Feature Request – Expanding Intel Graphics Software for Competitive and Casual Gaming

[bmzin1]

Hello Intel team,

First of all, I want to make it clear that this is both a request and a recognition of Intel's potential.

I have always had great admiration, respect and affection for Intel products. Intel has been my favorite brand for a very long time, and I continue to believe strongly in the company's ability to compete and evolve in the GPU market.

I purchased my Intel Arc GPU because I genuinely believe in Intel's vision and in the potential of Arc Graphics. I did not invest a significant amount of money in this GPU simply to have another graphics card. I invested because I believe Intel can build something truly competitive for both casual and competitive gamers.

However, I believe the Intel Graphics Software could evolve considerably further, especially for users who care about competitive gaming, latency, image quality and per-game optimization.

I would like to respectfully request consideration for the following features:

1. Driver-level Image Sharpening / Enhanced Sharpness

A properly implemented driver-level sharpening option would be extremely useful for competitive games, particularly older titles or games where the native image is soft.

I understand that Image Sharpening previously existed in Intel Graphics Software but was later removed. I would strongly encourage Intel to reconsider bringing it back, with a modern implementation and proper per-game testing.

2. Driver-level Anti-Aliasing Options

It would be extremely valuable to have additional driver-level anti-aliasing options that could be applied on a per-game basis, particularly for games that do not provide good native anti-aliasing solutions.

For example:

FXAA
SMAA
MLAA
Driver-level MSAA controls where technically possible
Other Intel-developed anti-aliasing solutions

I am not suggesting that Intel simply force these technologies into every game. Rather, I would like to see Intel investigate what can realistically be implemented safely through the driver, with compatibility testing on a game-by-game basis.

Intel itself notes that MSAA can have a considerably higher performance cost than techniques such as FXAA, SMAA and MLAA, which makes having appropriate per-game options particularly interesting for users who want to balance image quality and performance.

3. Advanced Per-Game 3D Profiles

This is perhaps one of my biggest requests.

I would love to see Intel Graphics Software provide a much more comprehensive per-application graphics profile system, where each game could have its own driver-level configuration.

For example:

Low Latency Mode
Frame Synchronization
Image Sharpening
Anti-Aliasing
Texture Filtering
V-Sync behavior
VRR behavior
Scaling options
Other available driver-level optimizations

Intel already provides application profiles, so I believe this could be expanded into a much more powerful competitive-gaming tool.

4. Per-Game GPU Power Management

I would also strongly appreciate an advanced power-management section for individual games.

Something similar to:

GPU Power Management

Minimum Performance
Balanced / Normal
Prefer Maximum Performance

And, ideally, the ability to save this configuration per game.

For example, a competitive FPS could automatically use a performance-oriented profile, while a less demanding application could use a balanced profile.

This would give Arc users much greater control over performance behavior, clock behavior and frame pacing without requiring third-party tools or global settings.

5. Integrated Game Overlay and Clip Recording

Another feature I would really like to see is a modern Intel gaming overlay with:

FPS
GPU utilization
GPU clock
GPU temperature
VRAM usage
CPU information
Frame-time information
Performance metrics
Instant replay
Game clips
Screenshot capture
Configurable hotkeys

I know Intel has already been working on performance-overlay functionality, and I appreciate that this area is evolving. The current Intel Graphics Software now has Performance Overlay functionality, while Intel PresentMon also provides advanced performance telemetry and overlay capabilities.

However, I would love to see these capabilities become a fully integrated gaming experience inside Intel Graphics Software, including recording and instant replay.

Most importantly: please don't interpret this as dissatisfaction with Intel.

Quite the opposite.

I am making these requests because I believe Intel is capable of doing this.

Arc Graphics has already evolved tremendously, and I have seen Intel continuously improve drivers, compatibility, performance and software. That is exactly why I believe it is reasonable for users to ask for more.

I want Intel Graphics Software to become something that competitive gamers can genuinely depend on — not just for driver updates, but as a complete platform for performance tuning, latency optimization, image quality and game-specific configuration.

I understand that every one of these features needs to be carefully implemented, individually.

[Mirac0909]

I agree about the sharpness issue. I think they left this up to Xess, but game developers need to include a sharpness setting in the menu I recall that BF6 was the only one that did this.

Leaving these issues up to the developers really complicates things even in Arc Raiders There's no FG key for Xess 3, which is why the menus freeze

Preset power consumption options are a great idea

They said they removed it because they thought the Windows Game Bar was advanced enough for game recording and I actually agree with that.

A custom resolution option would be great, too

[bmzin1]

I completely agree with you.

I especially agree about the sharpening option and the predefined power-management profiles. These would be very useful for users who want more control over how their GPU behaves in each individual game.

I also think Intel could take this opportunity to develop these features specifically for the modern Arc ecosystem rather than simply bringing back old options exactly as they were. For example, a properly optimized sharpening filter, per-game performance profiles, and a more advanced overlay/recording system could be extremely valuable.

I understand that developers should ideally provide these options themselves, but having additional driver-level control is still very useful, especially for older games and competitive titles where the in-game options are often very limited.

And I agree with you about custom resolutions as well. That would be especially interesting for competitive players who use non-native resolutions.

I have high expectations for Intel because I genuinely believe Arc has a lot of potential. I didn't buy an Intel GPU simply because I needed a graphics card — I chose Intel because I believe the company can become a serious competitor in the gaming GPU market.

Hopefully Intel continues listening to this kind of feedback and gradually expands Intel Graphics Software with more powerful per-game controls.

Thanks for sharing your perspective — I think we're asking for many of the same things.

[Ramgound_Intel]

Hey! Just to clarify a few things around the features you mentioned:

For Image Sharpening, Adaptive Tessellation, and Anisotropic Filtering, these features were removed from Intel Graphics Software starting with IGS version 25.22.1502.2, which was included with driver 32.0.101.6913. From this version onward, these options are no longer available in IGS. You can check out the details here: Intel® Graphics Software (IGS) Image Sharpener, Adaptive Tesselation,...

For Anti-Aliasing, Intel Arc Graphics supports Multisample Anti-Aliasing (MSAA) and Conservative Morphological Anti-Aliasing (CMAA). These are enabled on a per-app basis, so the game developer needs to implement and expose the Anti-Aliasing options through the game's graphics settings. More details are available here: How Do I Downsample/Downscale with Intel® Arc Graphics?

For the Advanced Per-Game 3D Profiles point, just to clarify, not every game that supports Super Sampling can use Intel XeSS. The game developer needs to specifically implement and confirm support for XeSS 1 or XeSS 2 in the game. So, XeSS support can vary from game to game depending on what the developer has implemented.

For the per-game GPU Power Management idea, we’ll take that as feedback and pass it along to the relevant team for consideration.

The other suggestions around more advanced per-game profiles, overlays, recording, and similar features are also good ideas for the team to consider as Intel Graphics Software continues to evolve.