Nvidia's DLSS 5 has officially launched, with NBA 2K27 becoming the first game to support it. According to Tom's Hardware, Nvidia worked closely with developer Visual Concepts to use DLSS 5 as an enhancement layer rather than a foundation: the game still relies on scanned 3D player models for base geometry, while DLSS 5 combines training data and engine data to infer lighting and shadows, aiming for a more photorealistic look. This engine-level approach lets developers fine-tune results rather than applying a blanket AI filter.

The feature comes at a steep performance cost. Tom's Hardware reports Nvidia's own marketing shows 370 FPS at 4K on an RTX 5090 with DLSS 5 versus 240 FPS with it off — but that 370 FPS figure relies on 6x Multi-Frame Generation, meaning five interpolated frames for every real one. The actual base framerate is closer to 61 FPS, upscaled from 1080p, representing roughly a four-times performance hit compared to native rendering.

DLSS 5 was initially limited to RTX 50-series GPUs, but Nvidia has since confirmed plans to bring it to RTX 40-series hardware once 50-series performance is further optimized, according to comments from Nvidia's Ben Berraondo cited by Tom's Hardware. That reversal came after modders had already gotten DLSS 5 running unofficially on RTX 40-series, 30-series, and even 20-series GPUs, per Tom's Hardware and Wccftech.

The modding didn't stop with older Nvidia cards. TechPowerUp and Wccftech both report that modder danielblnc released a tool called DLSS-NR that ports DLSS 5 neural rendering to AMD's RDNA 4 GPUs, tested on the Radeon RX 9070 XT in Cyberpunk 2077 and GTA V: Enhanced. The method works because RDNA 4, like Nvidia's RTX 40- and 50-series chips, has native FP8 support, which DLSS 5 relies on. Performance remains rough — Cyberpunk 2077 dropped from over 80 FPS to about 11-12 FPS at 1080p in early builds, though an Alpha v0.2.7 update clawed back roughly 12%, reaching about 30 FPS. Anti-cheat systems block the required DLL file, restricting use to single-player games for now.

Separately, Tom's Hardware reports that modders have also restored unofficial DLSS Multi-Frame Generation support on RTX 40-series cards after Nvidia pushed an app update seemingly aimed at blocking such workarounds — support returned within hours via ReShade plugins and game-specific mods. Nvidia had said Blackwell's hardware was required for proper multi-frame generation, but modders say their techniques back-port the necessary frame-timing behavior to Ada Lovelace GPUs. Meanwhile, PCWorld notes broader unease about DLSS 5's impact on games' visual identity, pointing to backlash over an earlier demo showing a character altered by the tech, and raising the question of whether games need a "developer intended" mode as AI upscaling becomes increasingly central to how games look and run.