AMD today once again took the pole position in the DirectX 12 era with an impressive roster of state-of-the-art DirectX 12 games and engines, each with extensive tuning for the Graphics Core Next (GCN) architecture at the heart of modern Radeon GPUs.

"DirectX 12 is poised to transform the world of PC gaming, and Radeon GPUs are central to the experience of developing and enjoying great content," said Roy Taylor, corporate vice president, Content and Alliances, AMD. "With a definitive range of industry partnerships for exhilarating content, plus an indisputable record of winning framerates, Radeon GPUs are an end-to-end solution for consumers who deserve the latest and greatest in DirectX 12 gaming."

AMD today announced it is collaborating with Tencent Games to bring new features, performance and functionality to Monster Hunter Online (MHO) in January, a leading massive multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) for the China market.

Beyond the features, performance and functionality improvements, AMD and Tencent also announced a marketing collaboration around MHO in China, including the first cross media "pan-entertainment" contest co-sponsored by Tencent, AMD and Sapphire, including promotions with i-Cafés and university campuses around the country. AMD will also offer customized PCs and AMD Radeon graphics cards for MHO throughout Mainland China.

AMD is planning a major driver update for its Radeon GPUs this November, under its Catalyst Omega moniker. These WHQL-signed drivers, which made their debut in 2014, are expected to come with massive performance optimizations across the board, and in a large selection of new and existing games. It will also present AMD with the opportunity to introduce new software features to their drivers, bringing about value-addition to existing machines running Radeon GPUs.

The 2014 release of Catalyst Omega, besides offering significant performance updates, also introduced major new features such as 4K Virtual Super Resolution (VSR), TressFX 3.0, 5K display support, and various image quality improvements. The new drivers are expected to have an equally exhaustive list of new features, performance- and stability updates, that level the features and performance playing field between AMD Radeon and NVIDIA GeForce GPUs. Below is the feature-set of the 2014 release.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided is poised to be among the first AAA game releases to take advantage of DirectX 12 out of the box, according to AMD. The game will get a few AMD-exclusive features, including TressFX 3.0 Hair (realistic hair and foliage rendering). The game will include a benchmark tool, letting enthusiasts and hardware reviewers integrate it into their benches. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided will be one of the big AAA game releases in 2016.

Today at the 40th SIGGRAPH 2013 International Conference and Exhibition, AMD (NYSE: AMD) powered visual computing experiences for content creation with outstanding industry leaders Adobe, Autodesk, Christie, Dell, and Optis. AMD FirePro professional graphics demonstrations featured unique animation, display, simulation and other creative hardware and software collaborations for attendees from around the world. With strong adoption of OpenCL, AMD FirePro graphics have gained positive momentum in the months leading up to SIGGRAPH 2013. Recent highlights and wins for AMD FirePro graphics include:

• Acknowledgement as the dual graphics solution for the forthcoming Apple Mac Pro;
• Optimization and certification of Maxon Cinema 4D application;
• Certification for The Foundry's MARI application;
• Optimization of Adobe Premiere Pro CC, backed by OpenCL standards.

Late last week, NVIDIA rolled out GeForce 314.21 Beta software suite with the single intention of improving performance and stability (eliminating artefacts) on Tomb Raider (2013). When it was released, enthusiasts observed a performance gap between comparable NVIDIA and AMD GPUs on running the game, particularly with features such as TressFX enabled. The new driver works to close the gap. In addition, NVIDIA added some new SLI and 3D Vision profiles.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 314.21 Beta

AMD posted a performance-enhancing beta version of its Catalyst driver suite, version 13.3 Beta 2. The driver provides across the board performance improvements of up to 5 percent in Far Cry 3, up to 16 percent in Sim City 5, reduces frame-time latencies noted in Tomb Raider (2013), and Hitman Absolution; and corrects a slight display corruption issue noted with TressFX enabled in Tomb Raider (2013), on both CrossFire and single-GPU setups.

DOWNLOAD: AMD Catalyst 13.3 Beta 2

AMD today announced a collaboration with Crystal Dynamics following the launch of "Tomb Raider," one of the most highly anticipated PC games of 2013, and part of the AMD Gaming Evolved program. AMD and Crystal Dynamics worked together extensively on the development of "Tomb Raider," most notably with TressFX Hair, the world's first in-game implementation of a real-time, per-strand hair physics system. This leading-edge technology imparts one of the most iconic video game characters, Lara Croft, with an astonishingly lifelike appearance. With AMD Radeon graphics, gamers can unleash the full potential of this next-generation technology.

"With the launch of 'Tomb Raider' and TressFX Hair, AMD and Crystal Dynamics have radically pushed the boundaries of realism in the PC gaming experience," said Matt Skynner, corporate vice president and general manager, AMD Graphics. "Over the past several months, AMD has proven that the Gaming Evolved program is set to full throttle, and today's launch is a testament to AMD's ingenuity and innovation. Our team is working with the finest game developers in the world to ensure AMD Radeon HD 7000 Series graphics deliver the ultimate PC gaming experience."

AMD unveiled the new TressFX technology it teased us with, earlier this week. The technology, as predicted, works to create realistic hair rendering and physics; but we imagine it could be applied to foliage and hopefully, furry donuts as well. It will be first implemented in the 2013 reboot title of the Tomb Raider franchise, in which Lara Croft finally parted with her braid. TressFX helps accurately render Croft's hair, drawing finer locks of hair than pre-rendered hair textures plastered on bigger hair polygons that look unnatural. The free and fluid nature of these locks can then be used to accurately draw the effects of wind and water onto the hair. Below are a few before-after instances of TressFX.

Technically, TressFX is a toolset co-developed by AMD and Crystal Dynamics, which taps into DirectCompute to unlock the number-crunching prowess of the GPU (specifically Graphics CoreNext ones), to render individual strands of hair. It is built on the foundation laid by AMD's work on Order Independent Transparency (OIT), and uses Per-Pixel Linked-List (PPLL) data structures to manage rendering complexity and memory usage. DirectCompute is additionally used to process the physics of these strands of hair, which are affected by the character's motion, and elements such as wind and water/rain. TressFX will be implemented at least on the PC version of the upcoming Tomb Raider.