According to Gizmodo, AMD is launching its new FSR 4 upscaling suite, codenamed “Redstone,” as a direct competitor to Nvidia’s DLSS. The update is locked to the company’s latest RDNA 4-based GPUs, specifically the Radeon RX 9000 series like the RX 9070 and RX 9070 XT. Key features include a new machine learning-powered frame generation for boosting frame rates and “Radiance Caching” to enhance ray tracing performance. These Redstone-specific features are available natively in just over 200 PC games, such as Warhammer 40K: Darktide and Call of Duty: Black Ops 7. AMD demonstrated the tech boosting Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 from 23 fps to 109 fps using performance upscaling and frame gen. The company has promised Redstone will be inside more games coming in 2026.
The Fake Frame Arms Race
Here’s the thing: the core battleground now is “fake frames.” AMD’s new frame generation is basically its answer to Nvidia’s multi-frame gen in DLSS 4 and Intel’s upcoming version in XeSS 2. It’s all about using AI to insert frames between rendered ones to artificially pump up that fps counter. And look, gamers have been skeptical of this tech since Nvidia introduced it—it can introduce artifacts and feels a bit like cheating the benchmark. But AMD is promising better visuals and lower latency with Redstone, showing a demo where flickering shadows in F1 24 were smoothed out. The catch? They recommend you already have a solid 60 fps base before you even turn it on. So it’s not a magic fix for a struggling game; it’s a turbo button for an already smooth experience.
Beyond Just Pixels
But Redstone isn’t just about upscaling and frame gen. AMD is pushing deeper into the rendering pipeline with features like Radiance Caching and Ray Regeneration. These are machine learning tricks aimed at making ray tracing—the super-intensive lighting tech—run better and look cleaner. It’s a smart move. Nvidia has owned the ray tracing conversation for years. If AMD can make credible visual enhancements here, especially on its own hardware, it starts to chip away at that “premium” feel Nvidia cultivates. The downside? You have to enable this stuff per-game in the AMD software, and for now, only a couple of titles support the most advanced ray tracing features. It’s a promising foundation, but the house isn’t built yet.
The Bigger Picture & Console Futures
Now, why should console gamers care? Because this software war is defining the next generation of hardware. Gizmodo points out that AMD worked with PlayStation on FSR 4, and leaks suggest the PS5 Pro’s PSSR upscaler is getting an update. But the real milestone could be the PlayStation 6. Redstone and RDNA 4 architecture are built for efficiency. Upscaling tech benefits lower-powered systems—like future handhelds or budget consoles—way more than it does a monster desktop PC. Your next gaming system, whether it’s a handheld PC or a living room box, might rely more on clever software like this than on a giant leap in raw silicon power. That’s a fundamental shift.
Can AMD Really Compete?
So, can “Redstone” actually knock Nvidia off its throne? In raw numbers, having 200+ supported games at launch is a strong start, basically matching DLSS 4’s roster. The tech sounds impressive on paper. But the ecosystem is everything. Nvidia’s DLSS is often baked into big games day one, and it’s a key selling point for their GPUs. AMD’s challenge isn’t just building good tech—it’s convincing every major publisher to include it, a hurdle Gizmodo’s report explicitly mentions. And by locking the best features to brand-new GPUs, they’re not helping their existing user base. It’s a bold play to drive RDNA 4 sales, but it risks fragmenting their own audience. The trajectory is clear: gaming is becoming as much about the AI software suite as the hardware it runs on. AMD is finally bringing a full arsenal to that fight.
