed architectures; for example, Fermi and Pascal.

There are still a few open issues in Windows 10. They include the following:

[Tom Clancy's The Division II]: The game may crash when played in DirectX 12 mode.
[Overwatch]: The games crashes with "Your rendering device has been lost" error.
[Firefox][G-Sync]: When G-Sync is enabled, flickering occurs with YouTube fullscreen video playback on FireFox when hovering over the timeline.

As it applies to Firefox and G-Sync, Nvidia says you can get around the issue by setting the refresh rate to 60Hz or 120Hz (or any refresh rate divisible by 60). Or if you want to play fullscreen videos with Firefox on a G-Sync monitor, Nvidia recommends creating a profile and setting it to V-Sync-On.

You can install the latest driver through GeForce Experience, or follow this link to grab and install it manually. Also be sure to check out our guide on how to update drivers for tips on best practices.

As for Control, it will be available to order today on Steam and is already available on the Epic Games Store. It's also being bundled (in redemption code form) with eligible GeForce RTX cards, alongside Wolfenstein: Youngblood.

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Paul has been playing PC games and raking his knuckles on computer hardware since the Commodore 64. He does not have any tattoos, but thinks it would be cool to get one that reads LOAD"*",8,1. In his off time, he rides motorcycles and wrestles alligators (only one of those is true).