This week's launch of NVIDIA DLSS 4.5, following the company's traditional CES keynote, has been yet another monumental step for the technology.
Now available via a new driver and NVIDIA App update, every game that supports previous versions of the technology can take advantage of the 2nd-generation Transformer model to enjoy superior image quality, which often matches or even surpasses that delivered by native resolutions in both older games like Red Dead Redemption 2 and in newer titles like Sandfall Interactive's celebrated role-playing game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which has earned the developer France's highest cultural honor and is spearheading its publisher respectful pricing strategy.
A new comparison video shared by Bang4BuckPC Gamer on YouTube puts the Game of the Year 2025 running at native 4K resolution and with NVIDIA DLSS 4.5 in Performance Mode on an AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU and RTX 5090 GPU, highlighting the image quality delivered by the new version of the upscaler in Performance Mode, which upscales the image from a base resolution of 1080p.
Foliage, hair and fine detail in general appear sharper and ultimately better than at native 4K resolution. While reflections look noisy, primarily due to the low base resolution, it's difficult not to remain impressed by what the 2nd-generation Transformer model can achieve in its very first public iteration, upscaling from lower base resolution. With such results, and with a performance hit that may not be as bad as expected on older RTX series GPUs, NVIDIA DLSS 4.5 can be a viable option even for users rocking RTX 20 and 30 series GPUs in some games.
"Native is definitely not worth the hit. This really puts a nail in [AMD FSR] Redstone's coffin," said user FrameRateX, echoing a widespread PC community sentiment. AMD definitely has a lot of catching up to do with its upscaler to hit a similar quality threshold.
The impressive 2nd-generation Transformer model is only one of the enhancements NVIDIA DLSS 4.5 brings. Later this Spring, NVIDIA will launch 6x MFG (Multi-Frame Generation), which will generate five frames for every rendered frame, further boosting FPS and delivering enhanced smoothness in supported games.
Dynamic Multi-Frame Generation will also launch this Spring to provide another option for users to hit their monitors' refresh rates. Unlike the 2nd generation Transformer model, which is also available for the RTX 40, 30, and 20 series (although with a performance hit on the latter two due to the lack of FP8 available in Blackwell and Ada GPUs), 6x Multi-Frame Generation and Dynamic Multi-Frame Generation will only launch for the RTX 50 series.
About the author: Francesco De Meo has been covering video games and technology since 2012, starting his career at small outlets like Gamersyndrome and GeekSnack. After joining Wccftech gaming section in 2015, he quickly expanded his video gaming coverage with in-depth reporting, interviews with iconic industry figures such as Grasshopper Manufacture founder and No More Heroes creator Goichi "Suda51" Suda, Resident Evil series creator Shinji Mikami, Team NINJA's president and Nioh series director Fumihiko Yasuda, and Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama, reviews and on-the-ground coverage of major industry events such as Gamescom and E3. When he's not reporting or reviewing, Francesco can be found playing the genres he loves most, spending time with his six cats, reading, writing music, playing guitar and drumming for his progressive rock band.
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