Nvidia's "Game Ready" Driver Updates to Be Locked Behind Its Software

Nvidia will soon require you to use its GeForce Experience software in order to download Game Ready driver updates, though it'll continue to offer standard drivers through its website.

This is according to PC World, which reports the switch will happen in mid-December and will require you to have registered an email address with Nvidia.

That this is true only of Game Ready drivers is significant--these are the smaller, far more frequent updates that tend to coincide with the release of a new game and help to ensure they run well. You'll still be able to download larger driver updates on a quarterly basis without using GeForce Experience.

"We kind of have two camps in terms of gamers," Nvidia producer manager Sean Pelletier said during a recent conference call attended by PC World. "On one hand you have the gamer that's just casually playing things here and there, using their system for daily use and gaming on the side. They don't want to be inundated with these [Game Ready] drivers."

"On the other side of the equation you have enthusiast gamers, who get excited about preloading a game, who want to play a game the day it comes out with all the bells and whistles," Pelletier added. "That's obviously the demographic we're looking at for Game Ready drivers. We're targeting GFE as a single-source destination for those gamers."

While it's true that these two demographics exist, and that only the latter might be inclined to use GeForce Experience, it doesn't explain why it's necessary to lock Game Ready drivers behind this barrier.

It might simply be that Nvidia wants to encourage GeForce card owners to download the software. It's traditionally been used as an easy way to keep GPU drivers updated and optimize in-game graphics settings based on your hardware. More recently, however, Nvidia has announced plans for more extensive features, including a PS4-style feature that allows for games to be shared over the Internet.