Intel Arc driver makes Palworld, Starfield run faster, and there's a 70% FPS boost elsewhere

Intel has a new Arc graphics driver out and it provides some worthwhile improvements for frame rates, as well as support for new games.

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Palword is a little bit nippier thanks to this new Arc driver (Image Credit: Pocketpair / Valve)

Team Blue's new driver version 31.0.101.5194/31.0.101.5252 also does some good work with ironing out a few glitches to boot.

Let's start with the support for new games, with the Arc driver now catering for Helldivers 2, Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden, and Skull & Bones.

One of the frame rate boosts is for one of those games, as Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden gets a 4% average FPS uplift (at 1080p, Very High graphics settings).

Also, the popular Palworld is provided with a 5% average FPS uplift (at 1080p, Epic settings), but the big frame rate jump is Snowrunner, with a 71% average FPS boost (at 1080p, Ultra). So, the latter game is not far off twice as fast now.

Another important tweak here is that Starfield is going to run better on Arc graphics cards, as Intel has fixed an issue whereby the game experienced lower than expected performance levels. The same is true of Ghostrunner 2, which should also now run without performance dips due to bugs in the driver.

Some bugs remain, however, with Arc desktop graphics cards and various games. They are as follows:

• Starfield (DX12) may experience an intermittent application crash while launching the game
• Helldivers 2 (DX12) may experience application instability using certain display panels when opening the game options
• Palworld (DX11) may experience an intermittent crash during extended gameplay sessions
• Dead by Daylight (DX11) may experience an application crash during gameplay

The Helldivers 2 problem could be a nasty one, then, for those who are using affected monitors, as crashing when trying to adjust the options is going to get old quite fast.